Dropping the armor around

Osho International Meditation Resort Pune, India. A woman practising body movement.




Sadhana

If you experience the feeling of being enclosed, hemmed in by limitations around your body, it may be that you are carrying body armoring around you. These old patterns of protection can be dissolved, allowing you to feel free again.
And it is good that you are becoming aware of it. You are carrying it unconsciously. If you don't carry it, it will disappear.
Osho says, small exercises like breathing, running and visualizing that a load is being dropped, or taking your armor off while undressing for bed can help you regain your freedom. Here are some Osho tips worth trying.

Emphasize your exhalation
While walking or sitting, or whenever you are not doing anything, exhale deeply. The emphasis should be on exhalation, not on inhalation. Throw out as much air as you can and exhale through the mouth. But do it slowly so it takes time; the longer it takes the better, because then it goes deeper. When all the air inside the body is thrown out, then the body inhales. Don't you inhale. Exhalation should be slow and deep, inhalation should be fast. This will change the armor near the chest, and the throat.

Visualize while running
If you can start running a little that will be helpful. Not many miles, just one mile will do. Visualize that a load is disappearing from the legs, as if it is falling. Legs carry armor if your freedom has been restricted too much; if you have been told to do this and not to do that, to be this and not to be that, to go here and not to go there. So you start running…. And while running, also put more attention on exhalation. Once you regain your legs and their fluidity, you will have a tremendous energy flow.

Take off your armor at night
In the night when you go to sleep, take off your clothes, and while taking them off, just imagine that you are not only taking off your clothes, you are taking off your armor too. Actually do it. Take it off and have a good deep breath – and then go to sleep as if unarmored, with nothing on the body and no restriction.
Excerpted from Osho books