Over the years I’ve spoken and written much about the human heart because I’ve become convinced that everything we do and say is a result of the heart’s overflow. I usually describe what it takes to form a healthy heart, and I’ve rarely focused on the signs of a disordered heart. But in the same way that there are signs that your physical heart is unhealthy or under strain, so it is with your ‘spiritual heart’, the core of who you are.

Here’s ten signs that there’s something going wrong in my heart:

1. When the things I normally love feel like an obligation.

2. When I’m trying to prove to people that I’m good at my job, but I have no idea who those ‘people’ actually are.

3. When someone I love does something better that me and my response is jealousy not joy.

4. When the things that don’t matter, start to matter to me.

5. When I complete my to-do list but I can’t lose the feeling of being hurried.

6. When I have imaginary combative conversations with people who aren’t even angry with me.

7. When I lose sight of where ‘I end and you begin’, so that I carry your stuff as if it belongs to me.

8. When I avoid necessary conflict because I don’t have the internal energy to face it.

9. When I’m easily irritated.

10. When competition and comparison are my unintentional, but prominent primary thoughts.

These are the signs of disorder in my heart.

Any of those resonate you you?