THE HEART-BRAIN ALLIANCE

 Q. I accept that the heart communicates with other internal organs. Nonetheless, shouldn’t it take back seat, when compared to the significance of brain development?

A. In 1991 the work of Dr. J. Andrew Armour introduced the startling concept of the brain in the heart. His research revealed the heart has a nervous system that is a complex network of around 40,000 neurons and neurotransmitters just like those in the brain.

Even more intriguing, this ‘heart brain’ is in dialogue with the ‘head brain.’ The heart to head information flows by way of the vagus nerve, to the medulla, through the amygdala, to the cortical areas.

There’s still more. The heart produces hormones that travel through appropriate arteries to all the organs in the body, including the brain. These hormones include neopinephrine, dopamine, and the ‘bonding hormone’ oxytocin. Oxytocin, present in parents as they cuddle their babies, also significantly affects pair bonding, levels of tolerance and cognition.

Cognition? Yes, cognition, as in learning and thinking. The brain in the heart helps the brain in the head think better. There are many advantages of an open channel of communication between the heart and head.

Now imagine a child learning while enveloped in the heart fields (12 ft in diameter) of elders who listen to the voice of their hearts and, likewise, cherish the child’s open channel. This opens a tantalizing new way to look at learning.

When the parents/teachers listen to the voice of the heart brain (their own, as well as the child’s), the child feels cherished, trusted and stimulated by engaging curricula, caring relationships and inviting surroundings. The child’s gaze is clear, the intelligence switched on, the hands and feet productively engaged. In this fresh envisioning of education, communities of elders and children actively create, work toward meaningful goals and harvest the fruits of their labors together.

Does this mean throwing out academics? No. It means the academics ride more naturally and easily into receptacles for scintillating intelligence, ie. beneficiaries of an open, flowing heart/head dialogue.

By contrast, have you ever been in a conversation in which another speaks so loud and long that you can hardly get in a word? In humankind’s current experiment with education that’s how the rational voice speaks over the quiet voice of the heart. The loud voice of the intellect concerns itself with how much, how fast, how much more, and how much faster the child absorbs and stores data. Adults anxiously measure this progress against norms.

Many child brains freeze up and/or seek escape from such a barrage.

The voice of the heart quietly confers about the quality, ie. the joyful, meaningful, compelling and creative self-expression inherent in  the learning experience.

Einstein said, “Creativity is intelligence having fun.”

In the past our society has not known that regimented schools, excessive paperwork and red X’s on papers obstruct the heart brain/head brain communication channel. Now we do. Now is the time to design systems that promote an open, healthful, intelligence-optimizing flow. In the wake of the rule of autocracy, let the reign of the heart/brain synchronicity begin.