The following excerpts from Sarah Childre's letter (President, Institute of HeartMath) talk about the struggle for balance many of us are experiencing as the news from Haiti rips our hearts open. How do we maintain our inner peace when disaster strikes or the negativity of the news knocks the air out of us?
"Dear Friend, The devastation from the earthquake in Haiti has caused me to feel such compassion in my heart...
[However] At times our attempts at true compassion slip into feelings of gloom, pity and remorse. This often drains our energy and vitality that’s needed to sustain our personal health and well-being. I experienced this throughout my life until I learned the importance of balancing my care. If we employ our heart intelligence, we can feel compassion while deeply caring about what others are going through – yet we learn to do this without experiencing the emotions that drain and devitalize our personal energy....
We cannot change the devastation and human tragedy caused by events like the Haiti earthquake, but we can find peace and compassion by becoming genuinely aware of how we feel. Are you feeling hurt, angry or confused about this event or something else? Focus on your heart area and breathe in love, appreciation and compassion and breathe out the feelings that compromise your balanced care for one to three minutes...Objectivity
will help to ease your feelings toward a state of neutral. When you rest in neutral and soak and relax in the compassion of your
heart, you gradually dissolve hurt, anger and confusion.
Do this daily until you feel you can send a few minutes of
compassionate heart to a person, issue or situation. Continue sending
heart whenever these feelings surface. In this way, you will begin to
re-pattern yourself to
become neutral when
these feelings arise."
Learn more about the process of re-patterning by going to Solutions for Stress - Depression in HeartMath’s Free Services section.
To read the rest of Sarah's letter, click here.
If you would like to participate in sending care to the people of Haiti, please join us at the Global Coherence Initiative
