5 Golden Keys for Aligning Head and Heart

Written by Cameron Tukapua, Heartfelt Coach, Chinese Medicine Practitioner

Cameron Tukapua is a heartfelt coach and Chinese Medicine practitioner. She helps people align the head and heart to create meaningful purposeful lives, and is author of 'Heartfelt Living - Your Ancient Wisdom Guide to Healing and Spiritual Awakening'. 

In today’s world of fast, chaotic change, navigation tools are essential for settling the mind. Whether you are managing anxiety personally or professionally, your superpower is your heart. In this guide we will explore how to align the heart-mind and the thinking-mind. Learn to trust your inner Self as your guide and compass for life.

1. Serve the highest in your Self and others

The ancient wisdom of Chinese medicine and Yogic philosophy agrees that the heart is the home of pure consciousness. Traditional teachings encourage us to recognise that a divine awareness lives inside us. In Yoga, we call it the Self with a capital S. In Chinese medicine, we call it the Shen, which translates as the spirit of the heart.

In the Huangdi Neijing, one of the earliest medical classics compiled around 500 BC, the heart is likened to the archetypal emperor. The emperor was the highest authority in ancient China, there to serve the will of heaven and care for the people on the ground. Heaven in the Taoist context is the overarching intelligence of life itself.

Becoming one with the divine

This idea of serving the highest consciousness is also present in the Upanishads, a collection of ancient Hindu texts compiled between 800 and 400 BCE. The core message of these texts is to realise the true Self and become one with the divine. To attain this high state, we meditate and do spiritual practices to burn off the coverings of the heart to reveal its fullness and splendour.

The heart is the supreme controller

In traditional Chinese medicine, the heart is described as the supreme controller. As the highest ruler, our heart has an expansive awareness which is naturally attuned to what is important and meaningful. It is the home of our authentic self. We feel strong and steady when we operate from the heart. From a Chinese medicine perspective, when the heart is out of balance, we can become over-controlling or operate in ways that are out of order.

Thinking-mind, the manager

All rulers need helpers. Our expansive awareness, our heart-mind, needs the support of the everyday thinking-mind, the head. Think of this as the management mind which attends to the practical needs of daily life. The head organises and plans. It is our problem solver and analyst, and it needs to understand how to operate at the highest level. With clear thinking and understanding, we can focus, plan, and manage our everyday needs.

2. Expand your awareness

Own that the highest awareness dwells within you. See yourself and others as divine, holy beings deeply connected to the goodness, truth, and beauty of life. Aim to remember that inside your heart is the queen or king of your being, the supreme controller. Make a daily practice of bowing your head to her or him. This positioning honours the heart above the head.

Be your own best friend

Be willing to treat yourself as your own best friend. Be kind, affirming, and encouraging, and fully allow your humanness. This is the loving way of the heart. Remember, there is no need for you or anyone else to be perfect. Most of the time, we are all doing the best we can. You being you is your gift to the world and a wonderful offering to life.

Trust that deep inside you is a constant drive to be whole, a program far stronger than any disease pattern. Take time every day to turn within. Contemplate how your body is a miraculous healing instrument designed to self-heal.

Witness consciousness

Hold the awareness that inside your heart is a pure witnessing consciousness. In Yogic philosophy, the character of this inner Self is light, free, blissful, eternal, and self-aware. This part of you is never judging or mean-spirited. It is quietly observing all that happens in your life. To meet with it, close your eyes right now and imagine your heart tucked behind your sternum, as close as your breath. Put your hand on your heart and welcome its unconditionally loving presence into your life.

Engaging awareness

Close your eyes and sense the aliveness of your amazing body. Notice your body sounds and sensations. Invite all the cells of your body to participate in healing, regeneration, and renewal. Invite anything that is ready for release to be effortlessly cleared from your tissues and memories. Allow the incredibly forgiving nature of your body to reach into your beliefs. Let go, let go.

3. Stay focused

Pure awareness is boundless and formless. When we focus our minds, we direct our thoughts in a specific way, for example, studying or reading. When we concentrate our attention on a subject, it guides the thinking mind like an arrow to a target.

Energy follows intention, sankalpa

There is a Tai Chi saying, Qi follows Yi, energy follows intention. If we practice Tai Chi with the intention to refresh and balance our mind and body, that can happen. Another way to imagine this is that intention is the steering wheel of awareness.

The Yogic term for intention is sankalpa. Both these ancient wisdom traditions recognise that learning to steer the mind is critical for best practice.

Thinking-mind as the manager

We need our thinking-mind to manage our lives. If our lives are busy it may speed up and we can get into patterns of over-analysis and judgements of right and wrong, good and bad. To settle over-thinking, it is helpful to use meditation to discipline and steady the mind. As the thinking-mind quiets down, the expanded quality of heart-mind takes over. This more open quality of awareness is like a witnessing presence, neutral and non-judging.

Over-thinking as a major cause of anxiety

Too much mental activity can easily lead to doubt and worry, in other words, anxiety. Many of us have overstimulated minds due to the constant uploading of information from virtual sources. It is helpful to consider that the digestion of information takes a lot of processing energy. Being mindful of limiting what we process gives the mind a rest, in the same way that not snacking all the time gives the stomach a rest.

4. Manage your energy: Physical, emotional, mental, spiritual

The head and heart both use and convey a lot of energy. Clear thinking, concentration, and mental focus require us to be steady and centered. To be awake to what is happening in the environment around us, and aware of what we sense and feel inside us, we use the heart's awareness.

To manage our energy and stay centered and present, we need to consider all our energy levels, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual.

The physical level

Our body is our lifetime vehicle. It holds our inherited constitutional tendencies. Some have been blessed with strong, naturally fit, healthy bodies that operate like faultless machines. Others are not so lucky. Learning to honour and care for our personal constitutional strengths and weaknesses is vital for our well-being. Age and life stage are also big factors to be considered.

Nurturing our bodies with regular sleep, healthy eating, and movement practices strengthens the body and the mind. Breathing practices which focus on sensations in the body activate the awareness of the heart-mind, which naturally calms the mind and emotions.

The emotional level

Our emotions are information signalling when we need to pay attention. All emotions, such as grief and sadness after a loss, have a place. The keyword is what is the appropriate emotional response to the current situation. A healthy emotion comes and goes like a visitor. It helps us respond to the constant change in our environments. Unhealthy emotions, when they are longstanding or too intense, are more like unwanted house guests who move in and never move out.

If we are aware that the emotional atmosphere of a place, relationship, or situation is not healthy for us, we need to establish some clear limits. Creating clear boundaries for ourselves is a powerful way to manage other people's emotional disorders. Less or no time in that situation may be the answer. Stress management is critical for heart health.

The mental level

The thinking-mind is designed to think and process information in order to understand. In Chinese medicine, the conscious mind is related to the digestive system. Too much thinking and scattered thoughts may be hard to digest. If the mind fails to understand, it can go round and round in search of answers. This can lead to worry, which is also known as anxiety.

The spiritual level

In Chinese medicine the spirit, the Shen, is governed by the heart as the home of our higher Self awareness. The heart spirit is very light. It is closely connected to the soul spirit which comes and goes, communicating with the heart in dreams and intuition. There are many ways to nurture our spirit, prayer, meditation, singing, loving, dancing, and service to others.

Heart science on regulating mind, body, and emotions

In Chinese medicine it is recognised that when the heart is balanced a person will know how to respond to life in appropriate ways. This is experienced as a sense of harmony and congruence between how we feel inside and what we express outside. Heart Math Institute scientists refer to this as the state of coherence.

For over thirty years, a group of scientists working under the banner of Heart Math Institute has been steadily gathering data on the heart. Their evidence shows that the electro-magnetic field of the heart is sixty times stronger than the brain and can be measured up to six feet away from the body. They have discovered there are three times more information highways from the heart to the brain than from the brain to the heart.

The potency of the heart as a powerful energy centre is clearly evidenced by science, validating the wisdom of the ancient traditions.

5. Love is a medicine

Instinctively, we know that the heart’s superpower is love. Love in action involves living with the intention to look for the highest in everyone and everything. When we give and receive unconditional positive regard, it brings out the best in ourselves and others. Generosity and gratitude strengthen and expand our sense of well-being and good fortune. Kindness and respect nurture goodwill, the foundations of strong communities. Expressing the virtues is simple, free, and an everyday medicine for transforming lives.

Being seen and heard, healing as a way of being

At the heart of humanity is the deep longing to love and be loved. This includes a longing to be accepted, respected, included, and acknowledged. Joyous to give and receive. Validation is a natural medicine applied when we share and exchange our life stories. Being seen and heard as we navigate change helps us to integrate what is happening in our lives.

Connection heals our hearts

Helping and caring for each other is as natural as breathing. We see this in times of adversity when people instinctively want to help those in need. Modern social structures tend to create separation between people, connection is the healing antidote. Giving what we can when we can is medicine. Allowing ourselves to receive help is important. My mother used to say, receive graciously and grace the giver.

Exploring our depths

Love takes us into our depths which can be very painful. The heart is our most sacred space, the place where we feel most deeply. The power of love is at times like a wild animal. It can strip us bare while opening us up. Heartbreak can be the path to heart healing and awakening.

Exploring our depths and listening to our supreme controller, our heart, helps lift us into higher levels of seeing and being. Learning the language of the heart we discover ways for living and loving that honour ourselves and others. Healing is about becoming the most whole version of ourselves. For deep heart healing, engaging a healthcare professional to guide your journey is wise.

Learn more about heartfelt living

Instinctively, we know how to live aligned with what feels important and meaningful, heart. At the same time, if we have been driven by the head, our lists and plans, we may miss the signs. Enrolling in a course on awakening to the call of our higher Self can expand our awareness and our world. Focusing the mind and managing our energy helps us navigate. Engaging the ways of love, we experience the truth, goodness, and beauty of life as an interconnected energy system.

In Chinese medicine, we recognise that when the heart is balanced, the person will know how to respond in appropriate ways to all the changes life brings us. Being fully present, awake, and aware of what we feel inside and outside activates our relational intelligence. Learning to align the head and heart helps us show up in our heartfelt presence.

The evidence is clear. Two and a half millennia of healing practices and thirty years of scientific research show the heart is ruling more than we realise. Learning the language of our heart and its areas of influence is wise. Aligning the head and heart is a natural way of taking care of ourselves and others. It is also a direct path for bringing our authentic self to life, one of the greatest gifts we can give to the world.

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Read more from Cameron Tukapua

Cameron Tukapua, Heartfelt Coach, Chinese Medicine Practitioner

Cameron Tukapua is a wellbeing coach who shares ancient wisdom teachings from Chinese Medicine, along with Qigong, Yoga and Meditation practices. She helps people align the head and heart. Cameron has written a book called ‘Heartfelt Living’ and her work has been featured in Thrive Global. She offers Individual coaching, online study pathways, and face to face wellbeing retreats.