Ever felt heart inspired?
Maybe it was when you first fell in love and your heart “sang” with the joy of it.
Or, you may have felt your heart “glow” with appreciation while looking at a beautiful sunrise or a piece of fine art.
You may have noticed how the rhythmic beat of your heart sets in motion the rhythm of life.
Oh yes, the heart is much more than an organ in your chest. It inspires you: body, mind, and spirit.
Heart Inspired Facts
Fact 1 — The heart is a tiny but mighty muscle.
The heart weighs between 7 to 15 ounces, only accounting for about 3 percent of total body weight.
It’s a little larger than the size of your fist and is located between your lungs approximately mid chest. About two thirds of it lies to the left of your breastbone.
Fact 2 — The heart’s contractions push blood throughout your body to nourish and cleanse it.
One beat of your heart pumps blood through your lungs where it absorbs oxygen. Then the blood flows on thorough arteries that grow progressively smaller to tiny vessels called capillaries. The blood nourishes your cells while exchanging oxygen and nutrients for metabolic wastes including carbon dioxide.
From there your blood goes back through vessels called veins to the heart where again it is pumped to the lungs. In the lungs, carbon dioxide exchanges for oxygen and the cycle repeats every heartbeat, every second of your life.
There’s no need for thinking about it or willing it. The heart makes it so.
Fact 3 — The heart has an intelligence of its own.
Most people think that the brain is the center of control in their body. Not so, say scientists at the Institute of HeartMath.
“The heart actually sends more signals to the brain than the brain sends to the heart!”
The heart contains its own built-in nervous system so sophisticated that scientists call it “heart brain.” It contains over 40,000 neurons and it can independently sense, process information, and demonstrate a type of learning, say these scientists.
Fact 4 — The heart secretes hormones and neurotransmitters that profoundly affect brain and body function.
One of these hormones, oxytocin, is known as the “love” or “bonding” hormone.
Fact 5 — The heart center plays a major role in healing through the human energy system.
Techniques like those used by HeartMath can quickly elicit positive emotional states that have positive effects throughout your body and its environment.
Fact 6 — The heart acts as a spiritual center.
Many traditions connect the heart to love and spirit. “Through it flows the energy of connectedness with all of life,” says Barbara Brennan in Hands of Light.
Although science shies away from studying the spiritual realm, it is beginning to understand the effects of the heart’s powerful electromagnetic fields. “There is evidence that the information contained in the heart’s powerful field may play a vital synchronizing role in the human body—and may affect others around us as well,” say HeartMath Scientists.
Nurture yourself by keeping in mind and heart these seven facts. Be heart inspired: body mind and spirit!
