Have you ever felt uncertain, confused or inadequate when faced with a difficult decision or challenge? During times of change, you need to be able to make decisions and receive guidance you can trust.

When you access your heart’s wisdom, you connect in your heart with your soul or Essential Self, and it infuses and informs your body-mind. Your intellect can become very adept at acknowledging and interpreting non-verbal information. The more you fully inhabit your entire body with awareness, the easier this becomes. In our head-oriented culture, even those of us who practice this can still feel as though we are teaching our intellects a new job description, as they often forget and automatically revert to their former roles.

Rather than being the sole decision-maker, your intellect can learn to work in harmony with your heart and soul. The intellect’s true function is to ask really good questions and to pay attention as the answers reveal themselves. This is a more important and engaging function than my intellect first thought. Initially it felt demoted from its position as CEO, of my internal organization, to a lesser position that seemed both unclear and insecure. It was a while before a true cooperative and co-creative relationship began to be established.

Since your choices in the present create your future, it’s necessary to be honest with yourself about what is really motivating you. Your intellect has limited information, which is often based on fear. Your heart can also store past emotional experiences as memories that, when unconscious, can affect your ability to receive clear guidance from your soul. One of the most powerful practices is to Witness whatever thoughts and emotions arise without judging or becoming identified with them. As you do this you will become aware of any past experiences which are being activated by your present circumstances. When you become conscious of them, you are at the point of choice. You can choose to let the past be the past, and allow your heart to create your future in your awakened present.

No matter how compelling a thought and/or emotion may feel, if you allow your breath to carry your thinking mind into your heart, the power inherent in your breath will begin to liberate you from restrictive thoughts and emotions. I’ve often noticed that when my body-mind wishes to clear itself, it makes spontaneous sounds, which can also be relatively quiet sighs or a slightly audible and very focused cleansing breath; it seems to adjust itself to my circumstances. Sometimes my body has begun making sounds before I even realized a fear-based thought or emotion was activated .

Often our bodies will immediately begin to release energy that does not feel harmonious in whatever ways are available to us. We all do this, consciously or unconsciously, through aerobic exercise, crying, sighing, taking long baths or showers.  What works really well for you? Your contributions are encouraged in the comment area below.

Becoming increasingly aware of our internal states and consistently choosing responses which resonate with our hearts is life-changing. We don’t often think of this as “decision-making,” but in fact we are making decisions almost non-stop all day long and even in our dreams at night! What might each of our lives be like, if all our thoughts, words and actions were heart-based?

Nearly forty years ago, when I first began creating a relationship with my heart, I started a “spontaneous writing” journal.   I wrote whenever I woke up earlier than my children or had other quiet times during the day. Writing in this way bypasses your intellect. Parts of you that have never been expressed have the chance to be heard. Some years after I began this practice, I started asking questions and spontaneously writing the answers. This was how I initially began to receive guidance from my own heart and Essential Self. I’ve explored many other mediums, including long-distance running, dancing, and various forms of art. How do you connect with your heart’s wisdom?

In my next post I’ll offer some specific guidelines for connecting with your heart for decision-making and guidance. May you keep deepening your relationship with your own heart in the ways that feel best for you.

Since there are many ways to connect with your heart’s wisdom, these guidelines are offered to expand your own unique practice. Your comments are appreciated!

This represents a piece of what I have been developing over the past 30+ years. If what I offer here is helpful for you, and you would like more information regarding my next experiential event “Create From Your Heart,” you can reach me through my contact page. I will be traveling extensively beginning this May. I will continue to be available for both phone, skype and in-person sessions.

Guidelines For Accessing Your Heart’s Wisdom for Decision-Making and Guidance

• When you first begin this practice, take a break from whatever you’re doing, where you can reduce both internal and external “noise.” Notice if there is any feeling of pressure to get answers in a hurry. If so, allow them to be, as you begin to focus on your breath, allowing your body to relax as your breath begins to deepen. Although you can access information quickly, it’s optimal to practice with stress free conditions inside and out.

Each question requires more or less time and internal quiet. When you create the time to take a break from “trying to figure it out” or from taking actions that may be motivated from worry, fear etc., you consciously connect with your soul. Through your soul, you connect to the One Mind, where infinite possibilities exist. Your soul connects you with those possibilities which resonate with it. Solutions to impossible situations can show up in ways your intellect would never have imagined. Your life could also take an entirely different direction, which allows your true creativity to emerge and flourish. Every challenge is an opportunity to expand from your core, your essence. Interestingly, “cor” the root of the word courage is the Latin word for heart.

• Developing patience and your ability to trust is an important part of this process. Timing is often an issue for our personalities; we are often more focused on results than in creating a deeper relationship with our own souls. In the midst of our busy, and often challenging lives we want answers and solutions, like some CEO’s, “yesterday!” Living with your question for whatever length of time your soul requires is a powerful practice which can transform your life.

• While objectively witnessing your inner state, you can ask your heart/soul about anything that concerns you. Focus on your heart and breathe, allow your mind to rest in your heart so that it can let go of all it thinks you “should” be doing or of any undesirable future outcomes it may imagine! Observe the inner responses you notice as you express or visualize whatever is on your mind. Avoid an automatic verbal answer or judgment before fully inhabiting and listening to your body-mind.

If you are making a decision, you can place each possible choice, one at a time, in the center of your chest. Here are some examples of what you might notice: your body may either feel expanded or contracted, energized, neutral or tired, breathing full or shallow, light or heavy feeling, light or dark or shades of either. Once I felt as though someone had turned off a light switch inside my body. The light came back on as soon as I made the decision to leave the consulting company where I was currently employed! Remember that your body does not speak in words, and as the wonderful Martha Graham said, “Your body doesn’t lie.”

• You will sense your answer before or as your intellect has words for it. You may experience it as a knowing or feeling of what is–not Right or Wrong–but most beneficial for you in your current present. Your answer can also come at another time through a person, a dream or even a song.

If you have a sense of neutral or gray, depending on the situation, it may be that your soul is not resounding with a fully energized “Yes” at this time. You could also be receiving guidance, which is letting you know that a certain situation is not harmful for you, depending upon your question. As your intellect learns to interpret the messages your soul sends through your body-mind, including through physical symptoms, the simpler and more fun it becomes to live in alignment with your soul.

• To insure you receive an accurate message, practice non-attachment to the answer. When you are attached to a particular outcome or to thoughts that you must find an immediate answer or solution, you are motivated by the emotions connected to those thoughts. This usually blocks the answers you most need. A relaxed, released state generates ideas or attracts seemingly unrelated events that can change everything in unexpected and often marvelous ways.

In our current evolutionary process we are each being asked to let go of the personality’s illusion of control. Any attempt at trying to “make” something happen or being in the grip of  thoughts and feelings that a certain thing “must, should or needs” to happen or might happen, will cloud your ability to sense what really ENLIVENS your soul, which is the object of the exercise–to bring your personality into alignment with your soul.

• If you truly feel energized, enlivened and joyful from your core, that’s accurate feedback that the message is from your soul. When you feel uplifted, or the opposite, you won’t need to ask anyone else what they think–needing to ask is often a sign that you know your answer and your intellect thinks it should be different. It’s a relief to be honest about what’s motivating you; “..the truth will set you free.”

Your personality could initially have a less than joyful response, and you would then be aware of feeling both a heart-soul response and a personality response. When that first happened to me, it was very clear that my personality’s unhappiness was fleeting and bearable, while my heart’s unhappiness was the kind of pain I did not choose to experience.

When you have no idea what to do next, you are being asked to deepen your relationship with your Essential Self. Sometimes there’s no desire or energy to Do anything. Your personality may desperately want “to do” and yet your soul is asking you to focus inward rather than outward. Our Western culture, as a whole, has a very little understanding or support for this process. You might feel helpless, insecure, confused and/or frightened when this particular “Soul Invitation” occurs. It’s worth repeating that this process requires trust, patience, and the willingness to let go trying to control from your personality. It is possible to experience intense emotions such as fear, while also feeling excited, expectant, courageous and adventurous. Your soul will create a far more interesting and enlivening future than your personality is capable of conceiving on its own.

• Perhaps the most transformational aspect of this process is that it is necessary to let go of resistance to your current present. If you judge your current situation rather than accepting it, the resistance you feel actually prolongs it. Accept what is, while staying connected with your heart, and remaining open to what it is unfolding in its own time. The birth or creation process is a Mystery that cannot be rushed according to linear time.

I understood this best both experiencing and teaching natural childbirth. If I tensed ,i.e., physically resisted a strong contraction, the oxygen my uterus needed went to the tensed muscles, and actually prolonged the labor and discomfort. When I relaxed, the oxygen went to my uterus and it could then do its job most efficiently. I also noticed that rather than feeling increased pain as the contractions grew stronger and more frequent, I experienced them as intense sensations in my body. All fear dissolved and I was in a heightened state of awareness and peace. The key for me was my breath, focus of attention and surrender to the process. Since that time, I have noticed that my life challenges are like contractions, and the birth of something new always follows.

When you let go of judging yourself and resisting your life, you are in the field of all possibilities. The same field Rumi spoke of when he said, ” Beyond ideas of wrong-doing and right-doing, there’s a field. I’ll meet you there.”

In my last post I said I would share a practical example of how the heart’s wisdom can effectively handle life challenges. This is both very simple and complex at the same time. I’m reminded of learning to tie my shoe as a young child. It was then the most complex task I had attempted. I remember how simple it looked and yet I couldn’t seem to figure it out when I tried to do it. Then suddenly I did it, and could see for myself just how easy it was.

Over the years what has become apparent is that many tasks are made more difficult when my intellect tries “to figure it out.” When my body-mind takes over, the task suddenly becomes so much easier. It’s taken me years of trial and error to learn to drop out of my head and inhabit my entire being, beginning with tying my shoes for the first time.

So what does that mean practically speaking? I’ve chosen the topic of  job loss, and financial stress Read the rest of this entry »

Many of us grew up feeling we needed to have “the answers” influenced by our educational system in particular. I clearly remember ducking my head and hoping I wouldn’t be called on when I hadn’t done my homework! The Wise Ones among us have always known that asking and living with good questions can ignite us to become more of who we truly are.

I was reminded of this on New Year’s Eve, and woke up early on January 1st to see what question would emerge to set the tone for the year ahead. I spontaneously asked myself, “What I would be like; what might I do, if I were even freer from the restrictive patterns of my personality?” I’ve asked myself that before Read the rest of this entry »

2010 draws nearer and the New Year holds so many possibilities—what will we all create? Reflecting on my own dreams and those of my friends and co-creators, I asked myself what was most essential to help our visions manifest? My attention was drawn to my heart and I could feel it was time for a more specific cleaning of memories that can create a “heavy” heart. This is the time to neutralize any disappointments, “failures,” and feelings of defeat or despair that may still be restricting our soul’s dreams and visions.

What is still there in my heart, in your heart, that causes us to recreate stories we no longer chose to live?

This is the time of year for reflection; it is easier now to see what may have been hidden from view. For those of us in the Northern Hemisphere there is less external light. It can be a time when our internal light can burn brighter Read the rest of this entry »