The Swinging Door

Heart, then, is a direct presence that allows a complete attunement with reality. In this sense, it has nothing to do with sentimentality. Heart is the capacity to touch and be touched, to reach out and let in. Our language expresses this twofold activity of the heart, which is like a swinging door that opens in both directions. We say, "My heart went out to him," or "I took her into my heart." Like the physical organ with its systole and diastole, the heart-mind involves both receptive letting in, or letting be, and active going out to meet, or being with. In their different ways, both psychological and spiritual work remove the barriers to these two movement of the heart, like oiling the door so that it can open freely in both directions.
--John Welwood, Toward a Psychology of Awakening