Primordial Fire To The Inner Heart Altar Theology Religion Essay

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

<Fig. 23: Double-page spread Shiva’s dance with the galaxy and small pictures of fig. 24 Angkor Wat; and fig. 25 Chitzen Itza; and fig. 26Callinish; Fig. 27 Kamakhya Somanath; Fig.28 Surya Temple in Orissa; Fig. 29 (or shiva note ganga, kailash).>

<Next 2-4 double page spread Chidambaram one big picture, smaller pics>

I am the taste of water.

I am the light of the Sun and the Moon.

I am the original fragrance of the Earth.

I am the heat in the fire.

I am the life of all that lives

I am the radiant Sun

Among stars, I am the Moon.

Of bodies of water I am the ocean

of flowing rivers I am the Ganga

of secret things I am silence

All opulent, beautiful and glorious creations

spring from but a

spark of my splendor

- Bhagavad Gita *** Endnot Chris Tompkins

As is above as is below.

The body is the microcosm of the cosmic macrocosm - Shiva Samhita ****C.T.

Within the spiritual culture of India from which yoga emerges, the human body as a manifestation of the sacred, all-permeating source: a reflection of the cosmic body. That the human body is a reflection of cosmic life is central to many of the world’s traditions. Temples found around the world serve a dual extraordinary purpose: as observatories of the massive awe of the cosmos - the alignment of the sun, moon, planets and stars—and as sacred ritual space built in this cosmic reflection that is activated by these alignments. This view first appears in the fire altar of Vedic tradition, where the sacred flame of Agni flame was tended with reverence under the star-filled sky. It flowers in Tantric tradition with the inner fire of the cosmic body found within.

Throughout this evolution, the subtle energy body was increasingly viewed as a microcosmic map of the cosmos: the currents of energy within us were rivers flowing through the vast landscape of the body; the spine a mountain cradling the cave of the heart where the fire of consciousness burns.

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<H1>Chidambaram Temple—Body of the Cosmic Dance

<Fig. 30 Chidambaram Temple big; Fig. 31, small picture; Fig. 32, small picture; Fig. 33, small picture (to be provided in art log)

Chidambuda manim budha hridambuja

ravim para chidambaranatam hridi bhaje

(Adore in the heart- the supreme Dancer of Chidambaram.)

- source Shiva Sutras*

Located at the center point of the world’s magnetic equator, Chidambaram Temple in Tamil Nadu is considered the "heart of the universe." It is built on the plan of the divine body, vastu purusha, and dedicated to Nataraja, the cosmic dance of Shiva and Natarajika or Shakti that brought the world into being. The word chidambaram translates as "sky of consciousness."

The inner sanctum of the temple is the heart of Shiva’s body, represented as a crystalized lingam in union with Shakti as yoni near large statues of Shiva and Shakti as the cosmic dance. Other structures in the temple are also symbolic of the body: Crossbeams represent blood vessels. 21,600 golden tiles, symbolizing the number of breaths in a day, are fastened with 72,000 golden nails—the number of nadis (energetic pathways) that exist in the human body. On each of the four gopuras, or heads of the temple, depictions of the 108 karanas (flowing postures) that express the connection between the human body and the divine are carved on the walls. The image of a dancing universe gives rise to embodied practices that respond to the universal pulse, such as yoga karanas (asanas), namaskar(ritual movement or salutation) and natya (dance forms), and kirtan (music and chanting). Images of the yogic sage Patanjali, Narada, and Aghysta are carved within Chidambaram Temple as mythic witnesses to Shiva’s dance. Chidambaram has been a seat of the union of yoga and dance **finish sentence.

Body Pilgrimage to Chidambaram

<Fig. 34: Shiva Rea in natarajasana in Chidambaram>

Chidambaram has been a pilgrimage place or tirthas that has transformed my experience of a sublime embodiment. In this moment, without any formal yoga practice, I dropped everything to be mudra of Natarajasana in the middle of the mandala of the Devi temple. I felt completely open without warming up. In the living temple, limbs lift from the heart. Freedom of movement is a reflection of the inner current. I hear the teachings echoed through mantra, sutras, devotion, nyasa (activation of mantra-mudra-meditaiton) piercing my body – all the tirthas – places of pilgrimage are found within the body.

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<H1>Vastu-Purusha—Fire Altar as the Cosmic Body

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From his mind the moon was born,

And from his eye the sun,

From his mouth Indra and the fire,

From his breath the wind was born,

From his navel arose the atmosphere,

And from his head the sky evolved,

From his feet the earth, and from his ear,

The cardinal points of the compass:

So did they fashion forth these worlds. – Purusha Sukta of the Rg Veda

The mahavedi, or "great fire altar," is an altar that is built in a manner that reflects "the cosmic body," which honors all of the elements, directions, limbs, and divine currents. The five elements of the universe correspond to those that constitute the human body: akasha (ether), vayu (wind/air), tejas (fire), apas (fluid/water), and prithvi (solid/earth). These are considered to be the building blocks of all creation.

The Vedic fire altar is constructed according to an elaborate plan that expresses the cycle of the year and the elements of the universe, incorporating many meaningful, symbolic components. It contains 360 bricks, representing the number of degrees in a circle and the flow of the days of the year. A central pillar, called a stambha, is raised near the altar to represent the unity of above and below, heaven and earth. Five layers of bricks correspond to five seasons of the year. Fire sticks used to kindle the fire represent the friction of creation.

The basic square structure of the fire altar evokes the containment of the earth element, or prithvi, while the empty center of the fire altar is "space," or akash. When ghee is poured in the fire ceremony, it is liquid nectar, or apa. The sacred fire at the center is agni. The eight cardinal directions are linked to the directions and planets, which are revered as divine and which recreate the cosmic "body" within the fire altar. The human body (purusha) is symbolically mapped onto the fire altar so that the center fire burns at the heart or navel. Root and limbs extend around the altar. The purusha represents the eternal Self, visualized as the divine fire of agni.

The person who tends the fire supplies the final element, exhaling to start the fire and thus bringing in the element of air, or vayu.

<Fig 35 Vastu Purusha Grid – we need to create one or I will look for one here in India; Fig. 36 Fire Altar.

The lineage of firekeeping begins to crystallize in the Vedas, which view the fire altar as a reflection of the cosmic rhythm of nature’s cycles. Thus Vedic firekeeping allows us to remain connected to the rhythmic transitions of day and night as the earth journeys around the sun. We know that the sacrificial fire ritual of yajna has been performed in an unbroken flow for at least thirty-five hundred years, in sync with sunrise, midday, and sunset as well as during lunar cycles. This is invoked in the Vedas as the sandhya vandanam or the practice of synchronizing our own rhythms with the sacred junctures of time.

On most householder altars, the space for the fire offering now takes the form of a dipa or lamp. (A "householder" is someone with a family and professional life as well as a spiritual life, as opposed to one who lives an exclusively spiritual life). This represents the eternal flame of consciousness. The waving of the lamp at the end of the ritual, called aarati, is an offering of the blessing of light.

Text Box—Agni Hotra

<Fig. 37: offering agni hotra>

Imagine living your life with the rhythms of the yajna, ever attuned to the wheeling of the sun across the sky. This daily reminder of cosmic rhythms is reflected in the householder fire ritual known as agni hotra, conducted just before sunrise or sunset. The yajna is reconstructed in a smaller version, usually in a copper fire vessel described as a kund or womb. Traditionally, this fire is never to be extinguished; the fire of the daily offering is lit from the father’s fire and passed on to his children, generation after generation. All of the important life-passage ceremonies occur around this central fire ritual, and there are special yajnas for the new and full moon and other important holidays throughout the year.

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<H1>Tending the Inner Fire—The Cosmic Heart of Tantra

<Fig. 38 Large pic of sun- moon** with illustration of linking breath flow with Cosmos>

In Tantric tradition the inner fire altar is alive within the body: we are embodiments of the divine. Every inner movement is experienced as the flow of Shakti, every breath a reflection of the cosmic pulse. The macro-rhythms of the cosmos are echoed in the micro-rhythms of the heartbeat—and in myriad other movements and processes—spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical--within. Our very heart is the alchemical meeting point of sun, moon, and fire.

<H2>Cosmic Time Cycles of the Breath—Sun, Moon, and Fire

The One who impels the universe is the Source of Consciousness (Siva)

to be discovered within the flow of one’s own vital breath.

O Beloved One, Shiva gives rise to the year, the month, the half-month, and the day.

Find Siva within time through Shakti, who is the cyclical flow of breath-time in the body.

—Svacchanda Tantra

Within Tantra, as practitioners, we place our focus on the realization and embodiment of the cosmic rhythm as the flow of consciousness [1] . The pulsation at the heart mirrors the pulsation of life: the rhythmic cycles of expansion and contraction that create our experience of duality. Inhale and exhale, systolic and diastolic blood pressure—filling and emptying the heart—birth and death, young and old, night and day are experienced as a continuum of the divine Power (Shakti) of Shiva, worshipped as a goddess or Devi in her own right. [2] She is the vehicle by which Shiva manifests joyfully and creatively into the countless forms of the universe, or Shiva’s "body," experienced as the field of time (kala) and space (desha).

Thus the Universal Soul (purusha) is embodied within the form of all beings and located in the heart: always one with Shiva and Shakti, consciousness and creative expression, the two within one that is found in all the world’s spiritual traditions as the divine masculine and feminine. Shakti, as the creative manifestation of Shiva, is experienced as the vital force (prana) that follows a rhythmic cycle of creating, sustaining, and dissolving the microcosmic body with the flow of breath (prana-cara).

In the Tantric tradition, every breath is a reflection of all such cycles, referred to as vinyasa or cara—movement or flow. External cycles of time—the day, the lunar cycles, the passing of seasons as we circle the sun—are mirrored in the phases of the breath, creating a "procession of internal time." Thus we internalize time itself by observing the flow of breath (time) within the body (space) in a single round of breath, a reflection of the sacred pulse.

<Note to designer: these quotes are listed around the double page spread not all together.>

O Beautiful Goddess, I have taught that there is a single twenty-four-hour day in a round of breath. Now I will explain how it contains the two halves of the internal month (waxing and waning moon) …

—Svacchanda Tantra VII.64

The "day" is the upward moving exhale (prana-vayu), and the night

is the downward moving inhale (apana vāyu).

—Kalottara Tantra XI.9

Arising through Capricorn from the winter solstice in the heart, the breath circulates in the bodies of all beings through 12 months (before returning to the heart).

—Svacchanda Tantra VII.119 [3] .

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<H1>Sri Yantra: The Bindu of the Sun, Moon, and Fire

<Fig 39 Sri Chakra large Fig. 40 Small pic of Shiva-Shakti from Khajuraho>

A yantra is a sacred pattern created to express and honor the divine. One of the quintessential yantras of the Heart Fire is Sri Yantra, the sixty-four-point interpenetrating triangle that expresses the human body and the cosmos emanating from the pulsating bindu (center point or dot) at the heart of consciousness. Thisyantra also mirrors the cosmic body created from the union of Shiva and Shakti. And the bindu of the great yantra is mirrored within our hearts as the point of creation and dissolution, the receiving of new breath and the release of toxins in the out-breath.

Tantra views this oscillating motion as the lovemaking of fire and water, the interpenetrating of downward and upward, inward and outward, Shiva and Shakti united in the bindu of the heart of our own body and the universal body.

From the fivefold Shakti comes creation and from the fourfold Fire dissolution. The sexual union of five Shaktis and four Fires causes the chakra to evolve …When she, the ultimate Shakti, of her own will (svecchaya) assumed the form of the universe, then the creation of the chakra revealed itself as a pulsating essence … From this pulsating stream of supreme light emanated the ocean of the cosmos, the very self of the three mothers.

—Yogini Hridaya, I 6-16

At the very heart of the bindu of Sri Yantra is kamakala, containing the three bindus or potentials. One is red, representing the ova of the Divine Mother; another is white, representing the seed of the Divine Masculine; and a third is mixed as the union of Shiva and Shakti, the individual body emerging from Shri Chakra. The three bindus are the essence of the sun, moon, and fire, unified in the heart of a human being like a single cell from which a human being grows. From this bindu of Sri Chakra, the cosmic body emerges, containing the constellations of the solar cycle, the twelve months of the solar year, and more frequent cosmic rhythms. Once again, we see the pulsation of the heart linked to the totality of creation and the cycles of time.

The father form gives four alchemical dhatus or tissues to the child, represented as the four fires or upward-pointing triangle. The ova of the mother form gives five dhatus to the child, known as the five shaktis or downward-flowing triangles. Consciousness enters into form through the explosion of love from the eternal orgasm that is reflected throughout all of creation via orgasm.

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<H1>Heart Fire as the Creative Power—Kundalini Shakti

<Fig. 41 Image of Kundalini Shakti coiled from Tantric paintings>

In the earliest Tantric scripture, kundalini shakti, the creative life force andthe kinetic aspect of consciousness, was always located within the heart. Though this is not well known today, it was not until the thirteenth century that the first written record appeared saying that kundalini rests coiled at the base of the spine. Kundalini shakti isthe vibrating light that pulses the heart, coiling and uncoiling as the yogi or yogini’s inner Heart Fire.

Beautiful sutras and poems from the great Tantric sages confirm this understanding of the inner Heart Fire as kundalini shakti, and in them we learn to tend this fire by offering mantra, breath, and bhakti devotion to the heart. Just as a fire in the hearth is nourished and flourishes from fuel, the fuel of a practitioner’s offering kindles and stokes the brilliance of consciousness.

Knowing this, as practitioners, we can draw the moon and sun into our bodies through the in-breath and out-breath, as expressed in this passage:

The Source manifests into form before the yogī who in continual devotion, is unwavering in his one-pointed focus as his awareness is drawn towards the emergence within the heart of Kundalinii Śhakti who as the embodiement of pure consciousness, arises as a spark generated by the fire stick (araṇi) formed through the fusion of the lunar in-breath and solar out-breath as they are merged together in the heart.

—Shri Kshemaraja, eleventh-century master

<H1>Samghatta—The Friction and Fire of Lovemaking

<Fig. 42 Image of Shiva and Shakti in Sexual Union from Khajuraho or Tantric Painting>

The meeting of sun and moon can be found in the friction that starts the ritual fire, with the churning of lovemaking symbolized by the back-and-forth movement of the fire-stick in the "womb" of the sacrificial altar. This ritual reenacts the fire of creation in the heart of the cosmic body and within our own hearts in meditative practice.

In Tantric practice, the sun- and moon-breaths are fused in the heart in kumbhaka, the stillness between in-breath and out-breath, and the mantra is "seeded" there into a coil. The friction of the pulsing mantra combines the radiance of the sun- and moon-breaths and sparks the fire of arising kundalinī in the heart.

This merging is not just an esoteric union. It is experienced in every moment, particularly in heightened states when the heart and brain are in coherent flow and a meditative consciousness can arise within the fabric of everyday life. When we are in these states, we are able to perceive the extraordinary beauty and mysterious truths of life: shivam satyam sundaram—consciousness is truth and beauty.

The Heart Fire is alive with the energetic potency of the life force. We can hear and feel it in the pulse and life-giving energy of the breath. The heart center is the embodied nexus of Tantric meditation, the vision of the dancing universe—our continually pulsating quantum field of life—embodied in the movements of yogis and yoginis and the dancing mystics through the ages.

Mantra, too, connects the sound of the pulse of life with the heart of consciousness as the origins of all form. The mantra is a sound body representing the sonic signature of the divine body. The sounds of lovemaking mirror the cosmic sounds of creation: a u m.

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<H1>The Heart Fire of Bhakti

< Fig. 43 Find images of Shiva-Shakti dancing together, Fig. 44 Radha Krishna in dance together>

The Source of my heart dwells inside me. Everywhere I look, it is he. In my every sight, in the sparkle of light
Oh, I can never lose him—Here, there and everywhere,


Wherever I turn, he is right there!

—Rabindranath Tagore

We are conceived from love. Born in love. Emotions as "energy in motion" open and close like the valves of our heart, the petals of a lotus.

Bhakti yoga is a devotional love within the expansion and contraction.

To dive into the pool beyond

right and wrong doing where dualism

makes love in naked passion.

Invocation

May we realize the source of love that mysteriously pours through us

the igniting power of bhakti

the rasa of the heart regreening a desert,

regenerating with one pure drop

the bindu of Shiva-Shakti

pulsating heart

sphuratta….universal throb.

May our life be filled with vajra passion

May we realize the depth of love

The bhakti fire at the core of existence

The Sanskrit word bhakti originates from the word bhaj, meaning to "belong to" or "share in" as well as "to worship." Its meaning is often interpreted as "devotion," but the full meaning is beyond definition, as it is the igniting of a natural feeling of devotion, an inner realization of the fire of love that has been core to yoga from the beginning. It was first described as a path, or bhaktimarga, of realization through love of God in all forms and all ways in the Bhagavad Gita (500 b.c.) Central to bhakti is an emphasis on a mystic and loving experience with the Source, a relationship that is often seen as beloved-lover, friend-friend, parent-child, or God-servant.

The Heart Fire in the form of bhakti ignited a revolutionary change in yoga when bold one’s on the path were transformed by their direct experience of the Source. The transforming fire of bhakti lit a flame across India. It is characterized by the dissolution of all caste and wealth restrictions; equality of men and women as the true vision of Oneness and love; and the writings of its poet-saints—from Sri Chaitanya, Basvanna, Kabir, Mirabai, Makhadevi, many of whom were female—who extolled passionate devotional love for the Divine that released barriers of caste, religion, and gender so that all beings could be seen and respected as manifestations of the One.

The rich will make temples for Siva.

What shall I, a poor bhakta, do?

My legs are pillars,

the body the shrine,

my heart the inner sanctum

my head a tower of gold.

Listen, O lord of the meeting rivers,

the things standing shall fall,

but the moving ever shall stay. – Basvanna, 14th century Bhakti Saint

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<H1>The Inner Heart Guru

<2 pages>

<Fig 45 Guru Mandala (see below)>

O Guru, pierce my eye

with the needle of discernment so that I 

may see the light. - Baul Song

Our heart guru is our visceral encounter with our inner source . Heart Guru is "the one who transforms darkness," an emanation of the transforming fire of connectedness and love, an intimate teacher that speaks in a language beyond words. This is our internal guidance system, a living connection to the source within that enables us to find yoga everywhere.

The Heart Guru is

The fire of Consciousness that guides us through the matrix of life: the sacred and mundane, this world and beyond, the ordinary and extraordinary

Ishta devata—our personal connection to God, the divine current

The master Teacher of all teachers who have ever existed or will ever be

The mother rhythm pulsing in the heartbeat and all of the body’s pulsations, connected to the cosmic rhythm

Our inner navigation system in speech, thought, and action

Our beloved refuge

<H1> Reflection—Awakening the Inner Heart Guru

Listening to, bonding with, and resting in your inner heart wisdom begins with your inner senses. Close your eyes and awaken your inner gaze by letting your awareness stream downward from the back of your eyes into your heart center. Feel the sensations in your heart region and open to a sacred connection, a living presence felt within.

Open your "inner ears" and listen for an internal language beyond words. What is arising? Do you feel a natural communion, a coming home within your own skin? Or is there separation, a distancing arising? Do you find a stream of emotions or is there numbness? Is there a pang of arrhythmia—an unsteady beat? Do you find a sense of not being "good enough" for the One within?

Dive into your center. Bathe in the regenerative love in your heart, stronger than any dissonance on the surface. As the One that is sometimes "two," experience the inner sanctum of your heart as a place of refuge. Completely surrender there. Allow all that is carried on the heart to be expressed as streams of feeling, prayer, gratitude, longing, loving, sorrow, joy, bliss. Dwell in this intimate embrace.

As you melt into this fire, feel a stirring arising, a sacred presence—your connection to the One. This is your Heart Guru, inseparable from your very essence: the inner friend, Beloved. Allow wisdom, guidance, healing, opening, or inspiration to arise spontaneously. Experience the shift and let it reverberate throughout your being, flowing like a sacred tide, spreading outward from your heart. Feel your relationship with the One who has been with you since your first breath, alive in the altar of your Heart Fire.

108 Saints.jpg

The day will come when after harnessing space, the winds, the tides

and gravitation,we shall harness for God the energies of love

and on that day for the second time in the history of the world,

we shall have discovered fire.

- Teillard de Chardin

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Chapter 3: Embodying the Heart Fire—The Science of the Energetic Heart

Our body mirrors our cultural evolution. How we see ourselves limits or liberates our experience. Our experience shapes how we engage in the world. We are engaged in a planetary shift as we rembody our energetic heart and retrieve the fire from within.

<Fig. 46 Choose an image from Embodied Heart Folder illustrate electromagnetic field>

Our bodies and our lives are regulated by the cycles of the earth and the rhythms of the cosmos. As day flows into night, and as night gives way to dawn, our bodies synchronize with the solar and lunar cycles even when we attempt to override their rhythms. The human body’s core physiological functions are tied to the oscillations of the sun and moon, from the most obvious—sleep cycles—to the pineal gland, which depends for optimal functioning upon the full-spectrum light of the sun.

The great conductor of the body’s rhythms is the pulse of the heart. The heart is the only organ made of specialized cells—cardiac cells—with the unique capacity to create a pulsing electrical charge. This charge in turn creates a vast electromagnetic field of energy. As the most powerful "rhythm maker" of the body, the heart has the ability to govern all of the body’s other rhythms.

<H1>The Heart as the Pulse of Life

<Fig. 47 Find a fetal image and illustrate heart pulse or just image>

The pulse of the heart links us to our earliest development inside the womb. The dum-dum of our mother’s heart, its two-part rhythm, is the first mantra we hear, reflecting the very nature of the heart as the rhythmic conductor of consciousness. If we meditate on our own heartbeat, we find unbroken continuity with our mother’s heart, our grandmothers’ hearts, and back in time to the heartbeats of our most distant grandmothers.

Our hearts begin pulsing in the womb around five weeks from conception without any signal from the brain, which is still in formation—a mystery that science still does not understand. Then, for several weeks in the womb, our heartbeat entrains with (matches) our mother’s heartbeat, creating a bond that is reinforced by the sonic nature of the heart’s pulse; we can hear this beating for about five and a half months in the "surround sound" of the womb, perhaps feeling the pulse much earlier than our capacity to hear it develops.

The heart is—yes—a pump, but one of extraordinary power. It moves some sixty gallons of blood through sixty thousand miles of the circulatory system every hour, with a hydraulic power that could push water into the sky some thirty feet [need endnote]. But this is far from the whole story even from a purely scientific standpoint. The heart also radiates an electrical field that communicates with all other cells of the body through the fluid medium of the blood, which transmits vibration three times faster than air. Its "language" is its oscillating rhythm, ranging from slow and peaceful to hurried and excited. This rhythm is present in tension or relaxation, in stress or in joy, in conflict or love. The electromagnetic field is such a force of communication that in heart transplant recipients the heart and brain communicate through the energetic field rather than through the nervous system (vagus nerve) which is severed during the transplant surgery <Pearsall**>. This is just one example of the power of the heart’s energetic field.

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<H1>The Sun in the Heart: The Heart’s Electromagnetic Field

Keep squeezing drops of the Sun

From the sacred hands and glance of your Beloved

And, my dear,

From the most insignificant movements of your own holy body – Hafiz

<Fig. 48 Choose an embodied heart photo and illustrate sun like radiance of heart>

The heart’s electromagnetic field is five thousand times stronger than the brain’s, radiating forth from our core like the body’s own fiery sun. When we understand some of the key energetic functions of the heart, it becomes easier for us to experience this sunlike radiance, so let’s take a look at how the heart works.

While the blood carries chemicals and cells, it also carries electromagnetic signals that travel to every cell of the body. The entire body, in fact, is held within the heart’s electromagnetic field, which can be measured as far as ten feet away with a magnetocardiogram, a device that shows fluctuations of the heart as it responds to both internal and external environments. (86) (85) (87) As we shall see, this "heart field" strengthens and weakens according to our inner connection to our heart, a quality we can sense in the heart fields of others, those who radiate positive energy and those who telegraph some disconnection from their hearts.

The heart transmits pulses of electromagnetic energy—and receives them. Thus it is an organ of perception, and it can decode the information embedded within the electromagnetic fields it senses. ***Kristen endnotes: Buehner, Secret Teachings of Plants p. 88)

Text Box: Anahata Chakra and the energetic field of the heart

Take your heart into vast fields of light and let it breathe. - Hafiz

Anahata chakra is best understood as the electromagnetic field that emanates from our energetic heart – both our electrical organ of our heart but also the sublte body consciousness or hrdaya. The experience of the heart chakra is perhaps the most tangible in the body when feeling strong emotions of love and the sensation of the warmth that expands and radiates from the heart region. We sense in ourselves and in others when the energetic field of the heart is dim from loss or stress. Many forms of yoga from movement practice to mantra, prayer, music and karma yoga could be viewed as being ways the electromagnetic field of the heart increases. Saints and great beings are living examples of the power of the heart field of anahata chakra. Regardless of external circumstances, in sickness and health, war and peace, the heart energy field can stay in coherent electromagnetic field and radiate like the sun.

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<H1>Heart Rhythm

The average adult human heart, weighing roughly eleven ounces, beats seventy-two times a minute, a hundred thousand times a day. [4] That’s 3.6 million times a year. As the heart rate changes with the energy demand of different activities, the volume of blood it pumps changes accordingly.

A healthy heart responds to what is called heart rate variability (HRV); its rhythm is not fixed. Even the resting heart dances in a myriad of fluctuations. One of the vital signs of a heartbeat found in young, healthy people is highly adaptable, ever-changing rhythm, becoming more fixed with age or if the heart becomes diseased. So heart rate variability is a sign of health. (105)

<H1>Entrainment – Syncopation through Rhythm

The heart has a direct vibrational influence on every cell of the body—and beyond. It influences other organs or organisms through entrainment, a phenomenon in which two or more processes or organisms synchronize with one another’s movements. This is a state of yoga, or joining together, a coherence between multiple rhythmic patterns. Together these patterns create an unbroken stream of energy, an optimal flow for creating, sustaining, and regenerating life force.

Dissonance, by contrast, describes a state in which connected rhythms become separate and disordered, and this is usually caused by turbulent change or stress. Dissonant rhythms can have a degenerative, debilitating effect on the functioning and flow of life force.

When you are aware of the forces of entrainment and dissonance, you can begin to see how every experience, every relationship, every moment of your life has a direct effect on your heart.

<H2>Entrainment within the Heart: Pacemaker Cells

<Fig. 49 Find pacemaker cells imagery that is beautiful and colorful>

Within the heart, specialized cells called pacemaker cells directly control the tempo of the heartbeat. A reflection in miniature of the essence of the heart organ, they actively create a healthy, rhythmic flow in the body and respond to the dissonant rhythms of stress. Collectively called the sinoatrial node, these cells are located in the walls of the upper part of the right side of the heart.

The cells of the sinoatrial node entrain, or beat together, and the rest of the heart cells beat in response. As the heart develops in the womb, once the first pacemaker cell begins to beat spontaneously, each new pacemaker cell synchronizes with it, until millions of them create one beating, synchronistic unit. (84)

Laboratory experiments offer great insights into the nature of entrainment. If a single pacemaker cell is removed from the body and kept alive, it will lose track of the rhythmic beat, pulse erratically, and ultimately die. (85). If two pacemaker cells are placed close together, their beating patterns will synchronize; they will beat in unison. (85) If an erratically beating cell is placed next to a regularly beating one, the one that is "off" will begin to beat in sync with the healthy cell. (85) The cells do not need to touch in order to have these effects on one another because as they beat, they generate electric fields that connect them with each other. (85)

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<H2>The Heart’s Rhythmic Entrainment with the Brain

<Fig. 50 Illustrated image that connects brainwave and electromagnetic field of heart I see this as a kind of translucent image that takes us within the body; Fig. 51 chart of brainwaves and heart rhythm in synch>

Instead of seeing the brain as the sole source of our intelligence,

we begin to realize that it’s a remarkable partner to our heart, not its master.

—Paul Persall

Throughout our lives the heart sends more signals to the brain than the other way around. Although we may perceive a split between heart and brain, they love to be in sync. When our brainwaves and heart rhythms come into a state of entrainment, or "heart-brain coherence," we are at our highest state of energy flow, physically, mentally, and emotionally.

With the intellectual understanding that heart and brain synchronize naturally, we can begin to feel this coherence as a natural state of yoga. And we can see how ancient meditations and other practices—focused attention, breathing in rhythm, chanting, music, movement—facilitate alignment between the two. The following pages show the cycles of entrainment between brain and heart, which is the science at work when we tend the Heart Fire in meditation.

<Designer: Show heart brainwaves frequency comparison.>

<H2>The Cycles of Heart–Brain Entrainment

The heart is where the body senses new information first. Then, with every beat, it relays a burst of neural activity to the medulla, located at the base of the brain, via the vagus nerve and nerves in the spinal column—the same pathways that carry pain and other feeling sensations to the brain. (HC) Energy, or information that vibrates, constantly flows between heart and brain, assisting us in our emotional processing, sensory experience, ability to derive meaning from events, and reasoning.

When we shift our focus to the heart and away from the brain, large populations of cells in the forebrain entrain to the heart’s rhythms. There is a tremendous ripple effect that we can noticeably perceive as the first sign that our awareness of our heart’s energy has begun. Mental dialogue is reduced. Messages flow freely and directly between the heart and brain through the sympathetic and parasympathetic nerve pathways, as well as the baroreceptor system. Connectivity increases between brain and body, and neuronal firing increases. Greater heart-brain entrainment allows a person to function at higher states, mentally, emotionally, and physically. Such synchronization does not occur spontaneously, however; it must be consciously practiced through intentional focus on the heart.

<H2>Entraining the Breath and the Heart

We receive each breath as part of the extraordinary "breathing universe" in which we live. And every breathing creature on the planet inhales molecules of all other creatures; in this way, the breath connects us all.

It is your heart that brings the breathing universe to every cell of your body. Think about this important point for a moment: your heart, through its deep, pulsating rhythms, distributes your life force—prana—throughout the complex network of bone, muscle, ligaments, skin, nerves, and other tissues. The heart radiates life into every part of you. And it does this quickly: it takes just over a minute for a single breath to circulate throughout your body. Now consider that the heart responds to every little nuance of your inner experience, changing its action in accordance with your moods and thoughts. This means that what you think and feel affects your ability to distribute your life force through your body.

The interlinking rhythms of breath and heart give us the primary embodied experience of the pulse of life. This in and out, rising and falling, contracting and expanding, is mirrored in all of life, from the subatomic pulse of the atomic-quantum world to the pulsing vibration of stars.

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<H1>Stress Rhythms and the Healing Power of Attention

<Fig. 52 find a pic of a person in stress>

Stress is the body and mind’s response to any pressure that disrupts their normal balance. It can express itself as resistance, tension, strain, or frustration, among other sensations and emotions, and undermines our physiological and psychological equilibrium. If this equilibrium is disturbed over a period of time, the stress becomes disabling; we fade, shut down, and eventually get sick.

We often experience stress when we’ve lost our ability to navigate transitions in a fluid and healthy way—a key teaching that we will revisit when we talk about living vinyasa. With any transition there is a natural fluctuation, a healthy chaos, a variation to the flow, a change in the fire. Fluctuations are actually positive things; they have the ability to reset the vibrational patterns in our hearts. But they also create a vulnerability that we must tend to on all levels so that these transitions don’t agitate or dim the flow of our life force. We need to feel for signs of disruption in the heart field affecting our emotions, insights, actions, or speech.

<Fig. 53 Chart of Dissonate Brainwave and heart rhythm.

When brainwaves and heart rhythms are out of sync, inefficiency is introduced into the system and the entire body experiences further stress. But we can bring consciousness to this cycle. Pay attention to the arising dissonant rhythms in your heart, experienced as tension, emotional stirring, pressure, impatience, or a sense of holding, being overwhelmed, or out of sync. These are often the first signs of negative stress and, whether these sensations are large or small, they signal that something needs to change to bring you back into balance.

When we attune to the pulse of the heart, we become able to sense subtle movement toward stress and we can make a conscious shift toward balance. We can develop our own unique healthy heart rhythms and shift into more "solar" or "lunar" modes of being, from fully expressive to quiet and reflective. By tuning in to the heart in this deep and nuanced way, we can create the openness and flexibility that remove constrictions around the heart.

Slower heart rhythms alter brainwave frequencies in such a way that deeper states of being can occur. At the deepest levels of entrainment, our brainwaves and heart rhythms are in sync with every other cell in the body, creating a field of energy that extends beyond it. The strength of this field depends upon how aware of and connected to the heart we are. At the end of this chapter, I provide a meditation to help you become more connected to your energetic heart as the key to living in rhythm with the pulse of life.

If we are aware of how damaging "disconnected stress" is to our system and, in contrast, how powerfully regenerating the state of love is for our whole being, we will be more aware of which "fire" we are fueling. Fanning the fires of stress has profound physical repercussions.

The body’s stress response encompasses more than fourteen hundred known physical and chemical reactions and more than thirty different hormones and neurotransmitters.

Chronically elevated levels of cortisol have been shown to impair immune function, reduce glucose utilization, increase bone loss and promote osteoporosis, reduce muscle mass, inhibit skin growth and regeneration, increase fat accumulation (especially around the waist and hips), impair memory and learning, and destroy brain cells.

Common emotions such as frustration and sadness can trigger a drop in the blood supply to the heart. In daily life, these emotions more than double the risk of myocardial ischemia, an insufficient blood supply to heart tissue that can be a precursor to a heart attack [HeartMath pg 54].

The daily accumulation of stress does the most damage; the little stresses add up. With unrelenting adrenaline and cortisol arousal, our system begins to weaken. [HeartMath pg 61]

The toll that stress has on our health, relationships longevity and quality of life is a consideration for all ages and backgrounds across the globe. The power of love in many forms has and unbelievable power to heal and transform stress as we have known across time and culture. Knowing some of the science of the power of love generated through the heart may help some who are cynical or hardened to what is naturally available to us.

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<H1>Heart-Brain Entrainment and the Healing Power of Love

<Fig. 54 Find an image that conveys bonding without being corny see heart bonding folder>

The word emotion literally means "energy in motion" and is derived from the Latin verb meaning "to move." When you experience stressful emotions such as frustration, agitation and impatience, your heart rate variability—one’s heart rhythm—becomes erratic and disordered. When you tend your fires with regenerative core heart feelings such as gratitude or tenderness, you effectively intercept the physiological stress response that drains and damages your system and you allow the body’s natural regenerative capacities to work in your favor. Instead of being taxed and depleted, your inner system—your mental, emotional, and spiritual dimensions—is renewed through your own inner yoga or coherence. *****Kristen [HeartMath pg 90- pg 91]

When your heart is in a state of coherence with your brain, you more easily experience meditative states, optimal flow, and a connection to life. Stressful reactions are more likely to occur when the head and heart are out of alignment. HeartMath pg 139

<H1>The Energetic Bond: Heart-to-Heart Entrainment

<Fig. 55 Choose another Heart Bonding image from folder>

Science is in its infancy concerning the complicated energetic connections that take place between people, but it’s already clear that if we touch someone while feeling an emotion such as tenderness, we’re transmitting a signal to that person’s body that promotes their well-being and health. Caring for someone or something has an uplifting effect on us as well, one that goes directly to our hearts. It is a regenerative experience that we can pass on to someone else. [HeartMath pg 161]

One person’s heart rhythms can entrain with those of another person; this has been seen in spouses who live and sleep together and in people who work close together physically over time. Just as pacemaker cells can detect and synchronize with one another to establish a beat, the electromagnetic field generated by one person’s heart can be detected in another person, both when they are physically touching and when they are only nearby (measured up to ten feet away) and non-locally in the phenonmenon . The more interaction two people have, the stronger will be the patterns imprinted in their hearts and other cells.

<H2 Global Coherence Project is ******

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<H1>The Collective Heart—The Power of Music, Movement, Chanting and Meditation

<Fig 56 Image of large scale collective movement>

<H2>Heart Rhythm and Music

Fig. 57 small pic of drum>

At the root of all power and motion, there is music and rhythm, the play of patterned frequencies against the matrix of time. Before we make music, music makes us.

—Joachim-Ernst Berendt

Science is now coming to an understanding of what yogis and indigenous cultures have known through the ages: that we live in a rhythmic universe and our whole being responds to its music.

Music is medicine, whether we use it for simple release or to enter the mystic states of communion that are the peak experiences of life. Recent studies have tracked how heart health can be enhanced through the power of music as our heart’s rhythm literally entrains with the rhythm of the music. Music not only has a positive effect on our heartbeat, pulse rate, and blood pressure—it does much more. It affects respiration, equalizes brainwaves, reduces muscle tension, regulates stress hormones, boots immune function, stimulates neural pathways, and increases our emotional bonding.

<Fig. 58 Small pic of chanting/ kirtan> Caption***** Universal Mantra—Chanting, in all languages, has a positive effect on inner well-being as it activates the body’s natural healing process, even including a reversal of heart disease.

<H2>Rhythmic Movement

Fig. 59 small pic of baby with electrodes in national academy study, Fig. 60 Find an image of a child dancing joyously Caption*****

Our innate response to rhythm is an inborn reflex that every parent on the planet has observed in their toddler. A recent study by the National Academy of Science found that the only type of sound that babies and toddlers respond to universally is rhythm; they shake and move their bodies to the rhythm naturally and without any other stimulus. When it comes to collective rhythm—making music, moving, and chanting together—the worlds of science, art, and spirituality are now in agreement: bonding in these ways is a gift that can heal our bodies and lift our spirits. Experiencing yoga, dance, and music together re-attunes us to our core rhythms, freeing us from stress and fragmentation.

My heart is burning with love. All can see this flame. My heart is pulsing with passion, like waves on an ocean. I'm at home, wherever I am.  And in the room of lovers I can see with closed eyes the beauty that dances.  Behind the veils intoxicated with love, I too dance the rhythm of this moving world. -Rumi. 

Text box: Collective Heart Mandala – the "heart-charging station"

In a world where we may devalue affection and community bonding in the ways of our ancestors, it is one of the one of the most radical and effective ways that we can keep our energetic heart charging. I begin most workshops, retreats, yoga trance dances this way where you can feel the tangible shift from separate individuals of thinking mind into an almost instantaneous collective bond. You can reach out and experience the power of heart-bonding through the collective by gathering anyone – friends, family, students, team-members spontaneously everytime you connect physically. Keep one hand on your heart and extend your other hand to the space behind the heart at the back of the person next to you until you have an interconnected circle or mandala. You will literally feel a heat guiding your hand to the right position behind the heart. Suspend any skepticism or cynicism and be open to your experience.

With the circle connected, follow what is natural, whether pure silence, offering primal sounds, chanting, or meditation perceiving the collective energetic field. You can keep this formation for anywhere from five minutes to an hour (people can change hands on their own or with guidance). Experience the "heart-charging" or the intensification of the electromagnetic field.

<Fig. 61 Collective Heart Mandala from Teaching>

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<H1>Embodying Your Energetic Heart—A Five-Part Universal Meditation

<Fig. 62 Either embodied heart image or a heart fire image>

Now that we have explored the cross-cultural terrain of the heart and understood some of the science behind our ancestral knowing, we can embrace the importance of embodying our energetic heart, not just for our own well-being but for our evolution as human beings.

As we feel into our own embodiment, we can sense the potency of our heart’s energetic field—within our body and beyond. We can feel a sensation, a stirring, an emanating sun-like energy that we can now understand as the perception of our heart’s electromagnetic field. We can begin to sense oscillations of the pulse of the heart from agitating effects of stress to the calming power of love through sensing our heart rhythm. We can relate to our heart as the rhythmic conductor of all our sacred intelligences—belly, brain, cells, and energetic fields.

We sense in deep time how the rhythms of breath, heart pulse, blood flow, activation, and relaxation create a tidal movement that mirrors the cosmic rhythm. The ancient vision of our ancestors that is reflected in the yoga practices that connect the body with the cosmos do not seem so strange now. We can find the sun in our heart as the radiant field, the moon in our heart as the hormonal nectar of love. We can become embodied firekeepers, practical household alchemists. Meditation becomes natural as our whole being reattunes itself to our inner fire—the living fire that is the expression of our energetic heart.

The following meditation is a meeting of the science and spirit of the heart, forming the basis for deeper explorations in Part 2. [5] 

<H2>Feel—Touch, Sensations, and Your "Heart Mudra"

Take a moment and feel who you are right now.

Bring your hands to your heart, open palms. Experience the subtle shift that comes through this touch, a centering and a settling of your awareness. Feel the sensations in your experience of your heart region. Whether the sensation is of numbness, a dim presence, or a shimmering radiance, it offers a kind of barometer to sense fluctuations in your heart center, notice when it is closing down, and know when it is time to add more "fuel" in the form of awareness, feeling, or presence.

<H2>Listen to Your Heart’s Pulse—Heart Mantra

Bring your fingertips to your pulse—underneath your jaw or at your wrist pulse point—and feel the rhythm of your pulse. This creates the sonic sensation of also hearing that pulse within. Feel and hear this, the dum-dum of your heart. Allow the sound to bring you into the first mantra of your heart. Feel your inner ears open as if to listen to an intimate knowing deep within you, a truth we often resist, a calling to slow down, a wisdom unique to this moment. Allow yourself to merge with the source by simply being, quieting the outer mind, and opening to your intimate experience of your Heart Fire.

<H2>Steady Your Gaze—Heart Drsti

Draw your awareness inward to connect with your heart center. Awaken your inner gaze or "heart dristi" by streaming the energy at the backs of your eyes towards your heart center. You may visualize this energy as an inner fire or simply feel your way, guided without any images. You will begin to feel an energetic quality that increases with your awareness, like a fire that can be tended and amplified through the fuel of your awareness. Even your downward-streaming gaze may feel like a river of light pouring into the fire of your heart. This downward flow brings great relief from excess energy to the head as the higher-frequency brainwaves begin to shift and "melt" downward through a loving gaze. This is the yogic way of inviting heart-brain coherence. Steady your gaze around this inner fire as you open to your inner firekeeping.

<H2>Tend the Heart Fire—Unifying Inner Rhythms

Drawing on the science of the energetic heart, explore your state. What dissonance is arising? What rhythms feel disconnected? How is the flow of your breath—smooth, jagged, tense, restricted, calm, flowing, deep? What is your mental-emotional state? Are your thought waves present and connected, or are they fragmented and disjointed? Do your emotions feel turbulent, repressed, confusing, frustrating, flowing, vital, present, connected?

You will learn yogic practices in Part 2 to bring your inner rhythms into entrainment, but you can apply a few simple techniques now that are accessible to everyone:

For one, slow your breath rhythm into a tidal flow of six to eight beats, counting on the inhale or exhale. This begins to change your heart and brain rhythms into a more syncopated state. Exhale through your mouth to relax and let go. Feel your heart rhythm and brain waves beginning to synchronize as you experience fewer thought waves and more presence. As a second practice, bring one hand to your heart and one hand to the crown of your head and cultivate any healing emotion that arises for you, such as compassion, love, or tenderness. The Heart Math Institute suggests gratitude as the greatest emotion to create "heart-brain coherence". This manner of tending your Heart Fire offers what is needed to bring your energetic heart into balance.

<H2>Express Your Heart Field

<Fig. 63 – Embodied heart field mudra with illustrated radiance>

Bring your hands in front of your heart with your palms facing inward. Begin to sense the energy that is subtly radiating from your heart to your hands. Allow your arms to expand slowly from your heart like the rays of a sun radiating in all directions. In Part 2, you can go deeper with other arm movements or mudra vinyasas.

Emanate from your Heart Fire. Feel the pulsing vibrations radiating from your center. This is the state of your energetic heart sent through your electromagnetic field to every cell of your body and beyond. Stay connected to your energetic heart and explore oving through the world with heart-centered awarenss of your internal coherence and experience the difference within the flow of your life.

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