My friend Lexi and I have been hosting Lunch Club once a month for three years now. Our aim is to create a space for connection, HeartMath practices and Lexi’s love-filled food, bringing people together to simply feel better together. We choose a heartfelt theme each month, share our own reflections and invite others to do the same.
Bringing people together is my passion and my joy. The magic of it was instilled in me from a young age, through years of gathering around the table with family and friends. Another person’s energy has the power to lift us beyond words. Being in the energy of a warm welcome is a medicine all of its own, so we extend a warm welcome and let the experience unfold.
We share HeartMath practices because they help us, and we hope they might help others too. We also hope that our little monthly gathering might have a wider impact, rippling out into our communities and beyond.
Just a little science
The HeartMath Institute has spent years researching the relationship between our hearts, emotions and physiology. When we experience heartfelt feelings such as love, gratitude or awe, our heart rhythms can become more ordered, and create a physiological state known as coherence. HeartMath practices can also help increase heart rate variability (HRV), which is widely established as an accurate measure of our increased ability to adapt to stress.
HeartMath also researches the heart’s electromagnetic field and they discovered our physiological states can influence those around us. Its wider mission is to bring more love, peace and joy into the world, through initiatives such as the Global Coherence Project, We Add Heart and Make Love Go Viral.
We love being part of this bigger picture.
It’s a feeling
For me, it is the feeling that draws me so powerfully to HeartMath. It isn’t a cognitive thing. We invite people to quieten the thinking brain, bring their attention to their hearts, and lean into heartfelt feelings such as love, gratitude or awe.
It feels good. We feel relaxed, at ease and more able to connect authentically with others. We come together as equals, enjoying a shared human experience. We often find more clarity, and can also find we are able to move through life with more ease and flow.
Life isn’t always easy, and when difficult feelings arise, we can tend to withdraw. Instead, we invite people to pause, notice how they feel and meet themselves with compassion. We also invite people to lean outwards not inwards. To choose kindness, care and connection, and to reach for whatever feeling usually helps us to feel better.
Creating space to practice isn’t always easy, but the more we do, the more familiar these feelings can become.
Lunch Club is a pleasure and a privilege. We feel better ourselves because of the wonderful people who join us, and we believe that when we come together with open hearts, we can create ripples of connection that reach far beyond the table.
That is why we will keep doing what we do. Because we truly believe we can feel better together.