Declining The Call To Harden Your Heart

There's a call,

A call to harden your heart.

Sometimes the ring is loud,

Sometimes it's quiet,

Sometimes it's just a vibration.

There are days the phone rings non-stop.

Sometimes the call comes with a misunderstanding.

Sometimes it comes with the heaviness of disappointment,

The burden of unmet expectations.

This call can come from work,

It can come from a misunderstanding with a family member.

Sometimes the call comes from the constant shadow of loneliness.

As Solange would say,

The cranes in the sky,

They call to us and they pressure us to harden our hearts,

To close ourselves off from the world.

This call asks us to abandon our hope,

To abandon our aspirations for a better world.

It tells us that we should stop trying to create a better world for our children to live in,

A better world for their children to live in.

The call to harden our hearts asks us to create the same wounds in others that were created in us,

To re-victimize those around us in the same way that we were victimized.

This call says to love is to be naive.

It asks that we begin loving in transactional ways,

Only ever concerned about what we can receive,

What we can take,

And how we can benefit from those around us.

This call encourages us to play games with the hearts and with the emotions of those around us.

The call to harden our hearts asks that we pathologize each other as irredeemable,

Replaceable,

Violent,

Manipulative users.

It asks that we see the world in only black and white,

Not allowing for the gray,

The nuance,

The in-between,

The and,

And the or.

When you start to play games with others,

You usually start to play mental games with yourselves.

When you become emotionally manipulative with others,

It's not long before you start manipulating and lying to yourself about your own emotions and feelings.

We hide ourselves away from any possibilities or opportunities of love,

Out of fear that our hearts will become wounded again.

But the problem is when you choose to callous your heart,

You cannot choose which pieces of it becomes calloused.

When one starts to harden their heart,

They slowly start to harden it in its entirety.

You harden your heart towards your inner child.

You harden your heart from giving yourself compassion when you make a mistake.

You harden your heart from seeing your own worth and your own beauty in the midst of circumstances that you don't like.

See,

When we make the choice to harden our hearts,

We also make the choice to close our eyes to the realities of our own goodness.

When I hardened my heart,

Some of my greatest memories were reframed.

Moments of joy were erased from my mind.

Memories with people that I love.

All of these things were blocked off,

All because I blocked off my heart in order to keep myself from being hurt again.

A hardened heart tells us that to be free is to be unfeeling.

To be protected is to be uncaring.

Every moment that I can think about in my life where I answered the call to harden my heart,

When there was the choice to be vulnerable with someone I loved,

I answered the call to harden my heart.

I ended up more wounded.

My wounds did not heal.

A callus grew over them and I was fine until someone brushed against it and suddenly I was feeling that pain again.

Back in that moment,

Back in that place,

With that person.

And my heart would harden even more.

It's a process that continues and continues and continues until you stop it.

And it gets harder and harder to decline the call the more frequently it comes.

Whether it's grief,

Trauma,

Life,

Just life in.

There's so much,

There's so much pressure to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be cruel and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean and to just be mean So wherever you are,

I want you to get comfortable.

If you're laying down,

Get comfortable in your bed or your couch if you're sitting,

Put your feet flat on the ground,

Straighten your spine.

Throughout this meditation,

If you find yourself getting distracted or thoughts coming in,

That's okay.

Our brains are not machines that can be switched on and off,

Pushed to whatever purpose that we want.

It functions.

And when it functions,

When your thoughts come,

Acknowledge them.

Let them know that you will deal with them later,

That you will think about them later.

But this moment is for you.

And to meditate.

To start off this meditation,

We're going to do three rounds of box breathing.

And just to remind you,

If you don't know what box breathing is,

It is when you just picture a box on each side of that box represents four seconds.

And you're going to inhale for four seconds.

Then you're going to hold your breath for four seconds.

Then you're going to exhale for four seconds.

And then you're going to wait four seconds before you breathe in again.

That four seconds where you wait before you breathe in again is really important because,

Again,

There's so much pressure for us to fill ourselves up and to be stimulated in every moment.

So that moment of emptiness in the meditation is really important.

If you need to adjust those seconds,

If four seconds is really strenuous for you and your breath,

Take it down to three.

If you need to take it down to two,

That's fine as well.

But just slowly challenge yourself.

But don't make yourself uncomfortable in this meditation with all of the breaths.

If you have,

You know,

Limited lung capacity or whatever,

Take your time and do what works for you.

But just follow that consistent number.

Whether you do a three number,

You do a four or you do a two,

Just make sure that it's consistent on all sides of your box.

All right,

Let's begin.

So take a deep breath in for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Let's hold our breath for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Now breathe out for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Let's stay empty for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Round two,

Breathe in for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Hold your breath for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Breathe out for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Now be empty for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Breathe in for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Hold your breath for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Breathe out for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Now stay empty for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Now return your breath to a normal pace.

Whatever feels good for you,

Whatever feels whole,

Whatever fills you up.

My only requirement is that you make sure that you're breathing into your belly.

No shallow chest breathing.

Make sure that your stomach gets to your breath first,

Then your chest,

Then your throat.

So always fill up your belly first.

If at any point during this visualization you find yourself getting lost,

Just return to your breath.

As you breathe in,

In your mind say inhale.

And as you breathe out,

In your mind say exhale.

Use your breath as your guide,

As your homing beacon,

And as your foundation.

Let us begin.

I want you to picture yourself in a sunny room.

As you begin to visualize the room,

I want you to picture what kinds of plants there are,

If there are any plants.

If there's anything on the wall,

If there's any furniture.

It could be an empty room.

Paint whatever picture you want,

Whatever room you want to build for this visualization.

As you see yourself get adjusted to the room,

You notice that there is a lot of natural light flooding into the room through various windows of various sizes.

Sunrays beam through.

Everything is beautiful.

But yet,

The air feels a bit chilly.

This familiar feeling,

The anxiety before the moment,

Before the call comes,

Before the grief comes,

Before the hard conversation.

I want you to visualize yourself feeling that chill run down your body.

And just as you begin to reach your arms around yourself,

To begin to warm yourself and to comfort yourself,

You hear a familiar ring.

You look to your right and you see a phone sitting on a table.

This phone is blue.

How does the phone look besides being blue?

Is it an old rotary phone?

Is it a cell phone?

Is it a flip phone?

Is it an iPhone?

Whatever kind of phone it is,

Picture this blue phone ringing and buzzing nonstop.

You feel your chest tighten,

Your stomach tighten,

Your breath shallow.

All you can hear and see is this phone ringing,

But to your left,

In your left ear,

You hear a fainter,

A quieter,

A much more still buzz.

You look to the left of you and there is an almost identical phone,

But this phone is yellow.

The blue phone represents a call to harden our hearts,

The call to double down when we are wrong,

The call to not seek out resolution,

The call to not seek out understanding,

The call to not give compassion to yourself.

It all comes through this blue phone,

But this time you have another choice.

You also see this yellow phone.

It represents the call to be vulnerable,

The call to say I'm hurting,

I made a mistake,

I need you,

I need more from you.

I feel unloved,

The call to speak your truth regardless of how it makes the other person feel or how it affects the situation.

The call to be vulnerable allows us to acknowledge and hold our grief,

But not be consumed by it.

The call to be vulnerable allows us to hold our burdens,

Not by ourselves,

But with a friend,

With a loved one.

And if we don't have those friends or loved ones,

The call to be vulnerable allows us to cry out and speak,

Curse,

Whatever it is,

Name our lack of support,

Our lack of community.

The call to be vulnerable allows us to acknowledge that we have not done everything right and we don't know everything.

The call to be vulnerable leaves room for curiosity,

Leaves room for us to be surprised by the universe,

Surprised by God.

The call to be vulnerable gives us an opportunity to reveal something about ourselves that would otherwise be hidden behind a hardened heart.

The call to be vulnerable helps us to get to the core of our being,

The core of our wounds,

The core of the things that bring us fulfillment.

They all come from vulnerability.

I want you to picture yourself answering the call to be vulnerable.

When you pick up the call,

Picture yourself noticing the temperature in the room changing,

The chill that was once outside of you.

You start to feel it deep in your bones and for a second you're colder than you were before,

But then that coldness turns into a coolness.

And that coolness feels like drinking a cold cup of water after eating a peppermint,

Drinking water after a menthol cough drop.

The call to be vulnerable invites that coolness,

That coldness,

That uneasiness into your body so that you can process it,

Hold it,

And then let it go.

And slowly,

I want you to picture yourself being warmed up from the inside.

The room's still cold,

Nothing much has changed,

But the call to be vulnerable allowed you to see the thing,

Acknowledge the thing,

And let it go.

When the call to harden our heart comes,

We cannot ignore it.

We cannot do nothing.

We have to make a choice.

Either we're going to harden our hearts or we're going to be vulnerable.

This is not about not having good boundaries or any of that.

This is about opportunities and moments where it calls for us to love,

It calls for us to transcend our trauma in order to heal.

This meditation is about those moments that call for us to be compassionate,

Whether with ourselves,

With the circumstance,

Or with someone that we love.

When you get the call,

I pray that you're able to choose vulnerability.

There are boundaries within vulnerability.

There are better boundaries in vulnerability than there are in a hardened heart.

Vulnerability gives you an opportunity to,

Again,

Get to the root of the thing,

Get to your needs at their very core,

And establish boundaries,

And create barriers,

Not walls,

To protect us and to protect our soft and gentle heart.

Take a deep breath in for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Now hold your breath for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Now breathe out for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

And be empty for one,

Two,

Three,

Four.

Return your breath to normal and start to bring some awareness back into your body.

And at this point,

I'm going to pray.

If you're not comfortable with prayer,

This is a good moment to end the meditation.

But if you want to pray with me,

Close your eyes.

God,

I thank you for this moment where we got to meditate and breathe.

And I pray that this meditation reaches all those that need it,

Those with the soft and gentle hearts,

The lover girls,

Boys,

And non-binary people,

And everybody out there who just wants to believe in a better world.

I pray that you give us the discernment to walk away from avoidable situations with people,

Places,

And things that don't,

That don't,

Will never serve us,

And will never mean us any good.

And when those things come that are out of our control,

That are out of our depth of understanding,

I pray that you give us the strength to answer the call of vulnerability so we can get to the core of our needs,

Get to the core of our pain,

Get to the core of how the situation is affecting us,

Our spirit,

Our mind,

And our body.

I thank you for all of these things.

Amen and Ashe.

It's hard out here,

Y'all.

I know,

But we got this.

I'm Desi,

And this has been Meditation with Desi.

Have a good day or night,

Wherever you are.