Few people are aware of that energy center which is the higher heart chakra. How to open this higher heart chakra is the proper question for living a life of purpose and the fulfillment of the spiritual journey.

You answer the higher heart chakra question when you answer the central question of your life. This answer is at the heart of the central myth of the Western world which is the Search for the Holy Grail. The question is “Whom does the Grail Serve?” The higher heart chakra is the Holy Grail within you.

Let us explore this high heart chakra quest in this way

Higher Heart Chakra Menu

1. What is the Higher Heart Chakra?
2. Higher Heart Chakra Symbol
3. What Blocks the Higher Heart Chakra
4. Higher Heart Chakra Opening
5. Higher Heart Chakra Resources

Let the exploration of the question, “What is the higher heart chakra” lead you on a quest that is The Holy Longing.

Image by Peggy and Marco Lachmann-Anke from Pixabay

There are distinct ways to answer this question and a search on the internet will give you different answers.  The answer I give you is, “The higher heart chakra is a way of living in the world.” This is more important that leaning where this higher heart chakra is located.

I invite you to connect to the higher heart chakra is through the myth central to the Western psyche.  This is the story of The Search for the Holy Grail. The higher heart chakra is the holy grail.

Well, the Grail becomes the, what we call it, that which is attained and realized by people who have lived their own lives. – Joseph Campbell

Without your finding the Holy Grail within yourself then as the story tells us the Kingdom is a wasteland. The inner King is wounded and cannot be healed. This is a metaphor for each of our lives when we are disconnected from the Grail cup which holds our life blood and our vitality.

Photo by Jametlene Reskp on Unsplash

As a storyteller and writer interested in the language of awakening the heart, I think the higher chakra symbol is best represented by the symbol of the Holy Grail.

I love how Jamie Catto describes this higher chakra symbol in his book Insanely Gifted—Turn Your Demons into Creative Rocket Fuel (from Chapter Full Body Listening).

The Quest for the Holy Grail is not about going out to find an actual cup (though that’s typical of the early Christians who totally misunderstood the point); It is about you yourself being the cup. I am the chalice ready to be filled with inspiration when I empty myself of all my preconceptions and surrender to what is flowing into me – Jamie Catto.

Free 10 Page Introduction to Insanely Gifted here

When you live as the Holy Grail (higher heart chakra symbol) your focus is on being available to the way in which the Divine expresses through you. You live a life of paradox. You are empty but forever full. You become a living embodiment of the Quest.

Your primary focus in life is to allow yourself to be in service of the Divine.

Your life purpose is to serve Love’s purpose  – Guy Finley—Spiritual Teacher

We use the same metaphor in the myth that is The Four Treasures of Ireland. The fourth treasure is the Cauldron of Plenty that is always empty and forever full.

Image by Angela Yuriko Smith from Pixabay

4 Things that block the Higher Heart Chakra.

• Feeling unworthy.
• Mistrusting your magnificence
• Mistrusting your feelings.
• Not Knowing Your Purpose

The major reason most people have little or no experience of higher heart chakra communion is that at their core they feel unworthy in some way.  They feel, as we all feel, never quite good enough. We see this “never good enough” in the way our culture is focused on getting more and more stuff.

One wish I love to remember is the wish shared by the mystic poet Hafiz of Shiraz.  Hafiz says.

I wish that when you are lonely or in darkness that I could show you the magnificence of the Light of your own Being—Hafiz of Shiraz.

This light of your own Being radiates through the open higher heart chakra.

It isn’t about being good enough or worthy enough. It is about being willing enough. Are you willing to be open and in service to the purpose of the Divine as it created you to uniquely express through you.

Mohammad didn’t feel good enough. Buddha didn’t feel good enough. I think this is a sign that you are worthy of being a channel for the magnificence of the Light of Being.

When graced an experience of awakening, you will KNOW one thing for certain. This gift could never be earned.  How do you value the experience of eternal life? How do you value the fullness of infinity that you are.

Allied to the feeling of being unworthy is the feeling of mistrust and for many of us the issue of ignorance.

When I lived in Northern Ireland until the age of 21 I was never taught what it might be like to KNOW what the mystic Hafiz wanted for everyone.

I wish that when you are lonely and in darkness that I could show you the magnificence of the Light of Your Own Being—Hafiz.

I was taught by those who were ignorant of their own magnificence. Those who had no direct experience of the Light within. Their focus was on guilt, sin, and redemption. There wasn’t a higher heart chakra experience to invite because not one of my teachers had ever been there.

The whole spiritual journey is the journey of deepening trust of your energy system as aligned with Divine Presence. There is no place for guilt in this deepening experience of alignment. There is the invitation to self-love and forgiveness.

Not that there is no place for the feeling of guilt, but this is guilt related to actions and not to BEING as is taught within much of religion, especially Christian hierarchically religions.

It is very different when you come to religious and wisdom teaching through the language of the mystics. These are the KNOWERS and lovers of Divine Presence whose focus is on living within that Presence.  Mystics are not believers. They are experiencers. This is the experience of alignment with the higher heart chakra.

This is not something that you earn through good works. It is a revelation you realize through allowing. This trust is the meaning of the statement about having faith the size of a mustard seed. Most of us have little or no trust in our magnificence.

Do not confuse trust and confidence in the personality with trust and confidence in Being. We build one on the shifting sands of time and the other on the rock of the Timeless or eternity.

Many of us mistrust our feelings. We are often told that certain feelings are negative. On my spiritual journey, there have been many times when I have been told that anger is not part of the spiritual journey. This was particularly the case when I was training to be a Buddhist Order Member.

As I journeyed on I discovered that denial of anger (which we all experience) is spiritual bypassing. Not that anger should be expressed as and when you decide. However, people afraid of their anger have fragile ego boundaries and often cannot protect themselves psychologically.

We might think the spiritual journey is all peace, love, and light. This is not the case, especially for those who have the archetype of the Prophet. The Prophet isn’t fluffy and lovely. They need the dynamic of anger to push forward beyond the known to that place they are called to take their people. Do you think Moses was quietly spoken spreading love and light?

Don’t kid yourself if you are looking to activate the higher heart chakra and you have not done the shadow work of integrating your less than loving feelings. You can’t have access to higher and finer feelings while using your energy in suppressing those you do not approve of.

With the opening of the higher heart chakra, you will KNOW Your purpose. This is not your personal purpose but your soul purpose. Neither is it knowledge. The open higher heart chakra takes you into the dimension of KNOWING where you are KNOWN through.

This soul purpose is your primary purpose. How you express that primary purpose within this everyday world of time and space is secondary. This may be as a storyteller, it may be as a mother, or it may be as an entrepreneur.

This allows you to fulfil your destiny rather than follow your fate. You might determine your purpose from the dictates of your ego, but that will not serve you. This is the meaning of the Biblical wisdom instruction that says.

For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. -KJV -Matthew 16:25

The life you lose is not your life but your identification with the separate sense of the personal self. When you surrender your personal will for the sake of Divine.

The higher heart chakra is the energy centre where the will of the Divine is your will. Your purpose and the purpose of love are aligned. Your joy is in communing with the Love’s Message as it expresses through you.

You block the higher heart chakra, awakening when your purpose is driven from the personal will (3^rd chakra). This is the energy centre which is focused on the Will to Power. When the personal will is surrendered to the higher energy of Divine Love, you move into the heart.

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The opening to the higher heart chakra begins when you recognize that personal power can only get you so far. You come to where you recognize that there is more to life. You begin too long for connection to something higher than the limited time-bound separate sense of self.

You heal the wasteland of a self-centered life when you ask the Grail question from a sense of innocence “Whom does the Grail serve?” This is the same as asking, “How can I serve from my heart and soul?”

When you commit to integrating the lower three chakras in service to the highest good of all, which is your highest good, then you raise your energetic vibration.

Instead of living in fear, in separation, and with a focus on, “What’s in it for me,” you expand your awareness beyond “I, me, myself.” We do not drive this from the need to “do good.”  It is not driven by the need to save the world. We drive it from feeling connected to your authentic self.

In the last 10 years, we have seen a rise in selfishness: selfies, self-absorbed people, superficiality, self-degradation, apathy, and self-destruction. So I challenge all of you to take initiative to change this programming. Instead of celebrating the ego, let’s flip the script and celebrate the heart. – Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

Doing good and saving the world can often be from a need to feel better about yourself and is thus related to the lower three chakras. Higher chakra activation is where you allow the Good to be done through you. The focus is not about saving the world but about the revelation of Oneness.

From this revelation, you recognize that at a different level of awareness nothing is broken. This does not mean you do not act to make circumstances better for yourself and others, but the action comes from a different place.  In that way, you do not get burned out with compassion fatigue.

Image by mohamed Hassan from Pixabay

I will not address higher heart chakra symptoms. This suggests that the experience of higher heart chakra opening and activation is something like an illness. Rather, it is the cure for the primary illness of the illusion of separation from Divine Love.

There are signs, however, of higher heart chakra opening and it is good to be aware of these. However, don’t go chasing after these experiences. This would be like the gardener digging up the seeds he has planted to see how far they have progressed.

• Deep Peace of Mind.
• Increased Prosperity.
• Spontaneous Creativity.
• Authentic Faith.

Higher heart chakra activation gives you deep peace of mind. This is not the mind of the personal self. This is the mind referred to as Christ Mind. This is not the mind exclusive to those called Christians. It is where you and the mind of the Divine are in communion.

This is not your thinking mind but you are being thought through Mind. You relax and KNOW that the Universe has your back. You are not focused on goal setting and pushing the river. You are a happening in the present moment. Life is flowing through you.

One of the higher chakra opening signs is that you feel prosperous. This is because you are living a paradoxical life. You are empty of desire other than to allow the purpose of Love to express through you.  That desire fulfills you in ways that you cannot imagine.

This differs from the way they encourage you to use your imagination in the latest spiritual trend called The Secret or The Law of Attraction. If you are using The Law of Attraction in a self-serving way, then it isn’t the Real Secret.

When you are living from an activated higher heart chakra, then as the Russian poet Anna Akhmatova says.

The Secret of Secrets is inside me again – A Land not Mine – Anna Akhmatova

The land not mine is the Promised Land.

It doesn’t belong to you. You can’t own it because it is who you are. You can try to manipulate it and get it to give you what you think you need, but this is just more personal stuff. This is like the wave dictating to the Ocean.

What is truly attractive is when you are the channel for Love’s purpose. What is really attractive is when you as the wave allow yourself to be the Ocean.

You are the wave and you are the ocean  – Rumi.

True prosperity is a living paradox. It happens to you and through you when you set aside the personality for the flow of Presence.

Higher heart chakra opening allows for lots of creativity. Do not confuse this with increased productivity. Creativity is the fruit of your allowing Creation to express through you and as you.

This is the reason for this Life.

It is the joy of Creation to express creativity through the forms it creates for this purpose. Life is in love with the life forms it creates. The degree to which creativity happens is the degree to which we allow Life to Love through you.

You become a happening.

It means that you are being created through. You are a work of art, but you do not have to work at it. You need to have the skills to express it but if you are following your energy then you will learn such skills.

Higher heart chakra activation allows for living from authentic faith. I do not mean that you are a card-carrying member of some hierarchical religion, although you might be.

Authentic faith is not blind faith.

Blind faith is where the individual accepts the wisdom teachings of religion without having had the courage to acknowledge that they have no direct experience of what the teaching point toward.

You will not enter the realm of higher heart chakra through belief. The experience of the higher heart chakra is beyond belief. It is beyond knowledge. It is the experience of KNOWING and being known through.

You live in a state of unknowing. You wait without waiting. You do not dictate to the Divine. You keep the window of the higher heart chakra open and you allow the singing bird of grace to enter. You do not capture it in words and cage it in concepts and knowledge.

You allow the will of the Divine to be done through you. You do not overthink your life situation. You are a flow of Presence. This is not a belief you adopt though intellectual accent. It is your direct KNOWING through Grace of you as Love being lived within the One Life.

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Let me finish this higher heart chakra exploration by providing you with some resources. These resources point toward remembrance of this higher heart chakra experience.

Remember, too that the higher heart chakra is not something you open. Consider it like a flower. Your work as Rumi reminds us is to remove all the blocks to Love. These blocks exist mostly in the lower level chakras related to the personal sense of self.

To allow this flower to bloom, you have to integrate issues of safety and groundedness. Develop personal power to surrender this personal power to that higher power. This is really the work of the 1^st Half of Life. This 1^st half of life is the development of the ego that during the 2^nd half of life is surrendered to the will of the Divine.

• Higher Heart Chakra Affirmations
• Higher Heart Chakra Meditation
• Higher Heart Chakra Songs
• Higher Heart Chakra Story
• Higher Heart Chakra Podcast.
• Higher Heart Chakra Poetry.
• Higher Heart Chakra Checklist.

Affirmations only work if you work at them and with them. You really have to choose an affirmation that you connect to and feels right for you.

I think it is useful to try different affirmations and find if they work for you.  Here are some affirmations you might like to explore that reminds you of the higher heart chakra experience and how to access it.

• Thy will be done.
• I AM enough.
• I am willing to serve.

Let me give you a brief outline as regards how to use these affirmations.

First, notice which of these you are most drawn to and which of these you most resist.

There was a time in my life when none of the above would have been of any interest. I would experience a reaction to “I AM enough.” I would reject “They will be done,” because it reminded me of my Christian upbringing in Northern Ireland. I would be attracted to “I am willing to serve,” provided it served my interests.

Make a commitment to explore an affirmation.

Write it down and make it your Sankalpa—your statement of true heart’s desire. Then practice Yoga Nidra and include this Sankalpa in your practice. Notice how you feel when you declare this affirmation. Do not judge how you feel.  Allow the statement to enter the deepening silence within you.

Allow it to do its work within the subconscious mind.

I have not included a meditation focused on higher heart chakra meditation. The reason is that I haven’t found one I think has the correct approach.  This suggests that I need to write and record one of my own.

However, I have just discovered this chakra meditation which I was excited to find and I will now be using this as part of my practice on this journey that is the process of awakening to Divine purpose and revelation.

One thing they always recognized me was always for was my love of singing. I sing what I call heart songs. Here are two that I love to listen too.

Do you have songs in your life that remind you of the call to adventure that is the revelation of your true self?

Here is the opening invitation to the story that is one of the 21 Ways to Opening the Heart Chakra from my book Awakening the Heart – 21 Ways to follow Loves Message (4.6 star rating on Amazon)

Throughout my life poetry has played a central role. I left Northern Ireland to follow a romantic fantasy for a young English poet. I traveled overland to India with the poetry of Rabindranath Tagore. I met my wife in a poetry circle in London.

I left to return to Ireland after 30 years in England with a poem by W. B. Yeats (The Lake Isle of Innisfree). I later recorded a CD of W. B. Yeats poetry and read at Lisnadell House on the 150 anniversary of his birth.

I am a lover of all mystical poetry from different times and traditions.

Here are some poems to remind you of the higher heart chakra experience.

• Last Night When I was Sleeping. – Antonio Machado
• The Bright Field – R. S. Thomas
• Love After Love – Derek Walcott
• That Sweet Moon Language. – Hafiz
• The Alchemist. – Rumi
• Westwind II – Mary Oliver
• The Song of Wandering Aengus – W. B. Yeats

Here is a checklist that gives you some indication related to higher heart Chaka balance or blockage.

Higher Heart Chakra Imbalance
1. Sense of Longing.
2. Sense of Not Knowing
3. Sense of Non-forgiveness
4. Sense of not Fitting in.
5. Sense of Loneliness

Higher Heart Chakra Balance
6. Sense of Calling
7. Sense of the Mystical
8. Sense of Trusting
9. Sense of Prosperity
10. Sense of Communion

I would love to hear from you regarding your views on what contributes to higher heart chakra balance or blockage. You can leave your suggestions in the comments section below.