Early Greeks thought that illness was due to an imbalance of the four ‘humours’ – black bile, phlegm, blood and yellow bile. They also thought that the basic temperaments arose from a preponderance of one of these fluids, hence melancholic from black (melan) bile, phlegmatic, sanguine and choleric. Ancient Hebrews sometimes said that the deepest feelings came from the kidneys or the womb.
I understand the phrase “Let not your heart be troubled”, when translated into an Inuit language, became literally “Let not your liver shiver”! These are all examples of interoception, the process of perceiving signals from our internal organs. “Butterflies in my tummy”, “it felt like a kick in the guts”, “my blood boiled” or the old-fashioned “I feel it in my waters”, are all expressions of an awareness of our visceral responses. But perhaps most consistent in our culture is the association between the heart and the emotions.
Everybody knows what a heart emoji means, even though it is anatomically far from correct. We can be half-hearted, cold-hearted, soft-hearted, faint-hearted, light-hearted and all the opposites. Our heart can sink or soar.
Our heart can rule our head. We can follow our heart, and so on. No wonder than that a serious cardiac event can have a very significant emotional impact.
After a heart attack, or surgery, up to 80 percent of patients will experience what is called ‘the cardiac blues’. This is understandable, considering these are po.
