If we learn how to balance head and heart, we achieve our life’s true potential. It requires restoring ego, soul, and self to their natural healthy states without the harmful programming of religious bias and prejudice. If you want a healthy life, relationships, and community, you must achieve this balance.
We think it is important to define our terms so readers understand exactly what we are discussing. There are many ways to describe consciousness and mind. Some conclusions and concepts are based on scientific research, and some come from spiritual traditions. Modern psychology is simply the rebranding of concepts from spiritual traditions.
Restoring Ego, Soul, and Self
The widespread effects of religious bias and commercialization prove that our culture is out of balance. So, most of the people you meet are out of balance. You may also be out of balance because these two overriding ideologies affect more than 75% of the population to some degree. But you can’t fix what you don’t know is broken. So, let’s find out what we are talking about when we use terms like head, heart, ego, soul, and self.
We’ll start with the basic terms:
— The head refers to our ego.
— The Ego or the Self is the home of our personality and instincts.
— The “real you” is the Soul or Spirit, what we refer to as the Observer.
— The heart is the seat of emotion and intuition, the junction point of the ego, spirit, and consciousness.
It is consciousness, which is the conduit linking everything together. You are not your body. The Observer of your consciousness is the real you. It is who we speak to inside our heads. It’s the entity that watches or observes our lives. The heart feels our emotions and links us to intuition. To restore the balance between head and heart, we must clear the mind of any obstacles.
The Head and the Heart have unique channels for receiving energy and hearing messages from the Observer and a greater Source. The heart speaks to us through our emotions and intuition; the head talks through reason and common sense. We need both because they receive different messages. The Spirit, or Observer, watches the different energies and priorities but does not interfere.
How to Balance Head and Heart
To restore the balance between ego, soul, and self, we must become aware of the programming that affects the conscious and subconscious mind. We must learn to connect with our heart, intuition, and the innocence of our mind and spirit without the contamination of religion.
There are some excellent tools for determining what’s going on with the mind and the heart. The Enneagram personality profile tool helps you identify the common thought scripts that run your personality and instincts.
The Cultural Narrative Questionnaire will help you identify harmful scripts affecting your mind and heart. You can use these tools by yourself, but working with a partner or group can be beneficial. Working with others can help you when you run into roadblocks of harmful values and thought scripts.
Comparative Analysis, a structured form of comparative religious study, can help you resolve issues related to religious bias and prejudice by revealing the true origins of these ideologies. It will also reveal your core beliefs.
These tools are serious inner work, and they can raise many other issues related to strongly held beliefs. But the work is worth it.
Restore the Balance Between Ego, Soul, and Self
Achieving a balance of power between these elements is ideal. We were born this way, but the ego dominates most people’s lives because that’s how culture trains us. Modern culture values Head over Heart and ego over soul.
Ideally, we want to live fully present, always connected with the source. When we do this, the Observer can come forward to experience life more clearly and with direct thinking.
We need to dig a little bit deeper. Three things need to work together to achieve balance. We need to learn how to balance head and heart and restore the balance between ego, Soul, and Self.
What is the difference between these elements? Here’s how we define them. The ego is our default setting, which contains our genetic personality and instinct. The soul is another word for the Observer.
The self is the new element in our equation. The self is the subconscious mind connecting Soul and Ego. It’s the glue of consciousness. The self is our spiritual, physiological, neurological, and sociological identity. (1)
The Ego, our Soul, and the Self need an energy source to make them aware and alive. Consciousness is the element on which all depend for sustenance.
Connecting to the source is hard to explain because it is beyond the experience of the five senses. Dr. Wayne Dyer refers to Source as The Spirit (2). He considered himself a Sorcerer because he meditated regularly and bathed in this transcendent place of peace. He connects with the source or pure consciousness to engage his intuitive gifts.
Trying to Restore the Balance between Head and Heart
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi used the analogy of a flower to describe “source” like the sap within the plant (3). The colorless fluid makes the stem green and blossom in different colors. So, the sap is the source of the flower’s form and essence. The sap is everywhere in the plant, from the roots and the stem to the flower. The roots get their energy from the ground. In his analogy, the root is the link between the ground or transcendent and our conscious awareness. Connecting to this source of energy puts us in touch with our intuition. It is the most simple way to create a balance between head and heart.
Another way to look at it is through the analogy of the mansion. Imagine you own an estate but never go beyond the hallway into any rooms. That is what living with the ego in control is like. You don’t know what you are missing because you have no frame of reference for it. A lot of people live like this, and they never open any of the doors. How about you?
If you are going to correct this imbalance, you will need to do some serious inner work. It requires identifying and removing harmful thought scripts and values. It is hard to do because we are constantly bombarded with propaganda reinforcing this programming.
Why Learning How to Balance Head and Heart is Hard
It’s important to realize that our ego is not our enemy. Our ego is simply the tool that connects our minds to our spirit. It’s a complex mechanism, but we must be careful not to become fixated or identify ourselves with the instrument of perception.
The influence of social programming fills our culture. It comes through all forms of media, including the internet, radio, TV, and religion. This propaganda is harmful to both our minds and our souls. It can be a dominant force to control our minds by appealing to our ego— thus, adding to the imbalance of our ego. We need a healthy mind and soul to achieve the proper balance. We must integrate and restore the balance between ego, soul, and self. It’s easier than you think; just learn to meditate. Use the Japa or TM technique and bathe your mind in pure consciousness.
Without our ego to filter perception, we would receive too much input from our bodies and environment. But, it is vital to examine the programming to balance it. So, learning how to balance head and heart isn’t always easy.
Several things reinforce the ego’s control: the roles we play, the self-talk we repeat, and the beliefs we assert. These are all filters that limit our perception. We also project them into the world, whether we realize it or not. It’s a part of nonverbal communication that is always going on.
The Laws of Attraction
We see how our self-talk relates to the law of attraction, but in a way that we don’t desire. For example, unhealthy self-importance makes one self-centered and attracts the same type of people, just like a magnet.
Examining and re-programming your thought life is necessary because we receive messages from several sources that project unhealthy values and judgments. When we learn to understand our ego’s elements, we can see how it is programmed. We can see the difference between it and the soul, and you will open your awareness to greater possibilities. If not, you are negating the effects of affirmations. You must find out how to balance head and heart. When you do this, you will discover what you need and what is good for you.
Connecting to “source” is important because it helps us see our self-talk patterns. Once we can see the negative self-talk, then we can change it.
The Main Causes of Imbalance
If you are like most people, you expose yourself to large quantities of cultural programming. This programming aims to sell everything from cars and deodorants to religious ideologies. That’s why you need to question the cultural narrative. It uses psychological techniques that prey on our fears and insecurities.
They don’t want you to reason things out. They don’t want you to restore the balance between ego, soul, and self. Keeping you out of balance keeps you a customer, always buying their next remedy, which doesn’t work. Nor do they want you to reject their sales pitch based on gut-level intuition. Above all, they want you to make an emotional decision prompted by fear or anger. It motivates you to make impulse purchases. As a result, advertisers want to dumb down the customer to make selling easier.
They certainly don’t want you to connect with the source. Your source has the real answers to your most profound questions and your existential fears. Whereas religion has counterfeits; it wants to sell you.
The educational system centers on memorizing things that will make you a good team member for the people selling everything you think you need. This favors the analytical mind or the ego. Most people find their intuitive side is well below their analytical side. So, our analytical thinking is dominant. Our heart is secondary or silent.
Restoring ego, soul, and self to their original settings before we subject harmful cultural programming is the goal. When we do this, it enhances many other gifts naturally. We strengthen their abilities in many other areas, such as analytical thinking. However, most people will benefit from a program emphasizing learning to hear the heart’s voice. It is where you will find your wisdom. As you develop your program to strengthen your intuition and analytical abilities, the following are things to keep in mind.
As mentioned above, our modern culture does not value intuition. Many of our greatest thinkers rely on their intuition as much as on their analytical abilities.
“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift, and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.” — Albert Einstein
First, you must dedicate time and effort to enhancing your analytical and intuitive abilities. We suggest using logical reasoning, spotting logical fallacies, and spiritual axioms.
Being able to think freely without negative programming showcases one of the greatest paradoxes. We use the mind’s power to go beyond the boundaries of the mind. For example, when we exceed the limits of our expectations teaches us how to balance head and heart.
Our intuition needs more than nurturing. It is often asleep, so you must learn how to awaken it. Learning basic mindfulness meditation techniques can bring a sense of peace to yourself no matter where you are. Ideally, we need to spend quality time outdoors, preferably in the wilderness untouched by man’s hand. Nature is a sanctuary. You can use active mindfulness techniques here with excellent results.
Also, we recommend the Japanese wellness technique known as forest bathing. It will increase your connection to nature, and we are a part of nature, so this strengthens our relationship with the source. Last, learn more specialized grounding techniques, like tree grounding. These nurturing tactics will refresh your connection to your intuition. Another tool we recommend is a spiritual journal. Your intuition will speak to you once you write. It is by far the best and most underrated spiritual tool. You can do this almost anywhere.
Summation
If you are reading and thinking about it, you are already on your way to finding balance. With some inner work, you can restore the balance between ego, soul, and spirit. Remember to add one thing at a time when you seek a balance between head and heart. This way, you won’t overcompensate. Learning to connect with the source is vital to our health and wellness. Achieving a balance of Ego, Soul, and Self is possible.
Understanding your personality and instincts is the best way to start this integration process. We recommend the use of The Enneagram of Personality. This tool is based on two questionnaires that plot out your primary personality type and instinctual stack. We also recommend using a process called Comparative Analysis, a systematic way of investigating your beliefs by comparing concepts and ideas across many systems.
To learn how to balance head and heart, you’ll need to commit to change. Growth requires integration, and integration means change.
References
(1) Thine Own Self: True Self-Concept Accessibility and Meaning in Life:
(2) Wayne Dyer, The Power of Intention:
(3) Maharishi Mahesh Yogi: Wikipedia