What does it mean to be “heart-centered”? Two of my favorite spiritual teachers, Yogi Bhajan and Ram Dass, both talk a lot about the heart and the importance of being able to “come from the heart,” so I was deeply intrigued by an article I just read about scientific research into this mystical organ.

In his article, “How You Can Really Listen with your Heart,” in The Soul Body Connection, January, 2012, Stephen Harrod Buhner summarizes much of the recent scientific research into the heart as a sensory organ. He explains how the heart field– the electromagnetic field created by all the heart cells beating in rhythm– is “5000 times stronger than that of the brain’s and can be measured by the most sensitive scientific instruments up to 10 feet from the body.”

Each of us emits our own electromagnetic signature, full of constantly changing information. Chemical, electric, magnetic, and emotional information are vibrating in our fields at all times. But we are not simply projecting information through this field, we are also perceiving information through contact with other electromagnetic fields. The heart field acts as both as generator and a receiver, exactly as the yogic concept of the aura is described.

In order to decode this information, however, we need to shift our consciousness out of our minds and into our hearts. According to Buhner’s own research, if you ask most modern Westerners where in their bodies they live, they will point to their heads. If you ask indigenous people who still live close to the land the same question, they will usually point to their hearts.

The chakra system in yogic philosophy teaches us that consciousness concentrates in seven areas of the body, each with its own vibrational signature, and that with practice we can learn to move our consciousness to these various centres at will, much like shifting gears in a car. Moving one’s awareness from the head into the heart literally opens up a whole new world of perception.

Consider the analogy of a dog, sniffing his way down the road and stopping to investigate a particularly compelling scent. The owner only sees a shrub or a patch of grass, yet the dog is able to interpret a vast reservoir of information: the last dog who was there, its sex, where it has been, what it has touched, if it is ready to mate, and its mood. The dog’s nose picks up a whole story, not just an interesting scent. Similarly, when we shift into perceiving from the heart centre, we are able to access a vast amount of information that was previously “invisible” to us.

When consciousness is focused in the heart, an altered state of consciousness occurs, one called “heart coherence.” During this state, the entire body, including the other organs and the brain, begins to oscillate in rhythm with the heart. As a result, the heart field increases in depth and power, and the type of information being processed in the brain changes. In a state of heart coherence, we are able to “read” another electromagnetic field with ease, whether it is the field of a person, animal, or plant: “Information flows through the heart first, and is then routed to the brain through the direct heart-brain connections for further processing.” Buhner hypothesizes that this may explain the complex botanical knowledge of so many indigenous peoples.

Ram Dass, author of Be Love Now, teaches a simple meditation to bring you into your heart centre.After taking a few, mindful breaths, you consciously move your attention out of your head and into your heart. From there, he says, “Love everything.”

Yogi Bhajan, Master of Kundalini Yoga, taught that the shift from the Piscean Age to the Age of Aquarius is characterized by an acceleration of the vibrational frequency of the planet to the frequency of the Heart Centre.

Both of these teachers emphasize the importance of understanding our oneness with all things, and pointed to the heart as a means to that understanding. The fact that scientists are now beginning to study and measure the effects of being “heart-centered” helps to validate these teachings and make them palatable for the Western mind.

Buhner explains the radical shift in consciousness that occurs when we perceive from the heart: “Heart cognition moves us from a rational orientation in a dead, mechanized universe…