“But what does it mean to ‘awaken the heart’? No doubt this phrase may sound strange to those reared in traditional Western psychology, which speaks of the goals of therapy in much more technical terms, such as ‘ego strength,’ ‘reality testing,’ or ‘impulse control.’ The word ‘heart’ has a rather sentimental ring in our culture – it seems to belong in love lyrics and Hollywood movies, but hardly in the context of psychotherapy, which has been striving since its beginnings to achieve a certain technical expertise and scientific respectability. In our culture, ‘heart’ is considered to be something quite distinct from ‘mind,’ the latter usually referring to our rational, thinking capacity.
In the Eastern traditions, however, the word ‘heart’ does not mean emotions or sentimental feelings. In Buddhism, the words ‘heart’ and ‘mind’ are part of the same reality (citta in Sanskrit). In fact, when Buddhists refer to mind, they point not to the head, but to the chest. The mind that the Eastern traditions are most interested in is not the thinking capacity, but rather when the Zen master Suzuki Roshi called ‘big mind’: a fundamental openness and clarity which resonates directly with the world around us. This big mind is not created or possessed by anyone’s ego; rather, it is a universal wakefulness that any human being can tap into.
The rational thinking apparatus we know so well in the West is, in this perspective, a ‘small mind.’
The mind which is one with the heart ('big mind') is a much larger kind of awareness that surrounds the normally narrow focus of our attention. We could define heart here as that ‘part’ of us where we can be touched – by the world and other people. Letting ourselves be touched in the heart gives rise to expansive feelings of appreciation for others. Here is where heart connects with big mind. For we can only appreciate others if we can first of all see them clearly as they are, in all their humanness, apart from our ideas and preconceptions about them. In seeing and letting ourselves be touched by the humanness in others, we come to realize that we are not so different from them (at heart). This gives rise to real compassion, considered by many Eastern traditions to be the noblest of human feelings. Awakening the heart, then, involves a double movement: both letting others into us, which allows us to appreciate their humanness, and going out to meet them more fully. (As we say: ‘I took her into my heart,’ or ‘My heart went out to him.’) Heart is not only the open, receptive dimension of our being, but also an active, expansive opening out to the world.”
John Welwood ed. “Awakening the Heart. East / West Approaches to Psychotherapy and the Healing Relationship.” Shambhala, 1983.
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