Heart Resonance, Emotional Harmony, and Cognitive Bias

The heart, in the ancient sacred traditions, has a very specific and perhaps surprising meaning. It is not the seat of our personal and affective life — or even, ultimately, of our personal identity — but an organ for the perception of divine purpose and beauty. It is our antenna, so to speak, given to us to orient us toward the divine radiance and to synchronize our being with its more subtle movements. — Cynthia Bourgeault[1]

Lovely, yes? Wouldn’t you like to know your divine purpose, see beauty everywhere, and harmonize with the universe? Cynthia goes on to say that “finding the way to where our true heart lies is the great journey of spiritual life, and it crosses the vast uncharted waters of our being.” She cites Thomas Merton’s observation that in order to discern truth, we must get past “the fantasies of our own mind and the brutalities of our own will.”[2]

Why is the journey to our “true heart” so difficult? What are these “vast uncharted waters?” Why are we so susceptible to “the fantasies of our own mind and the brutalities of our own will?”

The language of the heart is resonance, which can easily be confused with cognitive bias. Cognitive bias is another type of resonance we feel when a story or a bit of information confirms our existing worldview. When our emotions are activated by our own sympathies, desires, and aversions, the resulting emotional resonance can likewise be mistaken for heart resonance.

For a simple rule of thumb, emotional resonance tells us what we already relate to and cognitive bias tells us what we already know or believe. The heart challenges us to expand in both fields. It allows paradox and ambiguity instead of sorting things into categories. If we don’t know how to tell the difference, we might think we’ve set off on a grand spiritual quest only to find ourselves trapped inside a three-way mirror — dazzled, comforted and assured, but none the wiser.

Let’s say we have a friend who has always just sort of known that sexual activity that is not for procreation is wrong. He knows it doesn’t really make sense, so he’s unsure. Then he comes across a teaching that says the squandered energy that men release at sexual climax takes the form of bodiless spirits that suffer for all eternity. This clarifies and affirms what he’s always felt, and so a new belief is galvanized. But is this cognitive bias or heart resonance? Is this timeless spiritual wisdom or ancient birth control? How is our friend to really know?

A crucial step in discerning the differences between messages from the mind, the heart, and the emotions is to get to know what our own biases are, what we fear and crave at the deepest level, and what kind of a worldview we’ve constructed for ourselves. You know how spiritual gurus are always saying you create your own reality? This is what they’re talking about. It’s nothing magical or mystical. What they’re saying is simply that what you expect to experience throughout your daily life has everything to do with what perceptions make it through your cognitive filter and how you interpret them — in other words, you determine which small parts of what all goes on that you actually experience.

You can never completely get rid of your filter. Your brain would explode. The best you can do is to learn to see it, understand what it does, and work to allow more and more of reality through.

One tool I’ve found helpful in learning what my biases are is the Enneagram. I avoided it for a long time because the gram looks like an astrological chart and I thought it was woo-woo. But when I finally did look into it I learned a lot. The Enneagram describes the primary fears and desires that account for the varying ways each experience can be interpreted from one person to the next. You will probably see yourself in each of the nine types, but when you start to look at the patterns of thought and behavior that have persisted throughout your life, you will notice that one type dominates. There are tests you can take to determine your type, but I recommend a more thorough exploration of the whole system. Helen Palmer’s approach is to share narratives from each type and let you determine which you relate to (this is an appropriate use of emotional resonance).

I read the first line of Helen’s description of type 5[3] and laughed out loud at myself. I read about the rest of the types and saw everyone around me with empathetic new eyes.

Our friend is an Enneagram type One. Ones tend to have a very active and demanding conscience, or superego, telling them what’s right and wrong, good and bad, urging them to be perfect and warning against indolence and pleasure. This can be an asset as long as the One knows the difference between the demands of his own superego and divine instructions. When he is aware of times when his superego goes into overdrive, then, in Helen Palmer’s words, “he has a choice.”

[1] The Wisdom Way of Knowing: Reclaiming an Ancient Tradition to Awaken the Heart (Jossey-Bass, Kindle Edition, Loc. 410)

[2] Ibid.

[3] Helen Palmer has written several books on the Enneagram. The one I have is called The Enneagram in Love and Work: Understanding Your Intimate & Business Relationships (HarperCollins e-books).