The Mind Can Be a Lonely Place

The mind can be a lonely place. Feeling isolated in our own thoughts, we are depressed, anxious, stressed. We think the cause is too much work or a difficult early childhood. But the cause is actually our awareness is starved, continually starving day after day. When our mental world is tied in knots, all kinds of frustration and physical symptoms seem to come out of nowhere and find us. Underneath life's aches and pains is our awareness malnourished and underfed.

Thinking too much, feeling too little, locked in our minds, we are uptight, not much fun to be around, and especially no fun for ourselves. We are nervous and fearful. We have difficulty sleeping. Daily life is more about finding comfort then adventure and new experience. No matter how much, how new, how big, there is a feeling of never having time or space for ourselves. Our awareness is fragile, heavy in worldly matters, thin in resilience. We are judgmental. We find ourselves hungry and unsatisfied. Our needs seem beyond our means.

Pills? Therapy? We stay busy hoping our symptoms will pass. When the brain goes unfed, when nerves are under nourished, stress is the result. Life is complicated. There are a thousand different faces of stress but only one face, the one we are wearing, calls our attention. Our stress is a cry for help.

The problem is that our awareness is separated from our heart. This is like a plant pulled up out of the ground trying to keep living and thriving. Most of us are missing roots. Our minds are racing through life while our hearts have been left behind. We are busy. If we really slow down we feel lost. Our trust is in science, bank accounts, doctors, every thing but not so much in ourselves. Like a plant pulled out of the earth, we feel separate, disconnected, searching for our home. We have little energy. We are running on near empty.

A depleted awareness is bored, needing to be entertained. Even though in the eyes of others, we have just about everything, we feel incomplete. There is not enough. The main symptom of a starving awareness is our lack of joy in our own company and lack of compassion for others.

Time for a new diet. Time for a new beginning. A mind that is always thinking is a brain that is on overload, in survival mode. Metaphorically and literally, now, every day, we want to dip our toes into the pleasure of life. How far away are our toes? How far away are the pleasures of life? We want to heal this distance!

Meditation is becoming more and more popular as we discover when we stop the mind, there is something much more to life. Uncluttered with details of daily life, our awareness finds simple peace, beauty, innocence. There is an inner landscape to enjoy. Mindfulness is leading many to heartfulness. When the life of the mind slows down, the life of the heart grows in our awareness. Mindfulness is watching our thoughts and body sensations. Heartfulness is the next step. We are actively receiving, absorbing the presence in our heart. When we are not busy thinking, the space we find within is full of heart essence. This heart essence is food for our mind, food for life! Recognizing and receiving heart essence is an important development in understanding for modern psychology and spirituality.

As children we naturally are rooted in our hearts, feelings, our well of being. With our cultural stress on intellectual development, our hearts are left behind. At an earlier and earlier age, children are being pushed rapidly into adulthood. The result is awareness is separated from the heart. In the rush into adulthood they lose their ability to simply be, play, enjoy life without gadgets. Childhood is buried under all the thinking going on and on. Before we know it, children are showing adult symptoms of loneliness, depression, and anxiety. Time to get back to the heart. Time to understand the importance of being connected to our heart essence.

Meditation should be taught in every school. Meditation should be a regular part of life. When the mind slows down, awareness naturally relaxes and finds a vastness inside. There is an experience of expansiveness, gentleness, love. Our complicated self dissolves into simply being. Difficult feelings find healing. Memories and daily drama are lightened, often just washed away. As our awareness lets go and is free of worldly details, thoughts and feelings find space, untangle, finding their true substance. Meditation brings us out of our heads and into our hearts, our bodies, our wholeness. We trust and feel connected. As we fill our awareness with heart essence, our eyes and smile are expressing the inner peace.

Each new day calls for a diet of heart essence as much as it does fresh fruit and vegetables. Heart essence is real food, light for our awareness. Heart essence is God's presence in our lives. There is an infinite supply. Heartfulness meditation reminds us to nourish ourselves through the day through self expression, compassion for others, remembering joy and the pleasures of life.

As adults, heartfulness meditation offers us the rest that no amount of sleep can provide. The simple peace affirms, rebuilds, awakens dried up nerves and emotions. When our hearts are fed, our minds light up!

Heartfulness is the true medicine for much of what ails us. The habit of constantly thinking is broken in heartfulness. The doors open, setting our awareness free from the lonely world of being trapped in our minds. There is so much heart to explore, be, and celebrate life with. Lets save our children with heartfulness. Lets save ourselves.