Open Heart Meditation
Practised by thousands of people around the world, Open Heart Meditation reminds us that the peace, calmness and happiness we so long for can be found within us. In this beautiful 20 minute guided meditation, we can feel Love and Light pour into our spiritual heart so that it can cleanse, open and strengthen our heart and radiate freely from our heart.
With practise, as our heart becomes stronger, we become more peaceful and more joyful and able to follow our heart's own inner guidance to be happier in our daily life. Our connection to the True Source of Love and Light is strengthened, which also makes this meditation a way of deepening any other spiritual practices we may already be following.
What is Meditation?
The definition of meditation varies; it can be something as simple as focusing on one's breathing to deep contemplation of the cosmos. The most commonly accepted definition is calming the whole mind and physical body enough to open one up to the Divine.
For more than 5,000 years, meditation has been practised in Asia.
Some of the benefits of meditation are:
- Relief of physical and mental fatigue or stress
- Slows the ageing process
- Promotes more restful sleep
- Calms and balances the physical body
- Increases memory and learning
- Increases creativity and problem solving abilities
There are many kinds of meditation techniques, ranging from active ones where the practitioner controls their breath, to focusing the mind or by visualization. Other kinds of meditation are more passive where the meditator just relaxes and tries to calm or still their mind from thinking. All of these meditation techniques are focused at easing brain activity while benefiting the body and mind.
What is Open Heart Meditation?
Open Heart Meditation is different to most meditation techniques because it is about working with the spiritual heart (center of feelings) to connect with the True Source of Love and Light so we are able to let go of any kind of negative emotions which have caused us stress or problems with our spiritual heart.
By doing Open Heart Meditation we can feel the love and light radiate from our spiritual heart naturally and freely. As we repeat the Open Heart Meditation regularly the quality of our heart improves and the nice feelings from our heart increases. As our heart opens and strengthens we feel healthier and happier in our daily life, and automatically we enjoy sharing this love with others.
Some of the benefits Open Heart Meditation gives:
- Simple and enjoyable to do
- Increases your awareness in daily life
- Reduces negative emotions in daily life
- Relieves you from past emotional problems
- Better quality of life - able to follow the heart and feeling
- Promotes decisions based on heart feelings rather than logic or emotions
- Promotes more positive interactions with others
- Feeling happier, more joyful and grateful in daily life
- More naturally radiant complexion
- Stronger more open spiritual heart
Open Heart Meditation is effective at opening our heart
At times life can be difficult. When this happens we may be effected by others or even our own negative emotions, such as anger, arrogance or selfishness or by other upsetting situations. These negative emotions cause us stress and hurt our feelings, so instead of feeling good in our daily life we can be upset and burdened. After a while too much stress can affect our behavior and our overall well-being.
Open Heart Meditation enables us to gently let go of all our emotional baggage no matter how big or small. It helps us to be able to forgive ourselves and others for any past mistakes, fears, worries, burdens or resentment so that we can live a happier, stress-free life with a more loving open heart. This is a great benefit for ourselves and everyone around us.
Next: About Open Heart Meditation »Free Downloads: Get Open Heart Meditation »
About Open Heart Meditation
Practising Open Heart Meditation
Throughout Open Heart Meditation you just relax, smile and follow your feelings as you listen to the CD or free MP3 audio track which is 24 minutes long. For people that are new to meditation you can easily do the first two parts. When you do Open Heart Meditation regularly so your heart is more open you can then feel and enjoy the last part of the meditation: sharing the love from an open heart - much more deeply and freely.
Open Heart Meditation has three parts or phases:
Introduction - prepare the heart for meditation:
- To relax, smile and follow our feelings properly
- To strengthen and activate our heart and feelings
Main part - to open the heart:
- Removing all our problems blocking our heart
- Letting go of any negative emotions
- Cleansing the heart with Love and Light
- Forgiving others and ourselves for any wrongdoings
- To fill our whole heart and feelings with peace, calmness & joy
Conclusion - sharing the love from an open heart:
- To radiate Love from the Heart
- To dissolve into the Love and Light
- To fill our whole heart with Love and Light
- To share it all with others
The core of the meditation consists of letting go of any past negative emotions and burdens without you needing to remember or re-experience what happened at all. Throughout the meditation you are guided to radiate love from the source of your true self (the real source of love deep within the heart) to everyone wherever they are.
Results of doing Open Heart Meditation
During the meditation you become energised, cleansed and feel much happier about life's problems and burdens which are replaced with love and light.
After the meditation most people feel significantly lighter, happier and more peaceful with a much better sense of well-being.
Understanding Open Heart Meditation
To understand this further; think about what you feel like when you are happy or when you meet your close friends you haven't seen for a while. Naturally as you smile you may feel happy, light, and bright as your heart and feelings are more active.
Now think about what your body feels like when someone has negative emotions towards you. You may feel heavy, closed in and defensive, you may have an upset stomach, or your heart area may feel very tight. This is the feeling of a closed heart. Every time we experience negative emotions we have stress, our feelings get hurt and our heart closes.
Next: Open Heart Meditation Free Downloads
How to do Open Heart Meditation
The best way to do OHM is with a group of friends or family or you can do it by yourself. It will take about a half hour to do by listening to a CD or MP3 audio file you can freely download here. You don't need to memorise the steps because the CD/Audio track will guide and remind you about what to do and how to feel your heart.
1) Find a quiet place to sit comfortably. Either cross-legged on the floor or on a seat with your feet flat on the floor.
2) Make sure that your back is straight, keeping your head up at normal eye level.
(It is more difficult to feel anything if your chin is drooping.)
3) Taking a few deep breaths by inhaling through your nose and exhaling out your mouth to relax your body. Put aside any thoughts from the day to be able to use this time just for you.
Do the steps for Strengthening the Heart as already explained in detail properly:
4) Smile and relax....
5) With a few fingers of your right hand or palm, touch the centre of your chest to ease and help you to focus more on your feelings...
(our non physical / spiritual heart is at the centre of our chest at the level of the armpits)
6) Keep smiling and relaxing...
7) Follow your feelings without thinking how...
(follow your feeling for few minutes to properly prepare and strengthen your heart)
8) Now listen to the Open Heart Meditation and follow along without focusing on the words or thinking too much, instead just follow your feelings more to let the meditation happen naturally.
(keep on smiling, relaxing and following your feelings without stopping during the entire meditation)
Additional Notes
* Do not try to remember or think about anything other than enjoying the nice feelings when you are relaxed and smiling. Remember to keep smiling. Smiling is the key to feeling good and cleansing the heart and smiling also helps to follow your feelings more easily.
** To be effective, one should do the Open Heart Meditation daily. For most people to clearly recognise the benefit and feel their heart it typically takes doing the Open Heart Meditation 3 - 4 times. Some people may be able to feel things happen right away, for others it may take a few more tries. If you are not feeling anything, please continue to smile and do the Open Heart Meditation daily, as some people need to do it longer to recognise the benefits. Open Heart Meditation helps gently but very deeply, so even though you may not recognise any benefits yet many things are happening.
*** Try to do the Open Heart Meditation daily because often we have or are affected by negative emotions throughout our day. When we do OHM daily, our heart gets stronger and we are less effected by other's negative emotions.
Next: Open Heart Meditation Downloads
Open Heart Meditation - Free Guided Meditation Downloads
You can freely download and share these meditation files about Open Heart Meditation. To download and play on your computer you need an MP3 audio player such as Apple iTunes or Windows Media Player or any MP3 compatible music player or IPod.
If you are new to Open Heart Meditation we recommend that you first read and do How to Feel your Heart and How to Strengthen your Heart exercises before trying Open Heart Meditation.
46 mins duration. Open Heart Introduction talk, Q&A and short heart guiding
Preview: Download and install Flash Player to video multimedia content.
Open Heart Intro talk: 
Open Heart Intro talk Free Download (1 Mp3 file)
An in depth talk about the Heart and experiences of different people who have just started doing Open Heart Meditation. Hosted by a group of experienced Open Heart Workshop instructors. 46 mins duration talk with a 10 minute group meditation.
2 minute broadband download All Guided Meditation files in one Free Downloadable Archive
All Downloads: Open Heart Meditation Free Download Pack (all 7 files)
Download freely our Open Heart Meditation pack which contains all 7 meditation files or download each file individually. Alternativly buy the Open Heart Meditation CD online from Amazon.
Individual Free Guided Meditation Downloads:
Preview: Download and install Flash Player to video multimedia content.
Free Guided Meditation Download: 
How to Feel your Heart
Contains guided meditation for introduction to feeling the heart.
Preview:Download and install Flash Player to video multimedia content.
Free Guided Meditation Download: How to Strengthen your heart
Contains guided meditation to improve the heart and feelings using the steps from the Heart Strengthening exercise.
(simple background music)
Preview: Download and install Flash Player to video multimedia content.
Free Guided Meditation Download: Open Heart Meditation (simple piano cascades music)
Written and guided by Irmansyah Effendi
The complete Open Heart Meditation with with a simple relaxing piano tune playing as background music. For new people we recommend that you first practice and get used to doing the beginners version before trying this complete version.
If you enjoy meditating with background music then you may want to purchase a copy of the Open Heart Meditation CD box set which has been professionally recorded in a music studio just for this meditation. The CD box set version is not available as a free download.
(without music)
Preview: Download and install Flash Player to video multimedia content.
Free Guided Meditation Download: Open Heart Meditation (no music)
Written and guided by Irmansyah Effendi
The complete Open Heart Meditation without any background music. For new people we recommend that you first practice and get used to doing the beginners version before trying this complete version.
Download: 
Beginners guide to Heart Guided Meditation
Instructions and scripts for heart guided meditation so you and a friend can learn how to feel and strengthen your heart by guiding them how to feel thier heart and how to Strengthen the heart. This guided meditation is a fun exercise for both the meditation guide and the person being guided.
Download: Notes for Open Heart Meditation
Instructions and notes about how to do Open Heart Meditation as an individual guided meditation.
Download: Open Heart Meditation Transcript
The complete transcript of the Open Heart Meditation as a guided meditation script for use in a group guided meditation or for personal guided meditation use.
Cleansing and Opening your Heart
After doing the Open Heart Meditation a few times and if you do it properly, you will feel the differences clearly. For some people this will be very clear on the first try and for others who are less sensitive it may take a few tries.
If you feel pressure or throbbing on your chest during or after the meditation this is a good sign as it means the meditation is working to remove negativities (old emotions) from your heart. The pressure is actually the result of the cleansing process where the negativities are being pushed out. When you experience pressure during the Open Heart Meditation all you need to do is to relax more and let the meditation work more without any effort, and automatically you will feel lighter.
If you feel a lot of pressure or are somehow uncomfortable during the meditation it may mean that you are not doing the meditation properly, in that case please review the section on Tips for Open Heart Meditation to recognise and understand better the common problems and how to improve.
After the negativities have been removed from your heart, you may feel that your heart feels expanded and lighter because during the meditation we asked for the negativities to be replaced with Love and Light which is something very beautiful.
It is recommended to do the Open Heart Meditation regularly, twice a day if you can, in the morning and then in the evening, so that negative emotions you cannot avoid in daily life can be easily removed and also to remove past accumulated negative emotions that are much deeper and have been built up over time.
Frequently Asked Questions
1) What are the benefits of doing Open Heart Meditation?
2) Who authored Open Heart Meditation and how did it come about?
3) Can people who are already very open hearted benefit from doing Open Heart Meditation?
4) How often should I do the Open Heart Meditation?
8) How is Open Heart Meditation different to other kinds of meditation?
9) Is Open Heart Meditation religious?
10) Who or what is 'True Source' mentioned in the Open Heart Meditation?
11) Do I need to believe in a 'True Source' for the Open Heart Meditation to work?
12) Who does Open Heart Meditation and how popular is it?
13) What are the benefits of going on an Open Heart workshop?
14) What is the best way make use of everything you offer to open my heart?
1) What are the benefits of doing Open Heart Meditation?
Open Heart Meditation goal is to strengthen the non physical heart (centre of feelings), also known as the heart consciousness or spiritual heart. By opening the heart it helps you to heal any mental and emotional problems, resulting in you being happier, more peaceful and relaxed in your daily life.
In a relatively short period of time your awareness will increase and substantially you will have less negative emotions and reactions to situations in life. The benefits of having a more open heart and higher level of awareness will increase the quality of your life. Many important decisions are made not just logically with your brain, but by your feelings and emotions. By having a stronger heart you are better able to follow your positive feelings instead of regretting not having followed how you 'felt' you should have done.
2) Who authored Open Heart Meditation and how did it come about?
Irmansyah Effendi is the sole author of Open Heart Meditation; it was created in 2001 and translated into different languages for people that attended his workshops about the heart. In 2007 it was published as a CD box set for the public.
You can read more about the author and his biography on our About Us page.
3) Can people who are already very open hearted benefit from doing Open Heart Meditation?
If you are sensitive you may easily feel your heart is active and working on your first try. When done properly the feeling should be very gentle and soft as your heart opens completely and you should be able to share love freely without any effort which produces a very beautiful feeling.
The heart has no real limits on how open or how well it can share love, so you can always improve by doing Open Heart Meditation. In addition, it is normal in our daily life for our heart to become dirty and to close whenever we experience unhappiness due to everyday stresses and emotions. So our heart always benefits from a spring clean and active workout by doing Open Heart Meditation on a regular basis.
4) How often should I do the Open Heart Meditation?
It is recommended to do Open Heart Meditation regularly because opening the heart is a gradual process and it helps to counteract everyday stresses.
The best times to do Open Heart Meditation are:
a) In the morning - because it helps to activate and strengthen the heart for the day ahead, so you will feel calm, peaceful and light all day.
and
b) Again in the evening - so that any excessive thoughts and burdens can be cleansed. This will help you to feel calm and peaceful, to sleep better and to wake up feeling fresher.
If you don't have enough time to do it twice daily then once a day routinely will still make a big difference if done continuously for several days. You will feel that your heart and whole self become calmer, more peaceful and lighter.
5) I tried the Open Heart Meditation/Heart Strengthening Exercise a few times and I couldn't feel anything happen. Does that mean that I can't open my heart or it's not for me?
For some people it may take a few weeks of regular Open Heart Meditation to be able to strengthen, activate and open your heart so you are able to feel a difference. When the heart is more active and open it can be clearly felt as a gentle pleasant feeling in the chest heart area and you will feel better about yourself, towards others and about your problems in daily life.
Though you may not initially feel much happening during the Open Heart Meditation, bear in mind that it is a gradual process and things are changing in a manageable and incremental way. The meditation is very effective at clearing emotions from around the heart, strengthening and opening the heart and improving your ability to feel so that eventually you will clearly notice the differences it has made.
6) I did the Open Heart Meditation and felt an unpleasant pain/pressure on my chest which continued after the meditation finished. Why is that and how do I make it go away?
It is not unusual for a person to temporarily experience this sensation during or after the Open Heart Meditation because this meditation clears negative emotions and problems that are blocking your heart.
This pressure simply means you have not yet completed the process of releasing the past negative emotions or unhappiness that are surfacing, this is due to your unconscious unwillingness to let them go. To quickly let go of the problem without any effort, just relax, smile more and do the Open Heart Meditation again. Eventually it will clear away and you will feel much better.
7) I did the Open Heart Meditation and sometimes during it I seem to cry or laugh and be emotional for no reason at all. Why is that and is this normal?
If you cry or laugh during the Open Heart Meditation it means that you are slowly releasing old emotions stored around the heart, even though you may not be able to remember anything about them. This is quite a common experience, though there is a tendency for people to get distracted by the emotions and follow them instead of the nice feeling from the heart.
So just relax, smile and enjoy the gentle, subtle feeling from our heart. By doing this and following your feelings well enough then any kind of negative emotion is quickly pushed out. As you improve and do the Open Heart Meditation properly you should feel refreshed, happy and lighter with a better sense of well being every time.
8) How is Open Heart Meditation different to other kinds of meditation?
Open Heart Meditation is very different to most typical kinds of meditation and it is not directly based on any other kind of meditation.
Most meditations are either based on the brain or the soul, to focus or calm the brain, by various techniques like breating, using visualisation, or by focusing or using intention and therefore they use the brain/will power to control the meditation. Here we work with the heart so we can experience the real peace and happiness from the true source of peace and happiness which is from our heart. Open Heart Meditation is about naturally strengthening the heart consciousness (our centre of feelings) without any kind of effort.
Though they are not the same, some people suggest that the Open Heart Meditation reminds them of the Taoism Inner Smile meditation, the Buddhist Loving Kindness meditation or the Christian Lords Prayer, but when they compared them it was a completely different experience.
9) Does someone need a particular religious background to do Open Heart Meditation?
No. Open Heart Meditation is universally religious and does not require any kind of religious background. Working with and opening our heart is a simple and natural process and has nothing to do with any religious activity. But it is an acceptable and complementary thing to do for anyone that is spiritual or religious.
The truth is that naturally everyone has a heart, but not everyone believes in religion or considers themselves to be spiritual. Open Heart Meditation is about opening and cleansing our heart of emotional problems and burdens to feel better about ourselves.
But it is true that some religious activity do work on opening the heart. For example if you are religious: when praying do you do this with heart and feeling or just recite your prayers from the memory of your brain?
Nevertheless, if you are religious/spiritual this Open Heart Meditation is not intended to replace any prayers/practice that you might do daily.
10) Who or what is 'True Source' mentioned in the Open Heart Meditation?
The term 'True Source' is a neutral term used to refer to the source of your true self/spirit and the origin of where all the love comes from that you can feel within and around your heart during the Open Heart Meditation.
Feel free to use the terms or words that you are more comfortable with.
11) Do I need to believe in a 'True Source', or the Creator or anything for the Open Heart Meditation to work?
Not really. The meditation works regardless and requires no belief or faith. As long as you have an open mind and are willing to try you will get good results. To do this meditation you only need to relax, smile and follow you feelings to get the benefits.
12) Who does Open Heart Meditation and how popular is it?
Open Heart Meditation is practised all around the world by thousands of people from all different cultures, religious backgrounds and education educations, and it has been translated to many different languages.
Being cross-religious it is popular with people from all religions and also with people who are non religious, agnostic or just spiritual. Open Heart Meditation is also used by many psychologists/psychotherapist and other health professionals from around the world as an effective self help tool for themselves and their clients. More information about Open Heart Meditation in other countries can be found here.
13) What are the benefits of going on an Open Heart workshop?
Attending a workshop with an experienced heart workshop instructor helps you to learn and discover more about your heart, to experience meditation within a larger group which makes heart meditation easier to do, and to experience additional kinds of meditation/exercises you can do with the heart therefore deepening and strengthening the process of opening your heart. Attending a workshop also enables you to get feedback on how to feel and open your own heart further.
14) What is the best way make use of everything you offer to open my heart?
We recommend that you first read the sections on this website about how to open your heart, and try the exercises mentioned there to feel the difference between using the heart compared to using the brain. Then do the Heart Strengthening Exercise a few times, which should take you a few minutes.
Then we recommend that you read the section on how to do the Open Heart Meditation, download the Open Heart Meditation audio file (MP3) and try it yourself. The Open Heart Meditation takes about 20 minutes to do and has been for many a simple, yet profound tool to open the heart more.
Open Heart Meditation can be done by yourself or in a group. Often in a group the depth of experience is greater. You may feel it would be good to ask your family/friends to meditate with you if they would like to join you. You can also join an open heart meditation group in your area, or try our free online sessions at www.open-your-heart.net so you can also get feedback and find out how well you are doing.
After you have done a few Open Heart Meditations, we recommend that you review our Tips for Open Heart Meditation to see how you can improve and what you can do to open your heart more. We also offer Open Heart Workshops if you would like to learn and discover more about your heart.
Your Feedback and Comments
Send us your comments and feedback here.
Thank You. An Email has been sent to you with a copy of your comments. Your comments will be displayed once the site admin has completed reviewing it.
Tips for Open Heart Meditation:
While doing the Heart Strengthening Exercise or Open Heart Meditation you may have noticed that the nice feeling from your heart can be easily lost when you are distracted or if you do anything except relax, smile and naturally follow your feeling.
To improve your ability to feel more deeply with your heart requires practice and some understanding about what you may be unaware of that stops you from using your heart, then you can improve the quality of your meditation and go deeper into your heart. This is why we recommend that you ask questions, get feedback, practice in a meditation group and attend a workshop to get the support you need with opening the heart.
Listed below are the most common problems and challenges people typically have when learning to open their heart along with the most effective ways to solve them:
TRYING WITH EFFORT THINKING TOO MUCH
GOING TO SLEEP COMBINING TECHNIQUES
FOLLOWING EMOTIONS OBSERVING
Another way to look at practicing with the heart is that it can be compared to learning a new skill such as riding a bike or going swimming. At first it seems not that easy but after a while anyone can do it, all it takes is some dedication and practice.
Open Heart Meditation at your Library
Over 150 Open Heart Meditation CD sets have been donated to local libraries in central London, the South East and throughout the UK and may be available for borrowing from the public library catalogue:
Central London
Balham Library
Barking Learning Centre
Barons Court Library
Battersea Park Library
Belsize Library
Blackheath Library
Brixton Central Library
Chalk Farm Library
Charing Cross Library
Church Street Library
Croydon Central Library
Earsfield Library
Eltham Centre Library
Enfield Library
Fulham Library
Gayton Central Lending
Hackney Central Library
Hammersmith Library
Heath Library
Holborn Library
Hounslow Library
Kentish Town Library
Kilburn Library
Maida Vale Library
Marylebone Library
Mayfair Library
Newington Library
North Woolwich Library
Pimlico Library
Putney Library
Queen's Park Library
Queens Crescent Library
Redbridge Central Library
Regents Park Library
Roehampton Library
Shepherds Bush Library
Shoreditch Library
St James's Library
St John's Wood Library
St Pancras Library
Stamford Hill Library
Stoke Newington Library
Sutton Central Library
Swiss Cottage Central Library
Victoria Library
West Hampstead Library
Willesden Green Library
Wood Green Central Library
Woolwich Lending Library
South East & UK
Aldershot Library
Alton Library
Aylesbury Library
Basingstoke Library
Belhus Library
Birmingham Central Lending Library
Bradford Central Library
Bristol Central Library
Cardiff Central Library
Coventry Central Library
Derby Central Library
Dover Library
Epping Library
Feltham Library
Glasgow East Kilbride Central Library
Harlow Central Library
Leeds Central Library
Lincoln Library
Littlehampton Library
Liverpool Audio Visual Library
Maidenhead Library
Milton Keynes Central Library
Oxford Central Library
Selsey Library
Slough Central Library
Southampton Central Library
Wolverhampton Central Library
Worthing Library
York Central Library
Open Heart Meditation
Open Heart Meditation comes as a CD box set that makes an ideal gift for friends or for your own use. You can purchase a set by contacting us directly or at one of our meditation groups. You can also order online with this link to amazon.co.uk
The audio CD is 24 minutes and has been professionally recorded in a studio with relaxing background music so you can enjoy doing Open Heart Meditation more.
This professionally recorded version of the Open Heart Meditation is not available as a free download.
The CD box set comes with a 36 page booklet about the heart and Open Heart Meditation with information about how to feel the heart, how to strengthen the heart as well as tips on how to do Open Heart Meditation properly.
The booklet also contains testimonials and experiences from people that have found Open Heart Meditation to be very helpful in opening and experiencing their heart.
Not Relaxed Enough - Meditation Techniques and Tips
To follow our feeling well we need to be very relaxed and hold no tension in our body. Even though we may be satisfied with how relaxed we are, in fact we can always relax more deeply by letting go of even the smallest tension which we may not have noticed. Every time we let go and relax more deeply this greatly helps us to follow our feeling from the heart.
We also need to have good body posture with our back and neck straight and our head not drooping down but looking forward with the weight of our head spread evenly over our neck and shoulders. If we let our body posture slip such as our head droops down or to the side, then this can create tension even though it seems like we are relaxing.
If you are touching your heart with one or two fingers your arm can get tired, so to be more comfortable and reduce tension tuck your elbow in and rest your forearm against your body. If your arm gets tired you can place both down with palms facing upwards on your lap. Depending on the physical length of your arms some people find it's more comfortable to rest both forearms on a cushion on your lap to take the tension off the shoulders.
To relax more deeply try taking a few deep breaths at the start and then just breath normally while relaxing the muscles of your feet then working up your body relaxing more deeply each area in turn.
Not Smiling Enough - Meditation Techniques and Tips
Smiling freely is a key component to be able to feel and open our heart. When we smile freely, the feeling from our heart becomes stronger and we are able to easily feel our heart. When we stop smiling or don't smile enough then our ability to feel our heart is reduced significantly and any nice feeling we did have from the heart will start to fade.
As we get more experience with the heart and strengthen our heart and feeling more then our ability to smile is much easier and eventually our smile becomes natural and free because we feel happy when we can feel our heart.
Beginners need to be aware of how well they are smiling as they may think they are smiling a lot but in reality are hardly smiling at all, which means it will be much harder to feel with their heart. Another problem is that we can be trying to smile with too much effort and willpower. When we force ourselves to smile that blocks or reduces our ability to feel as the feelings from our heart can be experienced more easily when we are smiling freely and naturally.
Back to: Tips for Open Heart MeditationTrying with Effort - Meditation Techniques and Tips
Even thought we may be quite relaxed and smiling freely if we have any effort or willpower to try to feel our heart then we are actually having thoughts which will block us from feeling our heart. If we have a lot of thoughts this will create pressure and so it will be difficult for us to relax.
If you find when doing the heart exercises or Open Heart Meditation that it all seems like hard work then this indicates that you are trying too hard when instead you need to relax and enjoy the experience.
Sometimes you may not notice that you are trying too much because we are so used to doing things for ourselves and expect this is what we should be doing to make it work. It takes practice to get used to relaxing properly and naturally being able to follow our feeling without any effort.
If you notice that you are trying too much then stop trying and just wait and allow whatever feelings there are in our heart area to arise. As soon as you stop trying you may notice a very gentle but faint feeling around your heart area, now just follow that gentle feeling by relaxing more and soon the feeling will grow as we allow our heart to work naturally.
Back to: Tips for Open Heart MeditationThinking too Much - Meditation Techniques and Tips
Our mind can wander and this can happen without us realizing it for some time. The more excessive our thoughts then the more our heart and feeling is blocked by our brain. With regular practice our heart and feeling gradually becomes stronger and so it becomes easier to follow our feelings and we have less distractive thoughts.
If you find that you think a lot then the best thing to do after you notice is to relax more, smile and follow the nice feeling from your heart again.
If you get upset with yourself or try to use your willpower or any kind of technique to quieten our mind then you are too busy with trying to achieve that instead of relaxing, smiling and following the nice feeling from your heart.
Back to: Tips for Open Heart MeditationGoing to Sleep - Meditation Techniques and Tips
When doing Open Heart Meditation or working actively with our heart if we are following our feeling properly we should feel refreshed, stimulated and alert because of the nice feeling we get from our heart.
While learning to meditate we can feel sleepy as our mind settles down and no longer has lots of stimulation to keep it occupied if we are not following our feeling enough.
When we feel sleepy a number of things can happen: our body posture tends to sag which prevents us from being properly relaxed, our smile is reduced and we block ourselves from following our feeling.
With regular practice when we are not physically tired already such as in the morning or early afternoon we can meditate more easily, then our heart and feeling can be strengthened and gradually we get used to meditation and overcome sleepiness.
Back to: Tips for Open Heart MeditationCombining other Practices & Techniques
Often people try to combine meditation techniques with ones they already know or are reluctant to give up because they hope it will somehow be better than relaxing, smiling and following the nice feeling from their heart.
Using any kind of technique will only slow down and bring us away from our heart because working with and feeling our heart is something natural and does not require any special effort on our part.
Even thinking, believing or visualising will not bring someone into their heart because these are functions from the brain. We cannot follow our heart from our brain nor can we use our head to get into our heart.
The best way to overcome this limitation is to compare when you just relax, smile and follow the feeling with any other combined or extra technique to clearly notice which way works better. Once we are more aware and realise that the best way to strengthen our heart is to just follow our feeling naturally then we can more easily let go of our old habits.
Back to: Tips for Open Heart MeditationFollowing Emotions - Meditation Techniques and Tips
When meditating with the heart we release stored up emotions from our past, which may result in us briefly laughing or crying and we may not understand or remember where they come from. If that happens the best thing to do is just relax more, smile more and follow our feeling and it will pass quickly.
Releasing emotions is a natural process that happens all the time when working with the heart, but we do not want to experience again these releasing emotions because this slows down the process of releasing and letting go of them.
For some people following emotions and being emotional can be difficult to avoid because they assume that this is what following the heart is all about and so they actively follow their emotions more without realising it. However following our heart and feeling is gentle and nice, and afterwards we will feel lighter, happier and peaceful compared to if we just follow our emotions we will feel tired and exhausted.
Some people may be hesitant of working with their heart and feelings because they do not want to let go of their emotions for fear of losing control. However, when working with the heart we are always in control because we can always choose to relax, smile and follow our feelings anytime we like if that's what we prefer to do.
Back to: Tips for Open Heart MeditationObserving our feelings - Meditation Techniques
"A watched pot never boils" is a famous phrase and this is very true when working with the heart. If we are too eager to feel our heart and strengthen our heart then we may be using our brain to observe and notice every little feeling that arises and so never be able to feel our heart.
As we begin to use our brain to analyse and watch more what is going on then our brain is working more and so we block our heart and our ability to follow our feeling.
In this case the simple solution is to stop observing and putting too much focus on what we are feeling exactly, and instead we just relax, smile and follow our feelings without wanting to know what the results of the meditation are, and as soon as we do that we can feel much more and the meditation works much better.
Back to: Tips for Open Heart Meditation
