GETTING UNDERNEATH THE ARMOR
Finding relaxation
You likely remember waking up this morning and getting dressed in some clothes for your day, but it is unlikely that you remember that you put on some armor as well. Whether you are aware of it or not most of us are walking around with a few pounds of armor on and around bodies. I am not talking about physical pounds, although it can manifest that way. I am talking about subtle energetic weight that is often imperceptible to us unless we are quite subtlety aware of ourselves, which to be honest the majority of us are not. We need to roar of lion to really get our attention as opposed being fully aware and alert at the purr of cat. Is this normal? No. Is it normalized? Yes. We are wired for subtlety, but to get through all of our armor we need louder sensations. Those extra layers of armor that you unconsciously put on help dull out the intensity of sensations, feelings and emotions. That is the point of armor. To protect us from intensity. It is the way we defend ourselves from the threats we perceive around us or even inside of us.
What necessitates armor? Armor is relevant for us as long as we perceive threat. What are these threats? They can literally be anything. It could be that we perceive actual or potential physical harm. It could be emotional harm from others words or actions, or from our own thoughts and feelings about ourselves. It could be the energy we feel when we walk into a room of strangers if we view them as not on our side. Anything that we perceive or experience as hurtful or harmful will create the response of armoring. Over time and years of life we put this armor on every morning in preparation for our day ahead. We don’t know we are doing this, and beyond that we don’t know it’s a choice that we are choosing, because it has become so automatic. We don’t question whether or not we will need it. We simply put it on just in case. For many people there is no waking time in their lives when they are without their armor on. What does this mean for us? It means that we never feel fully relaxed. It’s hard to be present, to get a deep breath, to express ourselves freely, and to feel. Armoring creates restriction. It is putting on self-imposed limitations that we don’t even know we are creating.
Some might say that their armor is necessary, after all bad things happen and one should be prepared. Yes armor is necessary when there is threat or harm actively happening. If you are in battle wear your armor. If you are not in battle do you really need your armor on? What percentage of your day are there actual physical and emotional threats to your well-being? Unless you are in some type of war zone or in an abusive situation, the percentage is low to none. Yet you still have all of gear on everyday. You are not doing this on purpose. You just haven’t realized yet 1) that you have armor on & 2) that you have a choice to take it off.
TAKING OFF YOUR GEAR
Meeting yourself
What does your armor feel like and how do you know it’s there? If you are not in an open, relaxed, rested, non-reactive, accepting, heart centered, present state, you likely have some armor on. Our natural state is what I just described. Anything else is not our natural state. Fear, avoidance, terror, charge, reactivity, judgment, stress, frustration, irritation, and tension all indicate armoring. Now becoming aware of your armor and how it manifest in your physical body, and in your emotions, thoughts, and sense of identity is the first step. Being aware of something doesn’t always equal change, meaning just being aware of your armor, while foundational, will not always inspire you to take it off. Why not? Because you believe it serves you in some way to keep it on. If you didn’t believe this then once you saw your armoring you would take it off immediately because it would seem nonsensical to you to keep it on. It’s kind of like wearing a parka on a Florida beach. Say you are an Eskimo from a remote place in Canada and you’ve never left your home region, but you decide to go to Florida. You know nothing about temperatures in other places. You think you need that parka on the beach to protect you from the chance that there could be a snowstorm that comes through at any moment because you’ve always needed to be prepared in this way. However once you are made aware that it is nonsensical to wear your coat because the likelihood of snowstorm hitting is next to none, you take it off. Maybe reluctantly at first because you aren’t really sure if you can trust the people around you that are telling you this, and the parka is all you’ve known all your life, but after a few days goes by, and then a season, and then a year or two, you realize you don’t need the coat at all.
I say all this to emphasize having patience with yourself. Even if you are aware of your armoring and you haven’t taken it off yet, it’s ok. As you take the courageous actions of being open where you might have chosen to be closed before, and resting when you might have chosen anxiety previously, know that these actions are what is required for you to develop trust in yourself that things are well. The parka is always available if at some point you need. If that snowstorm does come through you can put your coat on and be prepared, but when the sun comes back out don’t forget to take your coat off again. Don’t let the coat become part of your identity. To do so is to lose the experience of connection to yourself and to full vitality and self-expression.
Investigate how you perceive that your armoring is helping you. Even if you know that you have it on, you may not fully grok why you do. Once you see how you believe it serves you to wear it, challenge that belief. See if it’s really true. I know it mayfeeltrue, but you have to go deeper than that and see if it is factually true. You might need outside reflection in order to really find the factual truth, because our belief systems are tricky and they like to be right. We will often try to prove the beliefs that we are dying to let go of as right and therefore we will never be willing to actually let go of them. This is why support is helpful. You can live a life without all of the unnecessary armor. You can be and experience the fullness of yourself and be who you are without anything extra or more. Just you, open, relaxed and real. This experience if known once you take the armor off. It is a reuniting of yourself to yourself, a self which you may have never met, which has been patiently waiting for you underneath the layers.
Dr. Amanda Love, Network Spinal Chiropractor, Spinal Entrainment, Boulder, Colorado
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