2018

Broken Heart

Sunipa Sen
Learner Explorer
01/01/2018
 Broken Heart

Cherish the child, man and woman in you to love,

appreciate and empathise with every being around
you.
I remember reading this message on the packet of QuickFix glue
tube “Joins Everything Except Broken Hearts.” Now, when I
recall the message, it fills me with many questions. What can
cause my heart to break? What will happen if it breaks? How
will I mend it? True, these questions are direct from my mind; if
my brain is dead then I am merely declared „brain dead‟, but if
my heart stops beating, then I am clinically pronounced dead.
Yes, this is again from my mind, which is trying to reason out
why, what, when and how my heart can metaphorically and
clinically break down. My mind is my rationality with respect to
the conscious and subconscious state of my mind. My heart
denotes my emotions and feelings. My wisdom is to maintain a
harmonious balance between the two.
When I try to answer the questions, I realise that both biological
and emotional factors together affect the heart. When I am
overpowered by negative emotions such as sorrow, stress,

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anxiety, depression, anger and resentment due to various

reasons, it affects the clinical health of my heart. This, to certain
extent, answers my questions of when and why heart breaks.

My mind does not stop here; it wants me to find out how can I
know my heart is broken? This again makes me ask myself
what are the causes of negative emotions that affect me mentally

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and my heart‟s health too? The most popular reasons I am aware

of are: losing a loved one, marriage or a loving relationship that
does not work out; setback in professional and personal life;
when someone betrays me or breaks my trust; when I don‟t
achieve what I am aspiring for; when I am unable to fulfill the
expectations of not only myself but also of my family, friends,
colleagues, organisation or community; when my self-worth
(dignity) is hurt. When I narrate the causes to my mind then it
makes me think of the biological symptoms like respiratory and
gastric problem, heartburn, hypertension, high blood pressure,
various heart ailments that indicate heart break and can be fatal
enough to be a clinical „heart break‟. Needless to say, strong
negative emotions apart from snapping the heart strings
(tendons) can also cause severe mental depression results in
addiction or suicide: a heart break of its kind.
Now, my mind asks me what I should do when I suffer from an
emotional heart break that can affect my health and happiness. If
possible, can I avoid such heart break? This question makes me
delve deep into my heart and mind and find this: I have to be
true (honest) to myself, have faith in myself, believe in myself
that is my true strength. This will help me see through lies,
deceit, manipulation, discrimination, exploitation and aggression
resulting in jealousy, resentment, sorrow, anxiety, helplessness,
depression, anger and vengeance. How can I avoid negative
emotions by being true to myself; in fact, what does being true
to me really mean?
Being true to self is to be aware of my strengths in the form of
my potential and capabilities; my fear and apprehension in the
form of my weakness and dislikes (the mental blocks) that can

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make me biased or prejudiced that invariably affect my thoughts

and decisions. To love myself means to accept my weakness
and not be ashamed of it; if I don't, then I will try to hide it
giving in to negative emotions, thoughts and actions. When I am
aware of my strength and weakness, then I can constantly make
every effort to improve on them to meet the challenges that
come my way to achieve my objectives or goals, such as to
harmonise with the environment - the surroundings.

Believing in self (being true to self) means being aware of my

potential, and accordingly should reason and develop the
strategy to achieve my objective. For instance, my objective is to
be happy. Then I will reason out the cause of my sorrow and use
my potential to deter the cause of unhappiness. This I can
achieve only when I believe in myself. If I don‟t believe in
myself then I deceive myself and succumb to failure.
Let me take the example of being happy. At the moment I am
tired and I ask myself how can I be happy? My heart replies that
a refreshing cup of tea or coffee would do. I do not heed to the
answer and fix myself a cuppa. Instead, I lie down and let

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negative thoughts crowd my mind only to take me farther away

from being happy.
Another example is: my heart urges me for an alcoholic drink to
feel happy. I give in to its wish and continued heeding to it for
more drink and drink until it affects my mind and body to the
extent that I fall into an intoxicated stupor. Why did this happen,
when I was merely heeding to my heart‟s demand?
The answer is simple I did not listen to my mind too that was
trying to reason with me to the beneficial limit of the alcoholic
drink. To believe in myself I have to constantly strike a balance
between my mind and heart. This will prevent me from harming
myself, or from getting overpowered by negativity.
Why should I believe in myself? Having faith in or believing in
self is the hope that keeps me moving on to achieve my day to
day objectives and even bigger objectives of life. It is hope that
keeps me alive.
Let‟s try to understand it through an example. I want to become
an artist so that I can paint and sketch beautiful pictures and
even take beautiful photographs of natural surroundings,
animals, birds and people around me. I need to believe in myself
so that I can fulfill my dream: My mind confers with my heart
about my interest with respect to my strength and weakness (my
true potential) to realise my dream of becoming an artist. When I
listen to my heart and mind together, then I can devise a realistic
plan and take necessary steps to develop my talent and fulfill my
objective: paint and sketch beautiful pictures.

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While trying to develop my talent I may take a famous artist as

my role model and his works as the standard I aspire to achieve
to become an artist. This is where I again make the mistake of
listening to my heart more than I do to my mind:
A role model is a person I intend to emulate and not imitate. To
emulate means to imbibe his principles, his good habits and his
way of developing himself and the way he addresses the
challenges he faces in his life. I do not blindly copy his favourite
colour, clothes, food, his handwriting, his hairstyle. Such a
fallacious imitation will evidently frustrate me as I will
invariably experience an identity crisis because I ignored my
true self and blindly copied someone I consider to be my role
model. This also means, I should not constantly compare my
work of art to that of my role model, then that will make me
doubt my ability to achieve my objective. Again, if I enroll into
a course with this objective in mind: to become a painter as good
as my role model and paint exactly like him, then the I am
confirming my failure to achieve my objective through formal
training too, as I have already explained it: I will constantly
compare my ability with that of the famous painter: my role
model. I begin to ignore my true potential, work on them to
develop my talent. This results in frustration and self doubt. I
become sensitive to explicit and implicit remarks and comments
of my friends, family and the community and that reinforces self
doubt and slackens my effort in achieving my aspiration.
Therefore, I should emulate the qualities of the people I admire,
I should not imitate them. I again miss out on striking a balance
between my heart and mind. Unfortunately, self doubt evokes
negative emotions of frustration and I miss out on rationally
striking a balance between my heart and mind and develop my
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unique potential with or without professional help. I miss out in

believing in myself.
Then the need of the hour is to strike the balance through proper
introspection or reflection that I can achieve through mindful
meditation to effectively strike a balance between my heart and
mind. The objective of mindful meditation and introspection is
to regain dignity-self worth (self confidence), while valuing and
respecting all that is around me.
Let‟s try to understand it with the help of an example: My
parents want me to become a doctor, they constantly remind me
of the tacit commitment I have made to them to become a
doctor. I give in to their wish; or I want to become a chartered
accountant because it is a lucrative profession, I ignore the fact,
I may not have the aptitude to be a chartered accountant and I
may not be interested in becoming a doctor as my parents desire
me to. My heart tells me that I have the potential to become a
Teacher Learner, but I ignore it. I reason out ways and means,
both fair and unfair, such as bribing or intimidating the
authorities to get necessary academic scores or marks to become
a doctor, if I have acceded to my parents wish or to become a
chartered accountant that my heart desires and ignore my mind‟s
reminder of my true potential. Have I really achieved the
objective? Have I been true to myself? Have I really believed in
myself to realise my parents‟ or my dreams? What will happen
then?
In fact, I have succumbed to negativity at the very instance of
trying to ignore and falsify my potential. I will give in to
negative attitude. I will become arrogant to defy the truth. I will
try to avoid any introspection to address the cause of my sorrow
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and frustration. I will get into a vicious circle of being attentive

to the failures and misgivings of other people in order to ignore
and cover up my own weakness. I will indulge in gossip, libel,
discrimination and even give in to aggression and vengeance to
hide from my own truth. Intense negativity will take its toll on
my health and above all, on my heart and mind. The cause of all
this is anyone‟s guess, I refused to trust myself, love myself,
believe in myself and have faith in myself. The resultant
negativity can also make me a timid and submissive person
without a mind of my own, when I constantly give in to undue
expectations my parents, well wishers and invariably I will set
skewed expectation from myself. I fail to be assertive enough to
reason with self and my well wishers. I avoid being a skeptic
rationalist and helplessly give in to blind faith: I give in to the
"herd instinct".
I cannot ignore the fact: “hurt people, hurt people”. When there
is negative emotion in me, I will share negative thoughts and
emotions with those around me. I become a victim of my own
negative emotions and I display it through my negative thoughts
and actions.
Let‟s take a simple and mundane example: I go to a public place
where I have to remove my hat before entering the premises.
When I return to the place I had kept my hat, I find someone has
stolen it. Instead of informing the administration of my loss, I
wear someone else‟s hat on my way out. When I discuss this
with my family and friends, I do it with an implicit expectation
that they will endorse my action, which people often do by
sharing their similar experience and unknowingly transforming
such act into an unwarranted norm.

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In the future, if I revisit the place and remove my hat only to

find it has been nipped yet again, and I this time I report the
incidence to the administration. They may assure me of
corrective action. When I share the experience yet again with
my peer group and friends, the same people who had validated
my action of taking someone else‟s hat and not reporting the
incidence to the authority will ask me, why I did not use my
„common sense‟ and wear someone else hat. This will make me
question my belief (in my integrity) and invariably shake up my
self confidence.
My mind says, survival is more important than integrity. My
heart responds integrity(humanity) is the very basis of my
survival. Constant subtle and severe backlashes of this kind will
affect the balance of my heart and mind resulting in negative
impact on my emotional and clinical health...
Now, my heart and mind together ask me, it is easy to deceive
self than to be true to self. Why is it so?
They want me to explain it:
When I am exposed to gossip, slander, aggression, vengeance,
discrimination, rejection, animosity, deception, connivance,
derogatory practical jokes, black humour, negative competition,
when social validation is more important than to be true to self
(Believe in self).
I reiterate, „hurt people hurt people‟. To be true to self, love self,
and believe in self and have faith in self culminates into my
dignity in the form of deep sense of self respect, self worth, and
this result in the courage to be compassionate. To be able to

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understand the person‟s hurt that has caused him/her to hurt me

and respond to him/her accordingly instead of reacting
negatively to their negative action. Such response is a sign of
wise use of mind and heart. It‟s easy to become vengeful and
retaliate when hurt, but it takes real courage to comprehend the
hurt caused by a hurt person. The ability to be compassionate is
a mark of true faith in self.
Negative intentions in the form of thoughts transform into action
can be negative and I am responsible for them. My ability to
take responsibility of my thoughts and actions is the basis of my
integrity and self respect.
My heart and mind are not satisfied with my response, they want
me to explain how I can overcome the continuous onslaught of
negative emotions that may distort my perception affecting my
dignity and self confidence, causing stress and anxiety the
precursor of both emotional and clinical heart break?
My instinctive response to the question is, if I am true to
myself, then I will respect my personal space and also that of
those I interact with. I will give time to myself to relax both
physically and mentally through reflection in the form of prayer,
meditation, yoga, physical exercise, creative pursuits: pursuing
in leisure my hobbies using my creative abilities to transform
my negative emotions like sorrow, anger, resentment in creating
a aesthetically beautiful art, craft or a delicious dish. I may tend
to the plants in the garden; spend time with children, elderly and
animals. In this way, I am able to take care of my emotional and
physical well being. I pursue only the creative activities I like
and not indulge in activities with the intention of gaining social

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recognition or social validation. Often people decide to go to the

gym to gain community/social recognition or social validation.
There are people who vacation in specific tourist places that
have been endorsed or recommended by their friends or by the
professional circle or social community they are striving to
establish themselves in. Such actions only prevent them from
being true to themselves and genuinely enjoy and are truly
happy and relaxed during the vacation without being self
conscious. When I am true to myself, I value my individuality
and that does not make feel lonely, value myself enough to value
my surroundings and the environment within and without.
I reiterate, the need for self development is not to feel
emotionally weak- to need someone's shoulder to lean on. Self
development is to improve my emotional intelligence and my
ability to emapthise.
My mind laughs at my heart and says, „without me, you cannot
identify sorrow and anger, you cannot control your anger from
becoming self and object destructive. Are you aware of it? I
scratch my head as I really wonder what will be heart's reply.
It gently put a smile on my lips and I hear it reply, “the sorrow
melts into tears and wells out of the eyes. It is always better to
cry and lighten the weight of fear, sorrow and resentment to
weigh down the heart and transform into destructive anger.
True, I do feel much better when I cry away my sorrow. My
mind echoes the smile and says, “I cherish the positive sense of
humour that does not belittle or hurt anyone's heart. It is a
universal truth, if I hurt anyone, I hurt myself. Therefore, I am
true to myself, love myself, believe in myself and have faith in
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myself, and all this I am able to do with you, heart. You help me
to avoid emotional or clinical heart break.”

References:

Meditation for Mindfulness:

http://ourworld-sunips.blogspot.in/2017/10/meditation-for-mindfulness.html

Selfie Mode of Self Development:

http://sunipslearning.blogspot.in/2016/11/the-selfie-mode.html

Acknowledgement:

Picture Source: Google Images

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