Here is what I have seen: The best writing comes from an open heart.
True, the craftsmanship must be there. But it is meant to serve transparency; it can never replace it, and without that honesty, that searching out of one’s emotions and convictions, of one’s deep personhood, writing is mechanical, contrived, bloodless, even death-dealing.
But how does one write from the heart? By writing, period.
Writing, if persisted in, over time opens the heart, a crack here, an inch there, now two inches, now a foot, until the door swings wide open—if not constantly, at least more and more frequently. Writing helps the heart find its way and discover its voice.
And then, in turn, the heart becomes the way of writing.