How to open your heart (mass-sourced)
For me, there is nothing more wonderful than feeling my heart open.
Sometimes it’s a sensational explosion in my chest, half painful, half joyful, like a tremendous energy bursting free. Other times it’s subtler, like a stirring inside me, a moment of recognition, a freeing up of anything tight that is stuck.
I am suddenly more present, more me; I can feel my own aliveness and connectedness to the world. An awe and a lightness - soaring and grounded at the same time.
It’s a hard experience to explain - it’s like suddenly going from feeling like a black and white film character to being coloured in.
How it feels in my chest sometimes when my heart is waking up
It’s those moments you wake up on holiday and open the curtains and windows to pure bright sunshine, but on a sensational level; the world gets more vivid, the volume gets louder, the vibrations thicker and heavier in my body.
It feels out of control, but in the most beautiful way possible.
Life force
Michael Singer talks about experiencing this energy in his book The Untethered Soul. He said this vital energy can flow through us all the time, and it doesn’t because, for one reason or another, we close our hearts.
We block the energy, the aliveness, the world, and hide in the darkness within us.
Also what a heart opening feels like to me
We close up, because life gives us something painful, or reminds us of something painful, and we can’t bear to experience it, feel it, let it move through us.
We first try and reconcile it with our heads, but when that doesn’t work, it moves down to our heart, and when that feels too much, we shut down.
It works on one level: we feel less pain or fear (I guess that is where the saying ‘harden your hearts’ entered general parlance) but we also accidentally shut out life.
The poison is the antidote with this one - love hurts and love heals. But we have to stay open to allow for the healing to happen. And this is hard.
Letting go of control
What I’ve come to realise, as an unenlightened, often unconscious, human, is that sometimes my heart snaps shut without me realising. And with it, so my life ends up becoming routine and dry and my interactions become surface level, dull, low sensation.
All we can do is be conscious of it; this is not another thing to beat ourselves up for. Really, the more we relax, the more our hearts unfurl on their own.
The benefit of pain
Tremendous emotional pain is fantastic for shattering down the heart’s walls and opening us up to the world again and a new level of consciousness, feeling and connectedness if we can bear it.
It’s not something I’d recommend, but I don’t have to recommend it, because it happens anyway.
The benefit of these experiences is that we do end up becoming more open, because we just don’t have the energy or will to shut anymore. We develop compassion here. And in that space, we are often also sensitive to other heart-opening experiences, of the positive kind, the transcendent kind.
These experiences are actually accessible to all of us. All of the time. We just have to slow down and choose them; relax enough to witness them, and choose not to shut.
Doggos have opened my heart when loving humans felt too hard
I asked a question on Twitter about what opened people’s hearts and I was surprised it got such a big response. But it seems there are some open hearts out there which heard mine - a heart to heart.
There were a lot of responses and many overlapped, which I LOVE because it really connected me to how my human experience is sometimes very the same to someone else’s human experience. My ego, which loves to think it’s extra special with its problems, got the most pleasant death ever.
I’ve made a list of them, in case you want some inspiration for how to open your heart. I haven’t credited religiously or put down everyone’s because time, and also repetition, but hopefully they have you feel good.
‘A chord progression’
> seeing animals play vulnerably in an environment they trust
> a chord progression that hits the spot out of nowhere
> solving a complex riddle, puzzle, problem, etc. by my own means
> cooking a good meal from scratch.
> laying in the grass, cradled by the warmth of the sun
(@verdesque)
Animals came up again and again… I think of animals as the most wonderful gift from the universe, to help us open our hearts again when trusting and loving humans gets too hard.
Animals greeting their owners, golden autumn sun on the trees against a cold blue sky, the smell of woodsmoke, stepping onto a train to go somewhere new, finishing a great book, watching strangers laugh with each other, music spilling from open doorways
Blasting music in the car with the windows down on a summer’s day, the first glimpse of the sea peeking over a hill, trying to recapture a dream after waking on a weekend, when writing flows naturally, meeting someone & feeling like you already know them
(@tinywriterlaura)
- sharing a rich dessert with a friend
- noticing pretty things in places I go by all the time
- making my mom & sister laugh
- seeing couples in public who emanate joy
(@mermaidenvy)
Moments of recognition with a stranger was one for everyone - hELLLOOOO THERE FELLOW TRAVELLLER
- Galloping full speed with a friend next to me
- When my dog looks for me, then wags her tail when she finds me
- Finding the best photo from a shoot
- Meeting a stranger who I instantly click with
- Reading (or writing) a perfectly crafted sentence/passage
@thecityspins
CUDDLE ME CUDDLE ME
-little kids being precious
-volunteering at an LGBTQ+ place where teenagers were given space to be heard and respect
-when an elderly patient starts singing for me after I ask them what their favorite song is
(@oneofajillian)
SHOUT OUT TO PETS - they are repeat offenders on this list! Little furry heart openers. That love is our love, we just kept it locked inside for so long.
- Being surrounded by friends and feeling like an integral part of the group
- When my kitten falls asleep in my arms
- When my boyfriend does something dumb he knows will make me laugh
- Being outside in really heavy rain
- The sun in foreign countries
@eve_v_shep
- cats and kittens
- hugs from guys as tall as me that feel protective
- the smell of roses
- new fabric ready to cut for a pattern
- hot, light evenings and hearing nature going to bed
- children’s laughter
- other people’s understanding of me
- colour everywhere
(@sequinste)
These guys make super soothing noises
Poems & sunsets & forehead kisses & wood pigeons cooing & cats purring & being silly with someone i love & cycling through tunnels of trees & love songs & caring for others (washing hair, painting nails, cooking) & the smell after summer rain @bybethan
I WOULD LIKE TO NOMINATE RAIN FOR A LONG SUFFERING AWARD - it shows up on here too a lot and we always complain about it and it apparently makes us happier than we admit.
Standing in shallow water and watching it pool around my ankles, a really deep cold inhale of breath somewhere remote, solidarity between strangers on the subway, laughing so hard I can’t breathe, swinging in a hammock, live music, sentimental truths between loved ones @azeegs
Any song by Enya
When Kevin and his mother are reunited in Home Alone
When Sparta meows when my phone makes noise
Rains of Castamere
More Enya songs
When students finally get the lightbulb moment
@kktg_
Just imagine how great this smells.
-Quran on a particularly sad day
-Hoyoo’s laughter
-reading on the floor of empty bookshop
-my brothers encourage & pride
-open space greenery/lakes
-when someone I respect acknowledges my intelligence
-my father still holding my hand in public
@whytrustme
- "Concerning Hobbits" by Howard Shore
- a stray cat's trust
- my own cats
- seeing people meet/talk to/get on stage with their heroes
- arriving in a new place
- Drop Dead Fred
- baby laughter
- people accepting who they are
- Kelly
@worndowntoys
Travelling also makes a few different entries - is there something about that fresh alert travel mind that we lose at home?
- choirs/people singing in harmony
- basically all animals but especially my own cat
- seeing/experiencing positive interactions between strangers
- the countryside at dawn and golden hour
- looking into a room/at a group full of people I love and knowing I get to walk into it
@lexcanroar
Dogs
Giggling children
Waves crashing on the beach
Drinking a cuppa in the garden with phone nowhere near.. bees buzzing
Standing under a Pink blossom tree
Family board games
Freshly washed sheets!
@kategolledge
- sunsets and sometimes a weird looking cloud
- the trust of a wild animal
- giving advice and being a (sometimes grumpy) uncle
- country path I used to walk with my granddad
- a proper log fire (with crackles)
- (if I'm in the right mood) a quiet room with a ticking clock
@paulN20
the sea, effective communication, warm bread, parents easily translating their young child’s gibberish-talk, poetry, strong 5pm sunshine, the end of a book
@imteddybless
THE SEA ALSO GETS MORE THAN A MER(E) MENTION. Feeling heart-blocked? Get to the seaside. mAYBE IT WAS THAT VITALITY THAT HAD VICTORIAN DOCTORS RECOMMEND THE FRESH AIR AT THE SEA?
- Honesty
- Seeing a loved one succeed
- That look
- The love/ trust of an animal
- A genuine smile/ pure joy
- Singing old songs in the car (no matter how bad the singing voice)
- Forests in spring
- Rain on a humid day
- Stargazing
- Cuddles (any time)
- People making an effort
@hattersonford
My son has just learnt to hug me back and he puts his arms fully around my neck and nuzzles his head down and I feel like my heart might burst right open. Also being on top of the moors when it’s really windy is a combo of feeling alive and nostalgia, heart openness.
(@Ey_up_Kid)
- pugs - feeling the sun on my skin - finale songs in musicals - hugs from the people I love the most
(@abbyderere)
Children being pure.
Real kindness
Singing with the car windows open
When you’re recalling a hilarious story and the other person gets to the funny part with you & you both can’t finish because you’re wheezing laughing.
My mom sending me Bitmoji.
@greendoondoon
- driving to visit my parents house on a weekend
- skylines
- walking the Los Angeles river
- nostalgic youth songs like literally when the Backstreet Boys come on the 90s playlist
- spring flowers in bloom
- when I think about the love that does exist in this world
@Damerons92
OK so apparently when we are kind to strangers we don’t just make us happy, we also make anyone who sees it happy - I see this come up a few times…
- Witnessing people being kind to strangers
- Elderly people successfully using technology to enrich their lives
- Being in the bath when it's raining outside
- Large gatherings like festivals, where strangers nod and smile at each other like you're all in on the same joke @thenikigrant
Roses open my heart
- hearing my daughter singing (she does it with wild abandonment at home)
- the heat when the plane doors open when you arrive on holiday
- the sound of the sea
- the smell of mowed grass
- listening to music from my teenage years
- cherries and Strawberries
@sproc
- seeing people smile at strangers' babies in public
- a hug that lasts a bit longer than usual
- little rituals like brewing pour-over coffee
- wildflower and cedar smells on a warm breeze
- Christmas tree lights seen from outside someone's house at night
- the golden hour
@barrenflowers
(FULL DISCLOSURE - I CRIED AT THIS ONE. IF VICARIOUS TRAUMA IS A THING, (IT IS) PERHAPS I CAN HAVE A VICARIOUS HEART OPENING?)
- the air at dawn, it's so light and clean
- the soundscape, temperature and scenery of the mountains
- subtropical plants in gentle rain
I love San Francisco, I think it’s a magical place.
- birdsong and open fields in England
- when it rains in the city and the lights become like liquid
- natural smoke in the air
- cacti
(@callmethistle)
a dad and his little girl together at a sports game, the first breath of air after rolling down the windows crossing the bridge into sea isle, skiing fresh powder, my 1st sunburn of summer, car rides w/ my friends, my dog plopping down at my feet, seeing the Fun Fair rides are up @_mvmrn
- tucking someone in.
- Christmas Eve night when all the preparations are done
- Making someone laugh so hard that no sound comes out of their mouths
- good blanket snuggles
- when the dog welcomes me when I get home
- that split second of anticipation before a kiss
@licklepuma