Did you know heart disease is the number one leading cause of death in the USA? While 1 in 31 American women dies from breast cancer each year, 1 in 3 dies of heart disease.
Much of the reasons why we die of heart disease is diet, belief and lifestyle related. We can prevent heart disease by quitting smoking, managing our blood sugar, getting our blood pressure under control, lowering our cholesterol, staying active, losing weight and eating healthy. A lot of these behavioral changes would be easier to accomplish if we valued and loved ourselves more. Too often we place other people in our lives before ourselves. We forget to make time to prioritize self-love, daily exercise, food that nourishes our heart and soul, and managing our stress levels.
Sometimes we do not prioritize nurturing our emotional heart and this affects our heart health also.
We can choose to heal our hearts if they have been wounded or broken. We can create an intention to live with an open and receptive heart instead of a guarded, defensive and closed heart.
Our heart feels more relaxed when we allow ourselves to feel, heal, express and process our emotions.
Our heart is not just an organ in the body, it is also a very sensitive sensor that perceives what is for our highest good and what is not. Our heart muscle responds to how we perceive people and situations, and it is affected by our body and our thoughts. We stress or relax our heart in every moment.  When we fear or feel threatened we release stress hormone and this causes our heart vessels to narrow and increase our blood pressure and heart rate. Stress is healthy to ward off danger and help us to keep safe. CHRONIC stress however is not healthy and this causes our heart vessels to becomes harder and more constricted which reduces blood flow to our heart muscle.
We feel more exhausted from being under a chronic state of stress and our energy doesn’t flow as easily. Allowing ourselves to feel and flow our emotions and tune into our heart helps us to open and soften the heart.
When we speak from a place of authenticity, forgive, love more, trust, feel compassionate and accepting, our heart literally softens and relaxes more. Our blood pressure lowers and we feel more expansive and feel lighter. We are able to focus more easily and are willing to connect and see things from a new perspective when our heart opens.
Many of us have been hurt in the past and have created a wall of protection around our hearts or have not allowed our hearts to feel and process our past emotions. When we guard our hearts we don’t feel as much compassion and we also have a more difficult time being vulnerable.
Some of us reading this article have been sexually abused, emotionally abused and may also be hurting themselves with unhealthy habits such as sedentarianism, unhealthy relationships, foods, beliefs or thoughts on a daily basis. All of these contribute to tensing up the heart, or closing the heart.
Since our nature is to heal, to flow, love, and release, once we make the conscious decision to let go of our past hurts or traumas and to keep our heart open and receptive, the heart relaxes and shifts immediately to a state of calm and ease, this takes a lot of inner trust and courage.
It is actually a lot of work on our system to hold onto pain, tension and trauma. When we try to hold on, as a way of protecting ourselves, we tend to develop addictions, ways of self-soothing and distracting ourselves from being whole and present in the moment. Because for us to be fully alive and present, interconnected with all the parts of our whole, means that we would actually have to feel everything, including the pains in our hearts from our past.
We are healing all the time, we are processing and releasing the past all the time, if we allow ourselves to. Yet many of us, do not allow ourselves to feel, be vulnerable and honest with our deepest and truest feelings.  Too often we are living out of obligation, guilt and expectations we impose on ourselves or we allow others to impose on us.
Does this ring true for you? No need to feel bad or judge yourself. Free Yourself! Your nature is to love, to live full of energy and vitality with an open and receptive heart. Your body, mind and emotions will feel much healthier.
5 Ways To Open and Heal Your Heart
1. Bring awareness to the heart organ with mindfulness meditation.
Notice how your heart feels. Breathe deeply and expand your heart side. Lay down and raise your left arm overhead. Listen to the Guided Meditation “Breathe In Love” Here. This meditation will guide you on how to become aware of your heart.
2. Feel Your Heart.
Allow yourself to feel without judgement, criticism, guilt or shame. Be like a video camera. Feel yourself throughout the day, notice how your heart feels. Place your hand over the top left side of you chest and check in with yourself. Be honest with what you feel in your heart. Allow yourself to feel with full awareness. You can ask your heart for guidance or whether something is aligned with your highest good. A “yes” feels light, softening and expanding in the heart. A “no” feels tense, constricting and hardening. Take a moment to notice what your heart feels like when you ask it questions. Feeling your heart on a daily basis helps you develop a heightened psychic awareness and intuition.
3.LOVE AND ACCEPT YOURSELF. This means embracing the WHOLE you-the light and the dark within you. 
Repeat daily this mantra “I LOVE AND ACCEPT MYSELF COMPLETELY NOW.” Repeat this as you feel complete self-acceptance. The more we accept whole selves and love ourselves just as we are in this present moment, the more connected we feel inside and this automatically allows us to feel connected to everyone around us! Be honest with yourself if there are qualities or feelings that you run away from.
See everyone interconnected to you, we are one. When we see ourselves in everyone, we experience more compassion for ourselves and others. We are not separate, we all affect one another. Choose to focus on connectedness and notice how this softens your heart. A great way to open the heart is by attending the Enter the Heart Tour, which is part of a nationwide tour led by Mastin Kipp, of THE DAILY LOVE and Senior Kundalini Teacher Sat Siri.
4. Practice forgiveness.
To forgive is to live. Forgiveness is a form of emotional and physical release. The heart feels more calm and relaxed when we forgive ourselves and someone who we perceive as hurtful.
5. Practice gratitude attitude.
Love and gratitude are the highest healing vibrations. Allow yourself to feel what you are grateful for on a daily basis. This literally opens and heals your heart. What are you most grateful for today? Who are the people in your life who you are grateful for?
When you can see every moment as a blessing and feel grateful for every person, event and experience in your life, you will feel an accelerated heart release and expansiveness.
6. Sing and Dance with an open heart.
When we sing, we are actually regulating our hormones and relaxing our whole body and mind. Dancing while you sing brings and even more powerful and healing effect!
You deserve to experience the energy and power of your open and energized heart. Take care of this precious organ by feeding yourself healthy food, daily physical exercise that you enjoy and healthy thoughts and inner and outer relationships. Try these five tips to keep your heart open and vibrant. Let me know how they help you! Share this article with a friend and comment down below on other heart opening techniques that help you! Share with us!