Meditation For Men: The Ground Beneath The Armor

The armor was never the problem. It kept you intact when you needed to be intact. It carried you through things that needed carrying.

But armor is for war. And you are not always at war.

This is the final meditation in the series — for the man ready to remember what was always underneath the protection.

You are not invulnerable. You are grounded. There's a difference.

Transcript

We've made it to the end of something. Not because you fixed everything. Not because you figured it all out. Just because you stayed through eight of these, To whatever came out while you listened. That's more than nothing, That's actually a lot for someone who was never taught that this kind of thing was for him. Find your seat, Feet on the floor, Hands open, Let the body land completely. Start with a slow scan, Not looking for tension, Not trying to fix anything, Just moving through. The top of the head, The face, Let it be whatever it is, The jaw, The throat, The shoulders, All the places where you learned how to hold the world in place, The chest, The place where the armor lives or lived. Notice what's different now, Compared to when you started the series. Not dramatically different, Maybe just slightly less defended, Slightly more honest, Slightly more you. The stomach, The lower back, The hands, Let everything land, Let the ground hold you the way it always has, Whether you let it or not. You've made it so that the armor there has always been a man who didn't need it. Not because he's invulnerable, Because he's grounded, There's a difference. Invulnerable means nothing gets in, Grounded means things can land without taking you down. You can be moved without being swept away, You can feel without dissolving, You can be present without performing presence. That's the ground beneath the armor, It was always there, It's still there, It's what you're sitting on right now. Repeat with me. I do not need the armor to be strong, My ground is not the same as my guard, I can be moved without being broken. What is real in me does not need protection, It needs presence, I am allowed to be this, Just this, Without the rest. Let the shoulders be where they are, Let the chest stay open, Let the face be soft. You have been carrying something for a very long time, Not because you were weak, Because you were doing the best you knew how with what you were given. You were given a lot of armor and not much else, And you made it work, But you were more than what you were given, You always were. The longest one you've taken today, Let the Rome come back, Let the. . . You're going to walk back into it now, The job, The people, The noise, The things that need handling, But you know something now that you maybe didn't know before or forgot or never had the permission to remember? Underneath all of it, There is a ground, And it belongs to you, It was always yours.