You let your guard down not by ripping the armor off, but by thanking it and laying it down – the way you would bury an old soldier who fought well and is finally allowed to rest. The armor was not your enemy. A frightened child forged it, and it did exactly what it was built to do: it kept the arrows out. The trouble is that armor cannot tell arrows from affection. It keeps everything out – the doubt and the sunlight both. Setting it down is not a defeat. It is a funeral with full honors for a defense you no longer need.

That is the ceremony at the center of “Burying the Armor,” the fourth song on Deva Nataraj’s The Still Point – a man giving his lifelong defenses an honorable burial.

Why do I keep my guard up even when I don’t want to?

Because the guard was installed for a real reason, in a real cold, and it has never been formally relieved of duty. “Burying the Armor” begins with how it was made:

Burying the Armor from The Still Point

“It was fitted in the winters when the world was made of eyes / Steel across the shoulders, a visor for the cries / It did exactly what I built it for - it kept the arrows out / But nothing else got in here: not the sunlight, not the doubt.” This is the whole dilemma of emotional armor in four lines. It worked. That is precisely the problem. It succeeded so completely at keeping pain out that it also sealed out warmth, connection, and change. You keep your guard up automatically because it once kept you alive, and no one ever told it the war was over.

The cost shows up most in intimacy: “I wore it to the weddings, I wore it to the graves / I even wore it in embraces, teaching armor to behave / And the ones who tried to reach me heard their knuckles on the plate / They deserved a man of warm skin - they were given armored weight.” If people who love you keep bouncing off something hard, this is the mechanism. They are not failing to reach you. They are knocking on plate steel.

Isn’t dropping my defenses just making myself a target?

That fear assumes the armor is still protecting you from a current threat. Usually it is protecting you from a threat that ended long ago – a siege that was lifted decades back, while the soldier kept standing at his post. The song addresses the armor directly, like a veteran: “Stand down, old friend, stand down / You held the line when I was small / You were forged by a frightened child / Doing the bravest thing of all / But the war is over, soldier / The siege was lifted long ago.”

Notice the tone. There is no shame here, no self-attack for having built walls. The armor is honored: a frightened child forging protection was “the bravest thing of all.” Letting your guard down does not require you to hate the guard. It requires you to notice that the danger it was built for is not the danger you are in now. (The frightened child who forged it has his own homecoming in healing the inner child as a man.)

How do I actually take the armor off?

Piece by piece, and paying attention to what comes flooding back in. The song removes it in a deliberate sequence, and each piece restores a sense: “The gauntlets first, so these two hands can feel the world again / The breastplate next, so this old heart can drum against the rain / The helmet last of all - and suddenly the sky is everywhere / I forgot the world was this much, I forgot the taste of air.” That is what people rarely warn you about: the first thing you feel when the guard comes down is not danger. It is how much world there is – how much you had been muffling in order to stay safe.

The reframe that makes it possible is refusing the language of collapse. “So dig the grave with honors / This is not a defeat.” Laying down your defenses is not losing. It is a decision made from strength, not weakness – the same distinction the album draws between hardness and real strength in its most-loved song, is it weak for a man to cry. And it comes with gratitude rather than regret: “And thank you - truly - for it all / You carried a boy to safety / Through the corridor years, the fall.”

What is left of a man once the armor is gone?

More of him, not less – the part the armor was actually protecting. “But the one you kept alive in there / Wants the wind now, wants the rain / Stand down, stand down, sleep easy / I can take it from here, old friend.” The armor’s whole purpose was to keep something alive inside it. That something is the actual man, and he does not want to stay sealed. He wants weather. He wants contact.

In the philosophy behind The Still Point, this is the difference between a fortress and a life. “A man is not a fortress and a life is not a war.” We did not come here to survive behind plate steel; we came to be reached, to feel, to be genuinely met by others – and armor makes that impossible by design. The song’s final lines are pure sensation returning to a body that forgot it could feel: “Bare skin in the open / Wind across the field / My god, the wind / I can feel it / I can feel.” That is what is left when the armor is gone: a man who can feel again.

Set it down with honor – the siege is over

If your guard goes up on its own, understand what you are dealing with. It is not a character flaw and not cowardice. It is a loyal old defense that has never been told it can rest. You do not fight it. You thank it. You dig the grave with honors, you tell it the war is over, and you lay it down – gauntlets first, so your hands can feel the world again.

Letting your guard down is not making yourself defenseless in a dangerous world. It is recognizing that the danger it was built for has passed, and that the thing it kept alive all these years has been waiting for exactly this: bare skin, open field, and the almost-forgotten taste of air.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why do I keep my guard up even when I want to be close to people?

Because the guard was built for a real past danger and never formally relieved. “Burying the Armor” shows it works too well: “It kept the arrows out / But nothing else got in here: not the sunlight, not the doubt.” People who love you “heard their knuckles on the plate” – they’re not failing to reach you; they’re knocking on steel that’s still on duty.

Isn’t letting my guard down just making myself vulnerable to attack?

That assumes the threat is current. Usually the armor guards against a siege “lifted long ago.” The song has you address it like a veteran: “the war is over, soldier.” Setting it down isn’t exposing yourself to a present danger – it’s noticing the old one has passed.

How do I actually lower my emotional defenses?

Piece by piece, noticing what returns. The song removes it in sequence – gauntlets, breastplate, helmet – each restoring a sense, until “suddenly the sky is everywhere.” The first feeling when the guard drops is usually not danger but astonishment at “how much world there is.” And you do it with honor, not shame: “This is not a defeat.”

Will I lose myself if I stop being guarded?

No – you recover yourself. The armor’s whole job was to keep something alive inside it, and that something is the real man, who “wants the wind now, wants the rain.” What’s left when the armor’s gone isn’t less of you; it’s the feeling, reachable man it was protecting all along.

Which Deva Nataraj song is about emotional armor and letting your guard down?

“Burying the Armor,” from The Still Point, is written directly about it – a man giving his lifelong defenses an honorable burial: “You were forged by a frightened child / Doing the bravest thing of all / But the war is over, soldier.”