HOW TO LET YOUR HEARTBREAK TEACH YOU THE SKILLS

*I’ve made an invitation (please see bottom of today's post)

• Today's suggested practice: Day 18 of this month's practice... (see below)
• My playlist while writing today's meditation: The wind in the trees —the Lombardy Poplars in the alley behind me, the Sequoia beside me...
• My morning practice: 75 minutes of physical, yogic, and meditative practice, including Infinite Trust meditation and pranayama (breath work)
• My vulnerability practice: Being reminded that I simply hold the space to receive her devotion...

—Hans Peter Meyer

TODAY'S MEDITATIONThat which seems most difficult to bear is here for me to receive and be tutored by.

Listen. Feel. Feel it all. Hear it all—every breath and pause and hesitation. All of it. And let it teach me who I am. Receive it all as Her devotion, Her gift. One of many. And, regretting that I failed to know this as she knelt before me, now I am grateful for this gift, her devotion, and grateful for my regret, that I stand, corrected.

Heartbreak, Stephen Jenkinson says, is a skill we would do well to develop. And what does this mean?

Every week I have men reach out to me with their heartbreak, and I am reminded of how it is to feel so suddenly torn open. To feel so much. To want, above all, for this to end.

And now I know: this is, again, Her gift. Her reminder that I am actually able to feel and be so much more than I allow myself. A reminder of the fruit of the "taking for granted" practice. And yes, complacency, "taking for granted" is a practice. Rarely conscious. But even so, a practice that so many of us become masters at.

The lessons of my heartbreaks are too many to list here, today. They are what I explore in these daily meditations on my apprenticeship to love. Heartbreak. Regret. Opening. Becoming the man I am, the man I love.

But here's a lesson for today: there is no security for the heart in protection; there is only security in the every-breath commitment to being the husbandman of this space, this present moment, allowing it all to flourish that it may become love. The hardest things, hold the space. The most challenging tests, gifts that demand I hold them, dear, potent, full of nourishment when I am rooted in the dark mystery of Her earth.

As long as I understand that I lead by following the follow, not forging my own path, not creating from my own will or ego, but opening a way that She shows me... as long as I understand this, cultivate the body-mind and nervous system to support this sensitivity to my beloved, the world, She in all of Her forms and flows... this long I am "secure." As secure in my husbandry as a sailor is secure in their skills at navigating the tides and currents and winds of Her whims... For She is whimsical, as my beloved is the whimsical one.

TODAY’S INSPIRATIONS 🌀If you want to get rid of something, you must first allow it to flourish. (Byron Katie)

🌀Sunia is.…the art of 'extreme deep listening’...beyond the words...listening to the tones; to the inflections; to the inferences -- each subtlety of the sound...

When a person experiences your depth of listening, their needs will relax...they feel heard. Once a person feels heard, they can further express their feelings and thoughts; their communication becomes more authentic; deep relation and connection occur. In today's world, this is an avoided art...listening at this deepest level feels too vulnerable...(Guru Singh & Guruperkarma, Stand Under and Lift Up)

🌀You are beautiful. (My beloved, my Oracle)

TODAY'S SUGGESTED PRACTICEDay 18 of this month's practice, take three minutes to breathe into your belly, your perineum, your rootedness....

Please read through first, then ...

• Today, sit (or stand) in stillness with this question.... How deep is this root? What nourishment comes from this rootedness?
• Set your timer for three minutes..
• Setup: your "setup" for daily practice is critical. It is, in fact, how you "stand your ground," not to resist, but to receive.
• If you are feminine-identified, please sit or lie down to allow your body to be a still container for the river that flows through you. If you are masculine-identified, discipline yourself to stand, feeling the tension in your body as you root, creating a safe space for yourself as the powerful presence your own river needs to freely move through you and through your world.
• Begin by closing your eyes and aligning your body into its truest, most elegant posture, tucking your chin to lift your heart, tilting your pelvis to straighten your spine. Become still, more still than you've ever been. Your alignment is the physical training for trustworthiness.
• Feel the movement of your breath through your body as a tide, a current, a dance of feminine energy wanting to move through and into every corner, every side-channel, every neglected or protected place in your body.
• As you breathe gently in let your belly get soft and round. Then, with a full and soft and round belly, press down into your perineum for a few seconds, imagining a root pressing into the earth below you.
• As you gently exhale, imagine that this root is drawing sustenance from this earth, sustenance that now flows up into your body, through your perineum, your belly, heart, throat, and beyond.
• Continue this gently but powerful and guided breath practice, pushing your root a little more firmly, a little more deeply every cycle...
• As the timer signals the end of these three minutes allow your eyes to slowly open. Take three, relaxed breath cycles, no pressing, no effort, and feel yourself relax from this "rooting" posture, and see yourself where you are right now physically, sitting or standing or lying still in this space you are in. As you step into your day know that you are both beautiful and profoundly receptive, able to husband any wilderness, sail any sea... You are so much more than you imagine. I know this, and now you do too.

*AN INVITATION: Teach others what you are learning. Please, set up a no-charge time to chat to talk about this. It’s important to me. And, I think, to you and the men around you.

Once you have done one of these daily practices you are ready to deepen your own heartbreak skills by helping another man to know his depth and capacity. Pease consider further training with the likes of John Wineland or David Deida, or one of their students. In our chat I’ll tell a little of why I think this is an important thing for every man who gives a sh*t to be doing.

Or, if what Wineland and Deida is a bit beyond you right now, and if you’re liking what you get here, consider the Path of the Sacred Masculine: Basic Six I offer as a place to start. I really want to see more men teaching more men. What do you need to make that happen? I invite you to set up at no-charge Zoom chat today.

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