Women & heart intelligence

This article first appeared in our International Women’s Day issue of My Green Pod Magazine, published 04 March. Click here to subscribe to our digital edition and get each issue delivered straight to your inbox

There is, at this moment in human history, an extraordinary opportunity for human development – and that is to demonstrate, recognise and use the intelligence of the heart.

While artificial intelligence (AI) may decrease the relevance of the human brain, we know that the intelligence of the heart cannot be taught to a machine.

Ponder this: can the human capacity for intuition, for example, or integrity, or compassion, be replaced by a machine?

I’m going to set out why the intelligence and capacities of the heart are the things that distinguish the human from the machine.

Heart intelligence enables the unique powers of the heart to work through courage (to take a stand that may be unpopular), self-awareness (to spot what we’re up to), empathy (to go one step beyond sympathy) and deep listening (to resolve conflict by being able to repeat back what we heard). Is that enough?

How about wisdom (discovered in the depths of your heart), forgiveness (the ability to open up when you’ve been hurt), intuition (to sense what’s required in the moment), compassion (to understand others’ needs) and caring (for the needs of a child or the relief of the dying).

As you read these descriptions, does anything strike you about who most demonstrates these skills? Perhaps your mum, your teacher, a nurse? Of course, all these people could be male (except your mum), but on this International Women’s Day I want to celebrate how often, every day, these qualities are exhibited by females.

What is heart intelligence?

Women have traditionally held the responsibility for listening to the troubles of the young – and the not-so-young.

Women tend to listen with care, without interrupting. Women forgive threats and taunts more easily than men. Women often intuit the needs of others before any words are spoken. Women traditionally have had the terrible job of picking up the pieces of war.

This is heart intelligence, or HI. In order to access HI, you have to be quiet, because HI is a feeling – is felt – and you need to be quiet to access it.

The brain chatters away all day long, but it simply does not possess these powers, and they cannot be replaced by a machine. 

All these skills and capacities are not only profoundly useful, but are now essential to human wellbeing. More so now than ever, as harshness creeps into every part of our lives, as kindness is replaced by recordings, as the human race deserts and destroys nature.

Feeling & believing

This time we’re living through may be a revolution for humanity that some people fear could destroy human civilisation – yet there may be another quite different picture of the future. And it belongs to the human heart.

While the brain fears the misinformation revolution – the chaos it can cause in our minds, and how shaky we feel when we cannot believe – the heart has a different view, and different reactions.

At a physical level, when the heart is our reference, we can listen to its signals. 

Here’s a tiny example: when I exaggerate or say something not truthful, my heart will twitch or churn. There will be a frisson. If I’m telling the truth, my heart is calm. At a political level, the examples are massive.

The mighty heart

They said to Mahatma Gandhi: ‘You cannot beat the might of the British Empire with passive resistance.’  Yes, said his heart, we can. And they did.

They said to Nelson Mandela: ‘You cannot beat Apartheid by being in prison.’ Yes, said his heart, we can. And they did.

They say to us now: ‘AI is terrifying. Human culture will be destroyed.’ Maybe, say our hearts, but we shall survive, and we shall thrive.

Those who can inspect their own minds and their thoughts, who can become quiet and thus access the power of their hearts, develop wisdom that is beyond the capacity of the brain.