Heart to heart communication and empathy
Theo. – I have observed the way you usually interview your patients. You always give the impression that you know all about the person and that you particularly care for him or her.
The Elder – I know nothing about the person I meet for the first time.
Theo. – Of course you don’t, but you do as if you were welcoming an old friend and resuming a conversation you had to interrupt some time ago. Can you elaborate?
The Elder – Which version do you want, the scientific or the spiritual one?
Theo. (with a mischievous smile):
– A mix of the two, if you please.
The Elder – I’m going to try and decompose what over the years has evolved into a natural and spontaneous approach.
Theo. – That reminds me of the Taoists’ notion of the Flow. So, you did not start it straight away, did you?
The Elder – That’s right! And as for the biggest secret, you already know it.
Theo. – It’s communicating through the heart, of course.
The Elder – It’s all there indeed!. The heart does know. It is important to let it do.
Theo. – But you must have an intention. You must bring about a move, musn’t you?
The Elder – I’m going to show you.
Think of a person you have to meet.
Focus on the heart. Silence
Let yourself be absorbed into its light. Silence
Then focus fully on the heart of the person you are meeting. Silence
Don’t force anything. Just let the light from your heart connect with the light from the person’s heart. Silence
Establishing that inner connection may take different amounts of time. Time is never the problem. We have plenty of time. Actually, we save time by waiting for a heart–to–heart communication.
Theo. – Yet I noticed you keep talking, and even joking.
The Elder – I am extroverted, you see. It’s natural. But my heart, for its part, is silent, still, and reverent. I facilitate, while both our hearts are at work. Take Daaji, for instance. Everything has to be interiorised with him, and it works wonders.
Theo. (teasingly):
– His nature, isn’t it?
The Elder keeps silent, before continuing:
– I won’t start any treatment unless that heart–to–heart communication has been established. Once it is, you must know that it is forever. Sometimes, it only needs being refreshed.
Theo. – How?
The Elder – By paying attention, showing interest, listening, just a word…anything that will arouse the love and compassion held in the person’s heart. That will give him or her an impression of having been adopted, identified, or even understood.
Theo. So you just refresh the person’s memory in fact. A simple thing to do, indeed!
The Elder – Simplicity comes from the being’s unity. The union …..
Theo. – There I’ll stop you, as you are bound to go adrift and start talking about God, or about the Divine, am I right?
The Elder (mockingly):
– Am I? Is there anything other than God?
Theo. – Yes! Life…what is normally between Heaven and Earth, you know? The human beings… the elections!!!
Both friends burst out laughing, well aware of what they mean.
Theo. – So the key to empathy is to be well aware of the other person, isn’t it?
The Elder – It is. But attention works both ways. Good teachers will capture the students’ attention. My Math teacher, in high school, used to be covered in chalk. Teaching was a passion for him. After he had taught for one hour, he could feel that our capacity to concentrate was faltering. Then, to revive our attentiveness, he would sit on the table with his legs crossed, throw up his hands and talk to us. We were like mice a serpent’s gaze fascinates. It was exciting to listen to him, and he would get excellent results with all his students.
As a matter of fact, researchers describe empathy as the capacity to focus on another person, so as to perceive his or her point of view and feelings. It is a non–verbal capture.
Theo. – Are there different forms of empathy?
The Elder – There are three of them: cognitive empathy, emotional empathy and the empathy of the heart, about which we have abundantly talked already. When you are in total empathy, your heart, mind, and emotions communicate. When in cognitive empathy, your brain is in touch with another person’s brain. The cortical part is what responds first, but many micro–observations are also at work, reading and analyzing body language and making connections between the elements gathered. Those are then correlated with the thoughts of the concerned person.
Theo. – I looks like the Mentalist, in a crime TV series. He asks himself questions about the suspect: What does he think? How does he think? What are his motives exactly? What does he want?
The Elder (approving):
– In fact, his brain will give him direct answers. There is some unconscious synchronism, on a physical and mental level. The Mentalist collects information, which the right part of his brain will synthesize, whereas the left part will analyze it.
Emotional empathy, five points of the heart
Theo. – And what about emotional empathy?
The Elder – According to Science, it would also relate to the brain, as it is connected with the limbic system
Theo. – You don’t sound very convinced, do you?
The Elder – Traditional Chinese medicine has taught me that our whole body partakes of emotion and that we communicate through it all. Scientific research demands that we should divide into compartments, into sectors, which is a good thing, but our unity is in fact what best represents us.
Theo. – It makes sense. So it would be somewhat like our DNA sequences, which are all identical, whatever part of the body we collect them from.
The Elder – The part contains the whole. It is a holographic representation, the concept of Fractals in Mathematics. We start resonating with emotions such as joy or worry. The Chinese explained how meridians, organs and their functions were like antennas. There are six levels in the way meridians are organized, from outside to inside, and they pick up all that is taking place outside (Heaven energies) and all that is taking place within an individual (Earth energies). There is a general twenty–minute cycle flow of energy, plus a daily regulation of the circadian rhythms every two hours, a seasonal and an annual flow, etc. So our whole system is crisscrossed in order to detect any change that might occur outside or inside, so that our being as well as our system may adapt to a specific environment.
Such functions also allow us to perceive a person’s distress, feel his or her pain and eventually sympathize.
Theo. – And take action?
The Elder – Here is when Shen (the heart) will intervene and see if acting is wise or not. The heart is our inner guide, and in order to play its role properly it must be free and be able to coordinate all the information and functions in the individual (the word individual meaning indivisible).
Theo. – As far as I can remember, the second level of the heart is related to instinct and intuition.
The Elder – Whence comes the high interest in meditating on the heart. Neuronal connections exist between the heart and the limbic system, the heart being also the original source of thought. So, it knows!
Theo. – Provided it has been purified and liberated of course!
The Elder – Even if it has not, but then the mind can’t easily grasp the heart signals, except where the danger is so great that the heart may directly interfere.
Theo. – How is that?
The Elder – Suppose you are driving on a motorway and listen to your favorite program. The program may be suddenly interrupted to warn the driver of an accident and recommend his exercising due caution.
Theo. (smiling):
– Attention recommended, again!
The Elder – We receive billions of information per second. A system for sorting and utilizing the information is therefore required.
Theo. – Except that we don’t always have the proper software to decipher the information. Command must be operational!
The Elder – Human beings have not yet been completed. So they must be working toward their own evolution. They can be helped, or even assisted, in the process, but they cannot be forced in any way. That is an absolute spiritual law.
Theo. – I can remember now. It’s all about respecting your famous freewill, the key to divine creativity!
It reminds me of the relation with the five points of the heart. For the heart to be free to speak to us, the five elements it is made of must be freed of all their complexities. Point 1, the Earth point, once it has been illuminated, makes us free of any desire. Point 2, the point of the Soul, gives us access to love and peace. Point 3, the Point of Fire, makes us access discernment and wisdom. Point 4 makes us be free from fear and it gives us strength and courage to face any situation with a still and serene inner Self.
The points of the spiritual yatra.
The Elder – The next one, Point 5, is very interesting. It announces that we are free from all the illusions in the manifested world and that, at long last, we can access the cosmic dimension within us (second star in the esoteric symbol). All the universal data are then available to us through Point 7 (Chit Lake).
Theo. – What about Point 6? Ajna-chakra, you never mention it.
The Elder – Until the eleven circles of the ego have been crossed, the spiritual Master won’t open it. It is the cosmic point of creation. It contains a great amount of energy. Unless the ego has been adjusted, it could be dangerous for men to work on that point. And until the Being has achieved Its union with God (Point 10), unleashing such a powerful energy could have a detrimental impact.
Theo. – In short, you mean no child should be entrusted with a gun!
The Elder – By comparison, the atomic weapon is a toy. Lord Krishna had full access to it, but he was an avatar, and could have only made a good use of it.
The esoteric symbol.
Theo. – I can imagine the damage if such a massive destruction weapon was in the hands of an evil tyrant.
The Elder – Somehow, I prefer the luminous explanation Saint John of the Cross gives in his book The Ascent of Mount Carmel. I’ll tell you about it later. The topic is fascinating. It concerns the right way for certain human beings to use the powers they have been endowed with.
Theo is very interested in such a topic, but he knows the Elder is waiting for the appropriate time to approach it. To contain his restlessness, he deliciously plunges deep into his heart where he is expected. Waves of peace emanate from it and shine all around him.
Theophile the Elder
An excerpt from Dialogs with Theophile the Elder
Theophile the Younger’s initiation