hardens someone's heart
Creates emotional armor
To harden someone's heart is to make them less sympathetic, compassionate, or open to persuasion.
The phrase draws on the biblical image of Pharaoh's heart being hardened against the Israelites.
Experience can harden hearts: Years of rejection hardened her heart to romance.
Someone might deliberately harden their own heart to avoid emotional pain: He hardened his heart and walked away.
- indifferenceLack of interest
- betrayalBreaking of trust
- desensitizationReduced response over time
- apathyAbsence of feeling
- defense mechanismsUnconscious strategies avoiding distress
stoicism · rejection · compartmentalization · detachment · bitterness · divine judgment · cynicism · numbness · callousness · resentment · coldness · abandonment · manipulation · disappointment · humiliation · trauma response · deceit · hardheartedness