“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it" ~ Rumi
The heart chakra or anahata chakra is located in the centre of the chest at heart level, and relates to the cardiac plexus, the heart, the lungs and the thymus gland. This chakra is the midpoint way of the seven chakras; a bridge connecting the lower and upper chakras which integrates earthly matters with the spiritual (Judith, 2004). The word anahata in Sanskrit means unstruck or unhurt, which reminds us that beneath any pain or suffering in the heart lies a place of pure, unconditional love.
Emotionally, the heart chakra is connected to our sense of caring, compassion, generosity, altruism, kindness and respect (2004). It is associated with our capacity to love, to give and receive, and to have meaningful relationships and connections with others. The heart chakra is often referred to as the centre of love. Love, not solely in the sense of romance or love towards others, but in the sense of transcending the ego to open up more fully to compassion and acceptance of ourselves and the world around us.
Our first understanding of love as children comes from the fulfilment of our basic survival needs of care and safety. We learn from imitation to adopt and internalize the beliefs, attitudes, values and behaviours of our parents, and this shapes who we become as adults and how we behave in our relationships with others (2004). Depending on whether our basic needs were met and what we internalized from our upbringing, showing empathy, compassion and love to ourselves as well as to others may not come as easily to us as adults. Lack of emotional support and nurturing during childhood, or abandonment issues relating to parents can block our heart chakra. We may carry this block with us to our adult lives, resulting in difficulty letting love in as it may feel like a foreign concept.
Anodea Judith refers to love as a state of being in harmony with oneself (1999). We must get to know our fears, needs, wishes, hopes and boundaries to achieve a sense of self. Without knowing ourselves intimately and loving all parts of ourselves, we cannot offer ourselves openly to someone else. Judith states that balance is an essential principle in achieving harmony with oneself; balance between the various aspects of ourselves such as our mind and body, our persona and shadow and our anima and animus (female and male energy). We also need to find balance between ourselves and the world around us; between work and play, self and other, giving and receiving, socializing and being alone. Retaining a part of the individual self in relationships is vital in maintaining our balance, so as not to lose ourselves, our heart or our ground. It is through balance that we can find a centre within ourselves from which we can love and form healthy relationships with others (2004).
The exhilarating feeling of love comes with a risk however. “Nothing is quite so uplifting as the flowering of love, nothing so devastating as its loss” (2004, p.224). When we fall in love, we open up to another person. When we are hurt in love, our most vulnerable and trusting aspects are wounded. The experience of losing someone we love or being rejected by someone we love can trigger a child-like state of vulnerability and abandonment. We may feel helpless and our self-esteem may plummet as rejection sends us a message that we are unwanted and unworthy of love. Rejection is a fear, which dwells in the heart, that threatens our internal balance and sense of self-acceptance and can lead to despair and grief. When our heart is heavy with grief, we often shut down and close ourselves off, losing a part of ourselves. Turning against ourselves and self-rejection is perhaps an even deeper wound than losing our partner. It becomes easier to hold back our love or turn away from love rather than to risk opening up and sharing ourselves with someone again, consequently closing down the heart chakra.
Whether intentionally or unintentionally, we may build barriers and defences around our heart as a result of hurt, betrayal, or past childhood wounds. Our heart shuts down when wounded and can cause feelings of insecurity, lack of empathy and fear, and cause us to disconnect and withdraw as a reaction to the hurt. According to Anodea Judith, these defences can become hardwired into the body and can manifest as tension, tightness, pressure or rigidity in areas such as the shoulders, chest, sternum and upper back (2015). As we guard our heart from the vulnerability of love, our body creates an armour which may result in our shoulders rounding or collapsing forward or our chest may puff up and out to protect the heart. Opening the heart chakra involves taking down these defences to experience the love that is the natural state of our being.
Yoga asana such as Gomukhasana, Anahatasana, Matsyasana, Ustrasana and Urdvha Dhanurasana help to open the areas of the shoulders, chest and heart, making room for the breath which may have become constricted due to postural defences to flow freely once again. Our breath is one of the keys to opening the heart chakra as it allows our bodies to relax, melt, soften, release and therefore surrender. Deepening our breath in these asana encourages us to open and expand, allowing feelings to emerge to the surface and energy to move freely through the body. This helps to free the heart from the heaviness of grief, which is often referred to as the demon of the heart chakra. Denying grief however only causes us to numb our feelings, become detached, cold and distant. Coming to terms with our grief makes way for compassion and understanding which allows us to reconnect with the self and others once again. Allowing space and time for grief is therefore an essential step towards healing and opening the heart to receive love once more.
Developing compassion, empathy and understanding for ourselves and for those around us is also central to the healing process. Offering forgiveness to ourselves and others and not holding onto anger, resentment or bitterness is a necessary step towards opening the heart chakra. With compassion, understanding and forgiveness comes acceptance, acceptance of others but most importantly acceptance of the self. Self-acceptance allows us to cultivate a loving relationship with ourselves, which is the first step to practising unconditional love. Only through attending to the most vulnerable aspects within ourselves can we drop the protective armour that binds us to the ego so that we can begin to radiate joy and love once more (Judith, 2004).
References:
Judith, A. (2004) Eastern Body, Western Mind. 2nd edn. New York: Celestial Arts.
Judith, A. (1999) Wheels of Life: A User’s Guide to the Chakra System. 2nd edn. Woodbury: Llewellyn Worldwide.
Judith, A. (2015) Anodea Judith’s Chakra Yoga. Woodbury: Llewellyn Worldwide.
