The Heart is the Door to Enlightenment
Ancient Wisdom - 7 min read“Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. … Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside, awakens.”
–Carl G. Jung
Physiologically speaking, the heart is a big deal. It’s important, obviously: its beating is what keeps us alive.
Spiritually speaking, the heart is also a very big deal, because ultimately the physical and the spiritual are one and the same.
Simply put, it is the location of God within the individual. It is our source of life in the body, and our spiritual source, the ultimate Source of all life.
Mike LoPatriello
Writer
Ever since a sudden and brief opening of his third eye, Mike has searched for answers. He wrote his book The Eye Opening to share spiritual wisdom, tools, and his own profound and momentary experience of enlightenment. Read more here.
The opening of my heart has been the initiator of all my spiritual experiences.
Its opening brings a presence of loving intelligence within me. It always feels outstanding. It feels like I am home.
The heart is one of the 9 main themes found in all religions and spiritual belief systems that I explore in my book The Eye Opening.
The Upanishads, ancient Sanskrit texts considered the core of Hinduism, mention the importance of the heart repeatedly. In the Bhagavad-Gita, Krishna says he is in the hearts of all men. Jesus placed the treasure that cannot be destroyed within the heart. The heart’s importance is mentioned again and again in spiritual texts.
“Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
–Jesus, Luke 12:33-34, The Holy Bible King James Version
“I am in everyone’s heart as the Supersoul.”
–Krishna, Bhagavad-Gita, As it is, trans. A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
“Do not search in distant skies for God. In man’s own heart is he found.”
–Shintoism
“If one is to have enlightenment, one must treasure it up from the heart.”
–Chen Weiming, Tai Chi master
“As the innermost Self of all, he dwells within the cavern of the heart. … The Lord of Love is the one Self of all. … Realize the Self hidden in the heart, and cut asunder the knot of ignorance here and now. Bright but hidden, the Self dwells in the heart. … He is the source of love and may be known through love but not through thought. He is the goal of life. Attain this goal!”
–Mundaka Upanishad, The Upanishads, trans. Eknath Easwaran
From The Upanishads, translated by Eknath Easwaran, founder of the Blue Mountain Center of Meditation, copyright 1987, 2007; reprinted by permission of Nilgiri Press, P. O. Box 256, Tomales, Ca 94971, www.bmcm.org.
“Why wilt thou go into jungles? What do you hope to find there? Even as the scent dwells within the flower, so God within thine own heart ever abides. Seek him with earnestness and find Him there.”
–Sikhism
Science today is discovering the high level of intelligence and the powerful electromagnetic field of the heart.
In yoga, it is the fourth chakra and is called anahata.
“The elevation of the human will to aims transcendent of this bestial order of life requires, according to the yogic model, an awakening that will not be of the pelvic region, but of chakra 4, which is of the heart. The name of this transformative center, anahata, has the curious meaning, ‘not hit,’ which is interpreted as signifying ‘the Sound that is not made by any two things striking together.’ For every sound heard by the physical ear is of things rubbing or striking together. That of the voice, for example, is of breath on the vocal chords. The one sound not so made is the great tone, or hum (sabda), of the creative energy (maya, shakti) of which things are the manifestations, or epiphanies. And the intuitive recognition of this creative tone within a phenomenal form is what opens the heart to love. What before had been an ‘it’ becomes then a ‘thou,’ alive with the tone of creation… an awakening (metaphorically) to a New World (the Promised Land) and to Life in the Spirit (the Virgin Birth).”
-Joseph Campbell, The Inner Reaches of Outer Space, p. 36
The energy that awakened in my heart and then moved up to my head is what opened my third eye. The heart’s energy is what did it.
Not me.
The heart’s energy filled me then revealed that its energy is the same energy in everything, that its love-light is the love-light in all things.
I believe you cannot open the third eye, open to higher perception, and reach enlightenment at all, without first opening the heart by humbly surrendering to its energy.
Operate from the Heart
To be spiritual and to become enlightened, one must think, speak, act, and operate from the heart by surrendering to it.
Enlightenment is really about moving into the heart. Then the individual realizes that she or he is already spiritual and so is everything and everyone else.
Moving into the heart doesn’t require new techniques or esoteric jargon or tales of ancient avatars. Breathe deep, go quiet, melt into the heart, allow yourself to receive the love from the universe, and perceive earth like a child again.
Use any method that works best for you: meditating, breathing deeply, taking a walk in nature, praying, doing a head-stand… whatever works, whatever it takes for you to go lovingly from the head to the heart.
Do that which best moves you gently out of the constant commentary, the individualistic, linguistic, egoistic, competitive, survival/fear-based mindset into the heart and into the innocent, quiet now-perception of the love in you and in all things.
Whenever you are in doubt, listen to your heart. This may sound cheesy, but it is advice we hear again and again because it is good advice. It is crucial advice.
Your heart is your inner compass that always points to the truth. Your heart is the physical space where your intimate connection to your True Self is (a.k.a. your connection with God).
Move into the heart and remember what you are. You are loved. You are loved. You are loved.
Our True Self, when allowed to be received and expressed, will enter and unveil paradise on earth. It has always been here. Allow yourself to feel this love from the Spirit in all things. Allow yourself to be taken care of, because you are. Let go of logically needing to know what will happen and how it will happen. It is more of an adventure that way anyway.
Surrender to your heart.
You weren’t designed to take on all the burdens yourself. You have backup from True Self, from your Higher Self, from Spirit, from Creator, from the love-light in all things, whatever you wish to call it. Allow yourself to be aided by it. Allow it to guide you. How? Move into the heart. Be still and listen.
Ultimately, it is all about Love
When you operate from the heart, all of your actions, words, and thoughts are imbued with love. And when you love, you move towards enlightenment.
When you love you become open for business and the energy of the cosmos flows through you and out to express on earth. Earth then supports you and entrusts herself to you because you become the embodiment of her true love. You are humming in tune with the melody of the earth and stars, vibrating at the same pitch of the Creator, being reborn as the child of light you are. You become aligned with the force that creates everything and is everything, and enter a new world that is here and now.
Love is the Creator, love is in all things, love is the energy and power in every atom, love is the answer, love is the Source, love is the foundational vibration, love is our true identity, love is our True Self. Align with it, allow it to be expressed and received and flowed through the body, and the miraculous transformation of your perceptions will happen instantly.
If I were asked to give spiritual advice but had to give it in one sentence, it would be this:
Surrender to the love, the light, the intelligence, and the consciousness, that is in your heart.
The Eye Opening shares the author’s profound, personal experience of the sudden opening of his third eye and how it forever changed his life. This book inspires the reader to seek out an experience of their union with the universe in their own heart and provides tools to do so.
Not only is it a testimony of what is possible and what humans’ highest spiritual potential is, but it is also a book of quotes, revealing 9 spiritual themes that the majority of the world's religious, spiritual, and channeled texts share.
Join the author on his quest for spiritual awakening, as he receives visions, connects ancient methods for attaining self-realization, compares advice from masters, investigates Kundalini Yoga, and shares the path he took that led to his eye-opening glimpse of enlightenment.
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