What does it mean to be open-hearted? How does it feel? Can you feel it in your body, in your own physical heart? Describe that physical feeling. Describe it out loud. Describe it now.

What are you if you're not open-hearted? Fearful? Defended? Can you feel that in your body? Describe what that physical feeling is.

Practice switching back and forth, from one feeling to the other. Feel open-hearted. Feel not-open-hearted. Switch back and forth, and back again, and again. Practice it now.

Then, as you walk through your day, notice what it is you're feeling in your body, in your heart. Open-heartedness? Rejoice, smile, dance a little jig. Not-open-heartedness? Switch.

There is nothing for you to be against.

There is plenty for you to be for -- including yourself.

A reader sent me the lyrics to an old Frank Sinatra song:

Once there was a silly old ram
Thought he'd punch a hole in a dam
No one could make that ram, scram
He kept buttin' that dam.

'Cause he had high hopes, he had high hopes
he had high apple pie in the sky hopes.

So any time you're feeling bad
'stead of feelin' sad
Just remember that ram.
Oops there goes a billion kilowatt dam.

Some of our dams in the stream of love are huge. Many were given to us already built -- built by our families, our teachers, our religions, our communities. But we can learn from that "silly old ram," and with perseverance we can release that which doesn't serve us, even if it's a billion kilowatt dam.