We read an article by Pema Chodron after sitting that looks at how our hearts can be hardened by circumstances, and how they can be awakened again. In it, she writes:

Fortunately for us, the soft spot—our innate ability to love and to care about things—is like a crack in these walls we erect. It’s a natural opening in the barriers we create when we’re afraid. With practice we can learn to find this opening. We can learn to seize that vulnerable moment—love, gratitude, loneliness, embarrassment, inadequacy—to awaken bodhichitta.