Understanding with Your Heart

As I was reading in 2 Nephi, chapter 16:10, it says, "understand with their ^bheart, and be converted and be healed."

This verse hit me hard as I had been struggling with some of my classes. What did this mean? how are we to understand with our hearts? Is that not what our brains are for? I pondered and asked these questions in my head. I wondered the difference between understanding with my mind, and understanding with my heart. Then I realized something; all this time I had been trying to learn with just my brain, relying on what we might call the "natural man" or I guess in my case, "woman", instead of relying on the Holy Ghost to teach me. I couldn't understand why I was doing so poorly in some of my classes, even though I was giving them full effort. It was because I was trying to understand the teachings of those classes with my head instead of my heart, when I should have been using both. As I began to study for my classes the next day, I found it easier to focus. I felt the Holy Ghost guiding me and I also found studying for these classes even enjoyable. Now you might ask: so what's the difference? The difference is that I've opened up my mind and I let the Lord open up my heart. It's as if I am learning through different "spiritual" eyes and I can see not only from my own perspective, but from the Lord's perspective as well. The difference is that I began to understand with my heart.