A while back, I listened to an episode of the podcast "Stuff You Should Know" that explored the idea of dying from a broken heart. Scientists in Japan explored subjects who died of inexplicable heart attacks. I'll spare you the science of it, but basically it's true. One more thing to worry about, right?

I'm not wrong, but it's not something I think of often. Until I am struck by profound emotions, I do not spend all day wondering what is the saddest I'll ever feel. Or angriest. Or happiest. It is not useful to dwell upon a future that has not arrived yet.

But I have always wondered why the heart got mixed up in the language we use to describe feelings. My heart has never made a decision in my life. It is an organ that relies on signals my brain sends to it, on instinct. Still, we have "heartache" that bursts from our chest and "butterflies" that flutter in our stomachs.

I'm not proficient in linguistic studies, so I don't know how other languages approach the subject of aching organs. But I do know there's an expression in French: "baume du cœur" which literally means "balm of the heart." My bilingual friend explained this phrase is simply used to describe something that makes your soul feel good when you're sad or upset.

But I am not writing to speak of sadness. I am writing to explain this aching feeling I get occasionally. I'm wondering if you've ever felt it, too.

Sometimes you feel it in your stomach. But it's mainly in your chest. "Ache" is an odd word, but it's equivalent to the feeling you get when you breathe out deeply, forcing all the air out of your lungs. This results in the slightest pressure on your chest. It sits just at the top of your stomach. Sometimes it sinks with your heart.

I also call this "the 3a.m. feeling." It happens in the dead of night, when I look out on a city scape and no one is around. The only lights are the ones sprinkled on the highway cars headed to their homes. It happens when I listen to a song with certain chords that strike mine. When I look out at the ocean. When the fog rolls in on a rainy day. When I gaze out at the top of a steep hike.

There are many powerful moments in life, however simple, that can "take your breath away." So perhaps that is what happens when I experience the ache. Perhaps I am just not paying attention. So what is really just me holding my breath, I describe as an aching feeling.

But what is the ache for?

I've called it "nostalgia for the future" before. Because this aching feeling is never over something in the past, it doesn't feel like heartbreak. It doesn't feel miserable. It feels hopeful. And that sensation is like those pesky butterflies I mentioned earlier. So the sinking meets with giddy excitement, and your brain does not know how to process it. So you have heartache.

All the prompts I mentioned have something to do with potential. Who are the people in their homes at night? Where is the song leading me? What lies within the deep sea? This leads me to larger questions about what dreams these strangers around me have? Is there a place still for us on this planet that we have harmed?

But when my heart itself flutters, it is because I am pondering my own place among these things. Which of these strangers out there will be important in my life? Which of these lands will I be able to see? Is there a hope for our future, and is there a hope for me? What will I do with my potential?