Featured Image

If I am going to follow my heart, first I have to learn how to listen to it.

In the past I have asked, “How do I know if it’s my heart speaking, or my head?” I didn’t quite get which was which and I was giving myself a lot of anxiety trying to figure out the difference.

This past weekend, I had this incredible opportunity to work with Kyle Cease (comedian/motivational speaker.)  It was an intimate setting called a flow group where Kyle worked with us one on one to help us have breakdowns, so we could have breakthroughs.

Fortunately, one of the major breakthroughs I had this weekend was learning just that.  I was able to grasp for the first time how to communicate from my heart and not from my thoughts.  It was just the simple ability to feel my body. When I was answering a question or talking about a decision I was making, Kyle would ask me where I was feeling it. To feel if the answer to my questions was coming from my heart or my head.

I didn’t quite understand what he meant until I took away the “thinking” and just went with the feeling.  I allowed my body to feel.  It is amazing to me now how much feeling I was actually cutting off from myself.  I was cutting off my ability to feel myself, to feel my heart. Not only the pain in my life, but the love and joy.

No wonder I didn’t know who was speaking! I was to busy trying to “figure” it out, instead of feeling it out!

I also began to understand that since I was not feeling my heart, I was often not communicating from my heart. In the past I had made decisions based on what I thought other people would want me to do, not on what I wanted to do. I was using my brain to make decisions, not my heart.  That just resulted in me “acting” to please the people around me, and not aligning myself with my best interest.

The consequence of that was, people were not truly loving me for who I am.  They were loving me for the “actress” I was being, without even knowing it. I am learning now that if I just start speaking from my heart, I will always be in alignment with my greatest good.  Which in turn, helps put other people in alignment with themselves.

If we could all get in the habit of always speaking from the heart, and doing the things that make us feel good, we would allow other people to start speaking from their hearts. There would be much less resentments and much more forgiveness.

We should all be free to do and say what we truly mean without worrying about what other people are going say about it.  On the flip side, we should always allow others to do the same, without judging them in return.

Speaking from our hearts opens up endless possibilities for compromise and communication. Every time we speak from our heart, we allow the people around us permission to speak from theirs.  We can be vulnerable and open in our conversations knowing that the heart can come up with many ways to find a common ground.

We can also start following our heart, like for real! Every decision we need to make, we can take a small moment to sit and see how our body feels about it.  When our heart speaks, we feel it on our whole body. If immediately we go to our head and start thinking of reasons why not to or how not to, we will know that is just our mind and not our heart.

The mind is constantly spewing endless thoughts, as it always does, trying to figure out some problem.  That’s it’s job. No different then the lung’s job is to bring air into the body and the stomach’s job is to digest food, the brain is for solving problems.

You wouldn’t ask the brain if you should leave your job, ask if that’s the girl to marry or if it’s best to move to that island any more than you would ask your kidney.  Those questions are not problems. You need to ask your “heart,” your soul those questions. Your soul will tell you the answer, with every fiber of your being you will know. You just need to listen with your body, not the space between your ears.

I am so excited to start speaking the truths my heart desires. To have authentic conversations with my boyfriend, friends and family. I believe it can only greatly improve my relationships, and the world around me.  Giving people the opportunity to be heard and excepted for who they are.

No more acting, not even for a minute.  My heart is so wide open for the love and acceptance that I am going to receive! All the decisions I make, from here on out will be consulted with my heart. I’m excited to see what’s next for me.

I know some of you may want a better understanding of what I am speaking about so decided to give you an example.

A husband wakes up early one morning and asks his wife to go to the store with him to pick out paint for their basement.  The wife is tired because she stayed up late working and doesn’t feel like going out.  She is hesitant to tell her husband the truth because she is afraid that she will aggravate him.  After all, it was her idea to repaint the basement, so she reluctantly gets out of bed and goes with him.  The entire time they are together she is wishing she was home in bed.  Cranky and tired, she acts by putting on a fake smile and follows behind him in the store.  The husband, feeling her not being present asks, “What’s wrong.”  Again not wanting to upset him she lies and says she’s fine.

The husband then goes inside his own head making up a story that she is ungrateful for his help and doesn’t appreciate him.  The whole reason he got up early this morning was just to make her happy by getting the paint.  He didn’t even want to go himself, he is just getting it out-of-the-way so he could meet up with the guys later.  They walk side by side picking out paint swatches but are a million miles apart in their minds. They end up picking out a paint that neither of them really like just so they can to get out of the store and away from each other.  On the ride home they get into a fight.  He accuses her of being ungrateful and she accuses him of being miserable.  They end the day by not speaking to each other and going to bed mad.

Same couple speaking from the heart.

Husband wakes up early and asks his wife to go to the store to help him pick out paint for the basement.  Wife rolls over and looks at the clock.  She hesitates for just a moment before she decides to say what she’s feeling. “I’m feeling a little torn because I am really tired and feel like I need the extra sleep today. I know I was the one who asked to have the basement painted but I am just not in the mood to go today.”  Husband releases a sigh of relief and explains, “Okay good, I didn’t really want to go either.  I just thought that’s what you would have wanted to do today.  I’d like to go out with the guys to watch the football game instead, if that’s alright with you?”  Wife also feeling relieved snuggles closer to him where he is sitting on the edge of the bed and replies, “I’m okay with that as long as your home to have dinner with me and the kids tonight. We can figure out another day to get the paint.” He leans over and kisses her goodbye. By the time he is out of the room she falls quickly back to sleep and they both enjoy the rest of their day. That night they enjoyed dinner as a family and went to sleep at peace.

You can see how insane it is to just go against what your heart and body are telling you to do.  Yet, we have scenarios like this in our lives every day! She was going to the paint store in the first story just so she wouldn’t upset him.  The truth was, she wanted to stay home and get sleep.  She was giving up taking care of herself and her needs just to please him.  He was getting paint only to manipulate her so he could go out with the guys later, instead of just telling her that was what he wanted to do that day. He was giving up taking care of himself by doing what he thought she wanted him to do. Both of them “acting” for each other, neglecting themselves.

Let us stop the madness and start communicating from our hearts again, the way we were meant to communicate. Acting never gives us the peace we desire, it’s only by listening to our own hearts.  In the end, by speaking from our hearts we will always be able to get what we need.

Write back soon, love Annie.