Letting go of your protective armor- and reconnecting to your inner power

Learning to survive childhood, with the dependency and lack of power it entails for us socially, we often needed to manage ourselves and our lives with efforts of protection.

We all had to navigate life in some circumstances that left their marks on us.

We had to find who we were, despite not being seen or accepted simply as we were.

We had to find ourselves, while expected to satisfy others or receive love with many conditions.

At times we had to find our inner stability, and learn about our strengths without having the support and the emotional holding we needed. Or maybe not always have the best examples around us to learn about those human capacities, as the adults around us were “broken” in different ways.

Being naturally open and sensitive, we unknowingly absorbed and carried the burdens and unhealed wounds of traumas from our surroundings.

Our go-to was the creation of armor, aimed to harden our soft shell. It aimed to give us the feeling of being stronger than we were. It seemed to give us a sense of control and potency, as well as relief from the fears and pains, we could not save ourselves from.

It helped us to be better prepared for the bursts of anger around us or the silence that chilled our hearts. It may have helped us to keep our deepest wishes free from harm or ridicule and turned them into secrets.

It may have helped us to distance ourselves from the frustration and disappointment when our needs were not met.

This armor was a wonderful tool for those times.

But the armor was the expression of rejection, and jailing who we are and all that is within us.

Getting used to that armor, especially when many around us live inside one, we simply forgot we had created it.

Growing and developing inside such a shell, shaped and twisted our capacities of responses and expression in different ways.

It unconsciously became the vessel that blocked the flow of experiences in us.

We had to hide what is within us and play out a role, or follow the rules not to get hurt.

We opened up a small window to express ourselves, feel, and be touched. The connections we create out of those windows feel like a dependency, colored in fear of the other. Inside that protective armor, we are unable to feel life and its abundance. We are bound to that heaviness of our armor. It oppresses us. As we forgot, we have created that armor, we believe others, or life, are the ones oppressing us.

Many times, the efforts we feel we have to do to act in the world, are the effort we keep under that armor, not to get crushed.

When we look at others, we are afraid to see them or afraid that they will see us.

We can recognize this state when we become harsh and judgmental towards others and ourselves when we perceive something as a mistake or a weakness.

We may express it by being cynical, using our intellect and humor to create a cold layer of distance from our embarrassment and vulnerability. Fearing it may be played with, we distance ourselves from it and fear ourselves.

We may have needed to overuse our anger and need refuse, becoming overly angry, easily explosive, or occupied with fighting, resisting, and accusing.

This armor today is holding our childhood promise to never be a victim again. Never feel, that which seemed to make us suffer, bring in our shame, rejection, and humiliation.

The problem is, is that we are afraid of what is within us and our feelings.

This armor keeps us solely focused on avoiding the feeling.

Avoiding the memory it brings with it, and the sensations it may provoke. It takes away the ease with which we can confront things today. It makes us forget who we are and what we can do. It cuts us off our trust and confidence. It keeps us isolated, and in some way gets us stuck in helplessness.

Getting stuck in the experience of helplessness is the way we see ourselves as victims. Things are done to us….

Staying under this protective armor is the effort we had to make not to be helpless, but as it stayed, we still believe that we are.

Inside the armor, we get suffocated and are busy with fears and dangers.

A victim cannot love.....

Love is a power that demands freedom, choice, and presence.

Love does not mean agreeing with everything or giving in to what you do not want.

Love is a power that allows you to become larger; Embrace and feel everything that is within you and in others without fearing it.

When you can do that, you are connected to a larger confidence and trust.

When you connect to your love, it will allow you to respond with freedom and adequacy.

You will be able to refuse for example, without needing to close your heart in defense or punishment.

Let’s try to free ourselves from the old armor of past helplessness:

Take a few moments, and find love within yourself.

Think of things you love.

Pay attention to the physical experience of it and land in it more and more.

Try to be taken by that sensation and feeling, freeing your head from needing to constantly bring you back to the safety of that armor.

Let it flow and move within your body.

Then think of a person that tends to anger you. Someone you get agitated by, feel you need to prove wrong, or someone that seems difficult to love because they are not agreeable with you.

If your mind jumps to resistance: thoughts of revenge, accusation, and blame, it means you lost the connection within yourself. These thoughts are the expression of old fears needing to make sure you are not losing your ground.

Pay attention to the way you close up your body. These fears make you go back to that armor, unknowingly trapping you and disconnecting you from your power and your own love. and chose again to open up. To breathe and connect to the chest and lower belly and legs.

Remember that the conflict you perceive is trying to pull you into the power that you may have been afraid to meet and feel.

The more you breathe and open up, the stronger you connect to your power. The more you recognize how your agitation tends to serve as a closing mechanism in your body, the more you can choose to open up. Move, breathe and step out of that protective armor rooted in past helplessness.

Then try to connect to the feeling and sensation of love again.

It is your love.

Breathe and feel love as a state that you can create.

A state that frees your mind from trying to find control to help you survive, know what is right or wrong, and remind you to fight and not forget…)

A state in which you are full again. Full and free.

Come back and try to include that person in the field of your love.

Feel your love as your power that flows within you and outside of you.

Can you direct it or send it to that person?

When you manage to feel the option of melting away all those efforts in your body, a state of simplicity and confidence will unfold. Now you can perceive what you do not agree with, or are hurt by, and still feel with that person.

You become larger as you let all in and can feel everything within you and within that person. You can do that without putting yourself above, but rather spreading yourself around.

When you love, you are free from anything that oppresses you.

You are freeing yourself from that armor and can better meet your fears without running away. You can find ease in moments of discomfort and other feelings you may have been avoiding.

When you know how to constantly find freedom within yourself and within every situation without hiding behind that armor, you found the secret of your life.

Now get ready for it to grow and unfold.

Anna

Photo by Cathal Mac an Bheatha on Unsplash