Activating the Global Heart: Creating our New Normal

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Spirituality
Mindset
Leadership
Health and Well Being
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Activating the Global Heart: Creating our New Normal

Sheva is a Visionary, Humanitarian, Creator, Lover of Life, Author, Speaker and the Founding CEO of Heart Ambassadors. She is also the Co-Vice President and U.N. Delegate Leader - for the United Nations Peace Messenger Organization "Pathways to Peace". Sheva helps people all around the world learn how to access your heart intelligence and peace of mind to receive the benefits of the hearts impact on your relationships, health, performance, creativity, contribution, legacy, social change and the building of a global culture of peace. HeartMath Institute are committed to help - awaken the Heart of Humanity to wake up. They believe that when we align our hearts and our minds and we connect with others, we awaken the higher mental, emotional and spiritual capacities that frequently lie dormant.

Websites & Community:
www.heartambassadors.com

WWW.PATHWAYSTOPEACE.COM

Gift: Shift to the Heart Course - Beginners Course

Description below in the first link then second link is your gift link.

https://heartmastery.com/l/shift-heart-beginner-course-description

https://heartmastery.com/access/HeartSoulWisdom

IMPORTANT: After you fill out information ~ "2nd step is to email support@heartambassadors.com with subject "Heart Soul Wisdom gift"  with your name and phone number to receive course instructions and the live call dates, times and access numbers."

Tools for Stress: https://weprovideppe.org/tools-for-stress

Global Coherence Initiative: HTTPS://WWW.HEARTMATH.ORG/GCI

References from Interview: https://mimiguarnerimd.com/

Heart Map Approach to Managing Hypertension:
https://store.heartmath.org/e-Books/managing-hypertension.html

Moira's Website: http://moirasutton.com/

HSW Community: https://www.facebook.com/CreatetheLifeyouLove1/

Reiki Sessions: http://moirasutton.com/long-distance-reiki-healing-session/

Transcript

Introduction  0:03  
Welcome to the Heart Soul Wisdom Podcast, a journey of self discovery and transformation. Moira Sutton and her amazing guests share real life stories, tools and strategies to inspire and empower you to create and live your best life. Come along on the journey and finally blast through any fears, obstacles and challenges that have held you back in the past so you can live your life with the joy, passion and happiness that you desire. Now, here's your Host Create the Life you Love, Empowerment Life Coach Moira Sutton

Moira  0:56  
Welcome to our second season, episode 31, "Activating the global heart: creating our new normal" with our very special guest, Sheva Carr. Sheva is a visionary, humanitarian creator, lover of life - I love that one - author, speaker and the Founding CEO of Heart Ambassadors. She is also the Co-Vice President and UN Delicate Leader for the United Nations peace messenger organization, Pathways to Peace. Sheva helps people all around the world learn how to access your heart, intelligence and peace of mind to receive the benefits of the hearts impact on your relationships, health, performance, creativity, contribution, legacy, social change, and the building of a global culture of peace.  HeartMath Institute are committed to help awaken the heart of humanity to wake up. They believe that when we align our hearts and our minds, and we connect with others, we awaken the higher mental, emotional and spiritual capacities that frequently lie dormant. So without further adieu, I would like to welcome back our very special guest Sheva Carr. Welcome Sheva.

Sheva  2:12  
Thank you, Moira.  Thank you for having me at this crucial time in our history.

Moira  2:18  
Yes, and your message is so powerful. That's why we're going to have you back many, many times. So if people miss you for one of the interviews, and I invite all listeners to go back to when Shiva was previously on so to be on the list, and listen to the first one and listen to this message over and over again. And definitely invite people to get involved with heart math Institute and to start implementing these tools. So let's talk about that. You know, and continue our heartfelt conversation. So first for new listeners, can you just start and begin with you know what heartmath Institute does their vision,  their commitment to help awaken the heart of humanity. So I get all excited there. So I'm just gonna take my own breath.

Sheva  3:06  
Ah, well, excitement is legal. Last time I checked, so I actually am Co Director at heart math, healthcare. So I'm going to distill things more in a in a kind of physiological conversation and say that it's to wake up the heart of humanity can sound a little bit grandiose, but really, it's quite simple in that most of us live if you think, I don't know, how often, in fact, I feel like I'm constantly on my computer pushing update later. It's always popping up these things saying download up, updates, upgrades No, like, No, no, don't bother me with that I might have a zoom call with Moira I can't be bothered. But we update our computers more often than we update ourselves. And so most of us are wandering around in this day and age with physiological programs or responses that were really designed when we lived in prairies and jungles and caves, fleeing predators. So this fight or flight response that activates in our nervous system and cascades throughout all of the body systems, which is very effective if a tiger is chasing us or a Mack truck is about to bound our way and hit us but not so effective if we get an email that's upsetting or dealing with a pandemic, where we need to use our higher intelligence to respond. So modern stress sores require a different capacity than the survival based intelligence of our ancestors. And when we go into that fight or flight response, it creates a chaotic pattern in the heart's rhythm and what's called heart rate variability. But it's just Herky Jerky, kind of Richter scale, earthquake type rhythm in the heart, that then sends a message throughout the body of a kind of organized chaos. And that tends to shut down the higher thinking centers of the brain and the self and situational awareness, impulse control those kinds of things. So with a simple skill we'll do right now, humans can learn to self regulate the heart rhythm, changing over 1400 things in their physiology. Not the least of which is the part of the brain perceiving the present moment and responding to it.

Moira  6:11  
So how does the brain - like there's a brain in our heart? How, how do we go about doing that as self regulation and in our room?

Sheva  6:19  
So when we do that, it optimizes our capacity for visionary foresight, problem solving, solution seeking the very kind of thing we need, in the modern stressors we face. So many, many, many of our mental health issues, physical health issues, can all be in some, not all but many, let's say the vast majority can be tied back to running the wrong software program in our hard times. And this simple shift in our physiology can occur literally in a heartbeat. So that's why it's well adopted, for example, right now, in hospitals and healthcare by law enforcement's beginning to adopt it more and more, because it can be done in the midst of the stress or in the height of the demand. So an ICU nurse who has to intubate a COVID patient can actually do this self regulation in the middle of that patient need. While she's, she or he is caring for that patient.

Moira  7:28  
What are some strategies that they that you teach them to use, so other people today can hear those.

Sheva  7:34  
40 different HeartMath skills, the only one we teach open source in a radio interview like this is called Quick coherence. It's kind of the hubcap of all the spokes of all the other tools. And so we can do quick coherence right now, if we just invite everyone to focus your attention on the area around your heart, the chest area. And imagine your breath is flowing in through the heart and out to the heart. Breathing a little slower and deeper than usual, if you find it helpful, and there's some method to this madness and some science behind the magic, you can count to five as you breathe in and count to five as you breathe out. And with that heart focused breathing, you could just start to notice, are there any changes already? In your body, your emotions, your thought process. Now the second step of quick coherence, which quickly gets the heart rhythm into a coherent state, again, changing those 1400 things in their physiology that optimize their health, or self awareness, their situational awareness, our capacity for a more effective response, is to activate what sometimes heartmath gets called a heart feeling or we would call a renewing feeling so a feeling that fills your fuel tank. So that could be a feeling of gratitude, for example,

Or appreciation. My husband and I just found out we're getting a new kitten in six weeks. 

Moira  10:01  
Wonderful! 

Sheva  10:02  
So I can just start appreciating that little guy. And instantly I feel my shoulders relax; I feel warmth, which is an increase in circulation. You can notice if you can find something to breathe gratitude for in this moment, as you breathe into the heart and out to the heart, you see, it doesn't have to be grandiose, like bells and whistles and angels on high and some kind of big awakening, it can be as simple as appreciating your cup of coffee or your tie. But that starts downloading that new software program to your heart where the heart gets coherent, radiating system wide coherence along four communication pathways. Four or five, actually, throughout the whole physiology, including the brain. Somewhere as you do that heart focused breathing and activation of gratitude, breathing into the heart and out to the heart. Do you notice any changes in your body for some emotions or thoughts right now,

Moira  11:19  
I found just like breathing in and out, just I relaxed, I went into a feeling of love and gratitude and appreciation, as you mentioned; it's just Oh, and what a beautiful simple exercise. As I said, we've put our house up for sale in a week and a half. And that's one of the big stressors I think there's divorce, there's having a child, moving. And just to do this during this, the packing, and getting ready and just know that all as well being in the moment. So definitely my my shoulders, I was sitting back, but I really felt a lightness. And just really a state of love.

Sheva  12:03  
Now, we bring these tools into the densest of human experience I've taught. We're in a really heightened conflict right now going on between Israel and Palestine. And I've taught these tools to girls in the Gaza Strip during a bombing. So they're realistic, not idealistic. And it's important that that our listeners know you're not always going to be able to access appreciation or love in certain stressful circumstances in those moments. And everybody could just try this right now. If you focus your attention on the area around the heart, and imagine the breath is flowing into the heart and out to the heart again, counting to five as you breathe in and counting to five as you breathe out. What that does is it actually begins to balance the autonomic nervous system. When I was in medical school, the autonomic nervous system was like the holy grail of medicine because 97% of doctor's visits were attributed to imbalances in autonomic function. For  our listeners, the ANS the autonomic nervous system is just the fuel pedal and the brakes of your car, it decides whether we're going or slowing. And as you can imagine, when you're driving, you want that to be in finesse. If you're just pedal to the metal, you'll crash into a wall. But if you're just brakes, you don't get anywhere. So this counting to five as you breathe in counting to five as you breathe out, roughly a five second inhale five second exhale is the optimal zone for autonomic function for the gas pedal and the brake. So that's one element of this. And if you can't access appreciation or love, just the breathing by itself can start to move the dial to bring you to a more optimal state and a more optimal response to your circumstances. But there are also renewing emotions you can find even in a stressful environment like the Gaza Strip right now. Like compassion or courage or dignity. So I invite our listeners just to try those on for a moment to breathe. Either compassion or courage or a sense of ease inside with what's difficult outside as you breathe in through the heart and out through the heart. All right. How does that feel for you Moira?

Moira  15:22  
Again, just beautiful. That was one of my questions for you when things are going around outside of us, and we don't feel that we have any control over that. And just to go into a state of compassion for people and for ourselves, but others in that courage and that dignity, sending love of it all the time, because there's so much fear out there in the news and, and, you know, with COVID, the fear is still, we're still in it. And, and just different, like you said, Palestine in Israel and different things still happening and racial stuff and but to send to people that and if we, I believe if we hold that intention, all of us, in this is probably part of your teaching what you teach us, just pull that in as a community a collective, you know, we can have an impact, you know, a global coherence effect.

Sheva  16:25  
Well, that's certainly the leading edge of the Harkness Institute's research is looking at how collective human heart fields because not only does the heart have a pervasive influence on your whole body, it also radiates like anything electrical in nature, this phone I'm holding and talking to you on Moira. Or your computer, let's keep my computer that keeps popping up. Giving me messages. Everything electrical in nature has an electromagnetic field that it broadcasts and it turns out the heart is the most electrical organ in the body. Each heart cell has its own electrical battery. So it's broadcasting a very broad spectrum electromagnetic fields that can be measured by crude instrumentation called a magnetometer, three feet away from the body. And so those fields in our hearts are interacting with other people's fields and the Earth's electromagnetic fields. And HeartMath Institute has actually begun to measure that interaction. We've known for centuries, the human field is influenced by the Earth's field, but now we're looking at can humans influence the earth. And that's a very compelling data starting to come out of sensors that have been placed around the world measuring the earth's electromagnetic sphere, and how collective points of human focus on caring for places like Israel, Palestine, or natural disasters influence the outcomes and the Earth's electromagnetic field.

Moira  18:21  
How do people, that's a lot of questions I was going to touch upon. So thank you.

Sheva  18:27  
Yeah, well, you call this activating the global heart. So that's really a lot of ways what that means to me. It's compelling that we can do heart transplants but not brain transplants the heart. Well, if you ask anybody to point to themselves anywhere in the world, they'll point to the heart the chest is their sense of self, except in Japan, where they point to the nose, but in Japanese acupuncture, the nose is a reflex for the heart. So we all feel our selfhood to be at the heart center. And yet, that selfhood is interchangeable. We can transplant it, but we can't transplant the brain. So in some ways, this is Sheva talking, not heartmath talking. I have come to feel in my own heart like there really is only one heart. We're all plugged into this universal heart frequency through our individual hearts. And when we unite in human caring, compassion, love and gratitude, then we change the field environments for the whole planet and probably beyond. And that changes outcomes we know from earlier research done, for example, by transcendental meditation, organizations that focused care can leverage a difference in localized violence

Moira  19:57  
Are there groups through HeartMath  doing work like this, like getting together. I  know Lynne McTaggart, she does like her power of eight, eight people coming together with  intention and this focus. Are there groups right now with HeartMath that people can join?

Sheva  20:16  
Absolutely. So there's two that pop to mind. And I'm sure there are many others. The obvious one is the Global Coherence initiative itself, which is free to join, which you can access through heartmath.org. They offer complimentary webinars on a regular basis with new information about the science coming out. But there's also an app so we actually have a biofeedback technology that will mirror to you in real time, this simple heart rhythm shift. There's two, there's one for an iOS or Android iPhone, phone cellular phone, called the inner balance monitor. And then there's a device for the computer called the M wave Pro. And with these devices, you can actually log into the GCI app, and join. Last time I checked, I believe there were 65,000 people in the app, joining at specific times to send heart to things together, or to do whatever practices they do, to radiate love, care and highest best outcomes to various global issues. So you can log into that GCI app and be a part of a group there. My organization Heart Ambassadors was designed precisely for this purpose to do to have a three fold effect. One, we do very in depth training on the self regulation body of work. So we train all 40 of the heart math skills, as well as about 50 other capacity building educational programs, for example on conflict, negotiation, mitigation, various healing modalities, and so on, to bring to full capacity people who want to make a difference in the world. That's the first step. The second step is we meet on a daily basis, and collectively as a Heart Ambassador community sent heart to specific issues around the world. And thirdly, we go beyond just sending heart we think of ourselves as kind of monastic activists. In that we have about 50 different world service projects, in 11 different categories in alignment with the Sustainable Development Goals from the United Nations, to take that heart intelligence and power and translate it into effectiveness on the ground for World Service. So that's how I ended up working, for example, with girls in Israel, Palestine, in the Gaza Strip. And so we work in that domain; we have hunger projects; we have conflict mitigation projects, endeavors to contribute to the effort and trafficking, conservation, food security. Because heart intelligence isn't just a soft skill, it's the soft skill I would want in hard times. And here we are, because it brings on board our innovative capacity to solve modern problems.

Moira  23:38  
That's extremely powerful.

Sheva  23:42  
Thank you, Moira. In fact, if your listeners want to send heart, you know, you were talking about your move today. And what I've been working on this morning is we've been collaborating with the United Nations for the last nine years. And I know there's mixed feelings out there about the UN, but I myself have a kind of reverence for the UN. Of course, anywhere there are people there are people issues, but the founding vision of the UN, in order to unite the world nations, to create peaceful resolutions to conflicts is profound. And some of what happens there is really the leading edge of possibility for our world. And so we just found out this week that we've applied two and a half years ago, to receive what's called consultative status at the UN to be able to work there more and serve the vision serve the staff at an even greater level than we currently have been. And so our review for that are sort of exam if you will, is our Q&A session with the selection committee is Tuesday. So I've been preparing for that all morning.  

Moira  25:00  
Sure to go very well. And I love that how you how you refer to it as the leading edge of possibilities because I truly believe that there's infinity that you know, the eight that there's infinite possibilities when we step into that zone.

Sheva  25:16  
Well, I love it that you brought that. I mean, this is obviously veering off topic. But in preparation for this, we created a new website about our world service work. And there's a top navigation panel on it called gratitude. But we turn the A into an infinity sign. And that's where we express gratitude to all our donors and volunteers who are creating the new world as we together choose love and create from that.

Moira  25:50  
Iisn't that perfect. I'm curious to Sheva, you know, people who - this is just again, I think it's all perfect our conversation, it doesn't have to go one way. And I love that this information is coming out, what you're sharing. People who have had a heart attack, and that comes through that. What happened when they were going through that, that heart attack, was it they were just in so much stress, the heart just almost like broke?

Sheva  26:17  
So there's not a one cause for cardiac arrest? In fact, there are, generally speaking, six known primary risk factors for heart disease and heart attacks. Almost all of them except congenital issues, meaning you were born with them are lifestyle issues that can be changed. We're really glad you're asking this question because it's become, for me personally, the primary focus of my work. Heart disease is in my family. Certainly my father died of sudden cardiac death. I have siblings who have hypertension, which is the number one risk factor for heart disease, and all cause mortality and morbidity, meaning that the likelihood you're going to get sick and die. A third of the world's population - maybe now getting closer to a half because they just redefined the numbers - and found that even small increments of increased blood pressure, produce long term damage. So a third to a half of the world's adult population has high blood pressure. So this is the much larger pandemic that no one is talking about. Heart disease and heart attacks, stroke and other cardiovascular episodes. kill more people than any other cause of death by more than double. Everyone's concerned or afraid about getting cancer, but you're far more likely to die of a heart attack than you are from cancer. Violent conflict, which we just spoke about, in which I certainly done a lot of advocacy and work in is number 236 on the list, whereas heart disease, which you're bringing forward is number one. 

Moira  28:16  
Number one. 

Sheva  28:19  
Since when did that make the evening news? Isn't that just a compelling juxtaposition of facts? And most astonishing more than 90% of those cardiac episodes are preventable.

Moira  28:39  
Can you share tools and strategies for people for that?

Sheva  28:42  
Why aren't we doing anything about that? So the top six risk factors that are known for heart disease include things like poor diet, and there are different definitions of what a poor diet is. But that's not a popular conversation because people are very attached to their food. We all know that elevated cholesterol is a high risk factor for heart disease. So for example, those who have a plant based diet don't have elevated cholesterol because the only place you can get that is from animal products. So Dr. Michael Greger who has an exquisite resource called nutritionfacts.org really outlines diet that would prevent heart disease if people were willing to do it. But why aren't people willing to do it because of their emotional attachments to food, which brings us back to self regulation, right? So that's when the capacity for visionary foresight, all of that is regulated by the heart rhythm. That's one of the risk factors. Obesity, which goes concurrently with obviously, poor diet and lack of exercise, which is a third thing. So lack of movements. Now, this is not about fat shaming anybody. And this is, we're talking morbid obesity as a risk factor for cardiovascular disease. Again, these are preventable measures. Blood sugar issues and diabetes. Again, diet related for the vast majority of people in our culture. Not all, there are other causes, and smoking. So what do people do when they smoke? They take a break from the momentum of the moment. They inhale deeply and draw a breath down into their torso, right. And they pause for the length of the cigarette and take deep breaths in and out Well, you could do that doing quick coherence instead. And I've taught many people to stop smoking by doing that. The benefits you get from smoking are less from the nicotine, which is the addictive substance and all the rest of it, and more, it's the actual pause to breathe deeply and get coherent in your heart. So these are kind of the accepted risk factors for cardiovascular disease. But when I was, when I did our first HeartMath patient educated patient education program at a hospital. This was in collaboration with the Cleveland Clinic Heart Brain Institute in North Hawaii. And we were studying together the dramatic heart disease levels in the local Hawaiian population, the Native Hawaiian population, who also had many of the other risk factors. 

First, I was shocked at that time, we're now talking over 20 years ago, I was shocked to read that lack of eating vegetables was one of the critical causes which, you know, no one ever taught me that in medical school. Let's just put it that way. But still 90% was considered idiopathic at that time. Idiopathic is one of my friends. And one of my cardiology friends used to say means the physicians are idiots and don't know what's causing it. Idiopathic, I don't know that I would agree with him. But it just means we don't know. We don't know the cause. Well, what's interesting now, and if you look at it this way, just look at high blood pressure alone as a predictor that you're on track to die of heart disease. Six weeks of practicing the self regulation skills from heart math. Reduce hypertension, in our study populations, equivalent to two years of taking medication; twice the impact of a salt restricted diet and exercise program and a 40 pound weight loss. And I don't know about you, but especially in the demands of this time, it will take me way longer than six weeks to lose 40 pounds. So we know that a huge amount of heart disease is humanity's stress. And this constant activation of a survival physiology that's out of sync with the demand of the moment, a situation and appropriate response, like calling an ambulance every time you want to go to the grocery store or the bank or the post office. We're draining our physical vitality, and our stress response and the heart is paying the price.

And the that is also treatable just like the other interventions are. And in fact, perhaps has more impact than all the other good you could do for your body in preventing heart disease. So you could still occasionally eat what you want, even if it's not the best for you, if you were managing your stress about it all. What's interesting here that I only recently myself realized in the last couple weeks because I've been focusing on building a blood pressure project for some of our healthcare partners and for you know, audiences, like your listeners, so that people can learn the skills to regulate their own blood pressure. Is that most of the drugs; in fact, I think all of the drugs that we use for hypertension, all of the pharmaceutical interventions, intervene with the hormonal stress response.

Moira  34:48  
Can you expand on that?

Sheva  34:52  
Have to go get my hypertension book and I can have a look but yeah, so if you look at beta blockers, for example, yes. All of the drug interventions that we're using are blocking either the adrenaline, the cortisol, or there's another hormone that's not popping into my brain right now. And so, when we self regulate our stress response, we're from the inside out balancing those hormones, we don't need a drug to help us do it, which is also good news for Olympic athletes, for example. DHEA, which is considered the resilience building hormone, and let's just say it eats out of the same pizza box as making a bed. It eats other the same refrigerator as cortisol, that quote unquote, stress hormone. So they're both, they share the same precursor, which is called pregnenolone. When you use the self regulation skills, you have less stress hormones. That make sense, right?

Moira  36:01  
Yes, it does.

Sheva  36:02  
So you can make more resilience building hormone DHEA, for the Olympic athletes I work with or any competitive athlete DHEA if they take it as a sub is considered a performance enhancing drug. And if it's discovered synthetically in their urine, they'll be disqualified, but they can make their own by self regulating their heart rhythm. If everybody wants to breathe through the heart for a moment, I can look up the name of the hormone I'm forgetting. And if I don't find it, I can always email it to you later. And you can. The book I'm sourcing this from, by the way is called 'The Heart Map Approach to Managing Hypertension: The proven natural way to lower your blood pressure' by Dr. Bruce Wilson and Doc Childre. With a pretty fabulous foreword by cardiologist Mimi Guarneri; she's, she really outlines well how managing our own stress response and getting in phase with the heart is the hidden solution to this unspoken about pandemic of heart disease.

You could send that to me, Sheva and I'll put it in the show notes for people so they can go look at that.

Absolutely.  

Moira  37:31  
Now, how do you define, because we we've we've, our focus for the title today was activating the global heart and creating our new normal. What do you mean by  creating this new normal? How do you see that? How do you envision that?

Sheva  37:47  
So we've been talking about the new normal already, which is really this upgrade to our physiology, right? So imagine if we didn't have to live our lives stressed every day, reactive every day? What if we could self regulate our emotions, and be at calm ease inside to talk through problems and solve them through solutions seeking innovations together in collaboration, rather than in conflict? Worry, fear; you brought up fear, which is another undercurrent pandemic to me. COVID pandemic, right. People are afraid of the vaccine or afraid of those who aren't getting vaccinated; like the fear is just part of the survival physiology. We can bring our rational, mature heart to all of these things, and handle them with poise. That's actually the new normal. That's the upgrade that our heart keeps prompting us to say, hey, "Yoo hoo, do you want to download this upgrade to your software?" And what that means in terms of, you know, when heartmath right now is talking about a new normal is that there is a collective impatience. As we edge toward a post COVID society, where people want things to go back to the way they were before COVID.

Moira  39:22  
What's what's your take on that?

Sheva  39:24  
That it? Well, first, I'll share what I'm hearing from heartmath. And I'd have to ponder what my take is on it. But what heartmath is pointing out is that we're not in a post COVID environment yet. If you look at India, for example, there's a huge surge going on. So the impatience is part of that survival physiology kicking in that can reactively and prematurely try to go backwards to the way things were before and create more messes and problems as a result. Does that make sense Moira?

Moira  40:00  
Yes, it does. I believe there's a gift in every moment, even if we've had all these crises and everything, and that we can learn from all situations, challenges that each one of us face. We all have that in our life and some people more than others. 

Sheva  40:18  
But I want to honor for the listeners who've had huge losses during COVID. I mean, spoken with who lost 11 family members, I myself only lost my aunt died of COVID. It's a little ,it can it can feel for some and I value the the willingness to see a gift and every problem that's definitely a heart perspective. But I also don't want to be callous.

Moira  40:42  
No, no. 

Sheva  40:43  
Listeners, it would be hard to say to someone who loves to live and family members, Well look for the gift in it. This is very painful and very difficult. There's no question. The main thing though, is that throwing ourselves into incoherence, and out of balance won't bring our family members back. Nor will exposing ourselves to unnecessary risks, in our impatience. So the way I look at this is, you know, our primary heartmath certification and actually my husband and I certify hospital workers in heartmath and as well as World servers. And if anyone's interested in becoming trained to train heartmath to others, you can reach out to us at Destress@heartmath.com that comes to my husband and I and our team. And we can give you information about becoming heartmath certified and one of our upcoming trainings. The training we teach is called the resilience advantage. This is the training we certify others to teach. And the emphasis is on resilience. Which is typically thought of as the ability to bounce back. And that's where this impatience to get past COVID is coming from right we want to bounce back. We want life to be the way it was before the crisis. But heartmath's definition of resilience, which actually was appreciated so much by the US Navy, that they adopted as their own, is a little more, the word would be complex. But let's say layered. It's not just to bounce back, because we can't always bounce back. I myself had birth anomalies in both my hips and pelvis, and I had my entire upper legs and hips reconstructed. A year and a half ago. 

Moira  42:48  
Wow. 

Sheva  42:49  
I have prosthetics in my body. I'll never bounce back to who I was when I was 20. In fact, I've done what I call resilience 2.0, I've bounced beyond. I can do things now that I couldn't do ever before in my life because of this intervention, even though I'm not the same. And so the heartmath definition of resilience includes this idea of bouncing beyond. To your point Moira, becoming more of the heart of who we are in the face of a challenge. And sometimes in spite of it. And we look at resilience in societies as well as individuals. So that's why I do this work with the Red Cross in the UN we look at how can a society become more after a wildfire or become more after an earthquake or a violent conflict be better together because of the adversity that was faced. And so the HeartMath single sentence definition of resilience is the capacity to prepare for, recover from and adapt in the face of challenge adversity and stress. So the new normal is an enhanced capacity to prepare for, recover from and adapt. The adapt is the bounce beyond in the face of challenge adversity or stress. And that capacity is built through heart coherence,

Moira  44:36  
Love that. Prepare, recover and adapt, the new normal.  

Sheva  44:48  
It's just times when we you know we can bring spiritual platitudes to things that are really tough. It doesn't fly, and so it can be easily Understood. And I just wanted to make sure you and I are not misunderstood.

Moira  45:04  
No. And I'm glad you clarified that, because that's exactly the way you said this, the togetherness, that's exactly where I come from. Yes, we'll just leave it at that mostly. I have a love for humanity and people on our planet,

Sheva  45:19  
Please, know, there was no criticism of you. I just happened to do this work in pretty gnarly situations, and you have listeners out there that are facing them. I want your heart to know this works; even in the darkest place, the light can turn on.

Moira  45:36  
Yes, thank you. I would really love to close with a meditation and then share with our guests. You know everything where they can find you and the gift that you'd like to give them. And if we can do a heart focused meditation just to really energize our heart intentions for, you know, to create new opportunities and the possibilities here in 2021.

Sheva  46:00  
So beautiful, thank you, Moira. It's such a privilege always to connect with you. I always leave more inspired by our time together.

Moira  46:11  
I also feel that.

Sheva  46:14  
So let's do a quick coherence to complete by focusing attention on the area around the heart, the chest area. Imagine the breath is flowing into the heart and out through the heart. Breathing a little slower and deeper than usual. If you find it helpful, you could count to five as you breathe in. And count to five as you breathe out. With that heart focused breathing, you could first just pause to ponder, "How is your recovery going from the stress sores of 2020?" Radiate compassion to yourself and your loved ones, for the way that the stressors of the last year, have played out in your life for theirs. And radiate this caring. This resilience. This compassion. By appreciating your strengths and theirs to meet these challenges.

Everyone during COVID has had to adapt and pivot in some way. What life used to be like for them, so appreciate your capacity, and that of others to adapt, to pivot, to innovate as you breathe in to the heart and to the heart. And one thing we didn't talk about in this call is that when you get coherent this way, it actually gives you more access not only to your higher brain function, but your intuition. So as we're breathing this appreciation for our collective human strengths and capacity and compassion for the challenges we faced, in through the heart and out to the heart, you now are sort of tuning your channel to your intuition. So pause and listen for any intuitive guidance your heart has for you. And in particular, you could ask your heart. This is one of the ways coherence helps us prepare. Ask your heart, 'Is there any preparation you could do for the rest of this day or your week to make an easier path for yourself?' Moira for your move.

Moira  50:13  
I was thinking I'm going to go pack a few boxes after this interview.

Sheva  50:15  
Hey, I mean, this is practical real world stuff. Last year, not only were we in the pandemic here, but we were evacuated for two and a half months, because our home was in the center of the California wildfires. And so I was doing this quick coherence technique one day and my heart said, "It's time to prepare for fire season." And my old self would have prepared by bracing and going into all that fear we just talked about earlier. My new self said, "Okay, so we did a walk about in the house and filmed all our belongings for insurance." And we called the fire chief, and he's coming over next week to walk around the house with us and help us identify steps we can take to create defensible space for the fire department. So that's a much more effective preparation than me just jacking my blood pressure up with fear.

Moira  51:19  
I know also with my family, that, you know, people say, "Do you know where you're moving to?" And as you and I were talking just personally, you know, No, I don't. But I trust very much my intuition and my higher self and my spiritual. Just being that the right home, the right area will show up. I don't have to get that home before I sell this home. It's just gonna unfold and And what if you know we have to rent or what if something like it will just, it will just unfold. And that's a trusting and knowing in a very deep inner being.

Sheva  51:57  
So of course the trusting and the knowing are renewing feelings that create coherence in the heart rhythm and are giving you another sort of ancillary benefit of it, which is confidence. It's a kind of what the founder of HeartMath used to say to me is opens a can of can do. You know, you can handle whatever comes your way because you'll just handle it effectively rather than react to it in fear.

Moira  52:28  
And really I have this I don't know if we talked about it before, you know, the fear act, acronym and it's not with dangerous having but fear being 'feeling excited and ready'.  

Sheva  52:41  
That's fun.

Moira  52:41  
Yeah, and I am excited. And I don't know where we're going. And it's a new adventure and I'm ready for a new adventure and it's just going to be perfect. So that's neat that you said that.

Sheva  52:49  
If you end up in Nova Scotia, and you want piano lessons my mom is a piano teacher there. In fact, I'm having a lesson with her in an hour because that was my COVID gift to myself is in lockdown. For the first time in 50 years, I let my mom Teach me piano on FaceTime.

Moira  53:09  
Oh, I love that because one of my things I've always like a baby grand and, and we'll look at homes and I go 'That's where my baby grand is gonna be,' because I want to play piano because I did my grade eight to teach elementary school.  

Sheva  53:15  
That's amazing. You have to send me baby grand magic because we're shopping for one right now. And I'm sure my mom would cook you a blueberry pie and some lobster to welcome you. She is a top notch piano teacher. She went to Juilliard and I was kicking myself, I didn't let her teach me 50 years ago, as you can imagine I'm kicking myself now.

Moira  53:48  
You're doing it now. 

Sheva  53:50  
And it's so amazing. I'll send you a little video of the story.

Moira  53:54  
I was I would love that thank you Sheva.

Sheva  53:56  
And that came actually out of doing quick coherence. That was an intuition that spoke to me. I was so as you can imagine caring for hospitals, my husband and I, when COVID hit, were in extremely high demand here at heart math. We were running a crisis center out of our home and helping physicians and nurses literally 24 seven around the world. And I noticed after a few months of that, that I was starting to burn out. And so I did this technique that we just did and asked my heart intuition what what should I do and my heart said you need a pattern interrupt something to take your mind off of what you're caring for all day long. And it said why don't you take piano lessons with your mom. It was just a flash. And so now my husband and I've been doing it together and we play duets, and it's been one of the greatest sources of joy in my life to date. So the heart really can create some magic in the mundane.

Moira  54:59  
I love that and to listen to that intuitive nudge, which next time when you come on Sheva we'll get into that a bit more too.

Sheva  55:07  
All right.

Moira  55:09  
Can you share what you'd like to give to our special listeners today.

Sheva  55:15  
So obviously, if you would like to become certified to teach Heart Math, again, you can write to us at destress@heartmath.com. If you want to just learn the the basic skills, let's say the first five skills for your own use, we're giving you the gift of our heart mastery shift to the Heart Beginner course, and Moira will have a link to that. It's five pre- recorded webinars with a group discussion that meets live for group coaching once a week. And you can participate in those daily calls we do Heart Ambassadors, as our guests during the time you're in that class, which we talked about earlier, where we practice the tools together every morning, and send heart to different things around the world. And we're giving that shift to the heart course with a month of daily heart start calls as our gift to you to help you get back in phase with your heart and become a pacemaker cell in the heart of humanity.

Moira  56:18  
Love that. Thank you Sheva.

Sheva  56:21  
Thank you.

Moira  56:23  
I want to thank you for just being such a special guest and sharing this powerful message and that's why I want to have you back and back and back is to...

Sheva  56:33  
That's all my favorite questions because nobody asks me about heart attacks and hypertension and I'm like that's the real conversation we should be having.

Moira  56:41  
Okay, we'll dive more into that next time. Thank you for sharing your heart and soul, your wisdom on activating the global heart creating our new normal. Namaste Sheva.

Sheva  56:52  
Namaste, such a joy. Smooth move Moira.

Introduction  56:58  
Thank you for listening to the Heart Soul Wisdom Podcast with Moira Sutton. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. Please join our community at Moira Sutton.com and continue the discussion on our Facebook page. Create the life you love. You will be part of a global movement connecting with other heart centered people who are consciously creating the life they love on their own terms. Together we can raise our consciousness for the greater good of humanity and for our planet.