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The Love You Seek is Not in Your Refrigerator

by Sandra M. Yee, DCM

Nor is it in the frozen foods or cookie aisle. And probably not in our jobs or relationships,either. It’s true – we’ve been looking for love in all the wrong places, and we can’t seem to eat enough or stay busy enough to diminish that gnawing hunger inside. Disconnected from the sweetness of our own lives, we search for sweetness outside ourselves, leading to frenzied food and adrenaline binges and imbalances of the Heart Energy Meridian.

The center of our passions, love of others, and love of self lies in our hearts. When we feel separated from our passions or feel unloved, we try to distract ourselves from this emptiness through external stimuli, such as junk food, personal drama, and bad TV. We do not want to deal with the truth of ourselves; we’re afraid we won’t like what we see, nor be able to answer the questions crawling beneath our skin: Who am I? What am I doing here?

Edible and emotional “entertainment” from outside sources is only temporary, leaving us wanting more. If we lack the courage to face our truths, we become tossed in a cycle of roller coaster highs and lows. Daily life and appetite appear uncontrollable.

Sugar and caffeine disrupt our Heart Energy Meridian, whose responsibilities include mental activity, spiritual connection, speech, and so-called nerves. The more sweets and caffeine we consume, the faster our hearts race in the external high. Thoughts ricochet in our minds like rubber bullets. We have so many things to do, so many things to do! – And nothing ever seems to get done. The Heart imbalance makes us move faster and think faster but with less efficiency.

Excessive external stimulants also separate us from our soul. Note the agitated hammering with which the heart greets sugar, caffeine, looming deadlines, and hmm, falling in love. When the heart continually finds its sustenance in these outside sources, we lose touch with our inner voice, or intuition. Muddled communication with the heart often means losing sight of self. We are unable to discern the best direction for our growth and tend to blame others for our feelings of inadequacy.

Note how many employers keep their premises stocked with sugary, processed foods and free coffee. (“Donuts, anyone?”) The sweets feed our heart cravings and pump up our energy for pressured multi-tasking. Our Heart Meridian thus unsettled, we can continue to numb or ignore our emotional hungers for freedom and fulfillment.

External highs, whether from sugar, coffee, mind-altering substances, or stress, must ultimately crash into lows. This is the Cosmic Law of Rhythm, which dictates that the pendulum swing manifests in all events: the measure of the swing to the left must equal the swing to the right. The body, mind, and soul crave balance. If we push too far in one direction – adrenaline rushes from working sixty hours a week – we must accept the consequences that balance the situation – exhaustion, depletion, lack of motivation.

An aggravated Heart Meridian can lead to a chronic state of scattered energy; emotional instability; sleeplessness; lethargy; and addictions to sugar, caffeine, controlled substances, or sex (belief that we need something or someone to make it through the day), not to mention physical dis-eases of the heart. Many of these symptoms can be reversed by balancing the energy of the Heart Meridian and giving ourselves proper rest and nutrition.

Also, one of the greatest acts of self-healing we can do is to listen to our hearts – to regularly create quiet spaces in which we can re-focus on our passions and self-love. We also must be willing to confront the demons that would have us stuffing our stomachs and schedules to unhealthy extremes.

By re-connecting with our Heart, whether through meditation or energy medicines such as acupuncture or chakra healing, we lessen the need for outside stimulation. We cease to be entertained by such cheap thrills as sugar highs, refrigerator bingeing, relationship dramas, and too-much-to-do! syndrome. We find the love we seek within.

This article originally appeared in Atlanta's The Life Line.