As a man, you want to be more present, grounded and stable to create more love and safety in your home and relationships. You may have begun to practice presence and groundedness, but it may be difficult to maintain, especially with an open heart.

This is a practice John taught live at the 2019 Embodied Men's Leadership Training retreat in the California Panamint Valley Desert to powerfully deepen and widen your heart and root, and fill your space with embodied grounded presence and blessings to hold everyone in your life.

If you want to expand your heart and presence to hold and bless everyone in your life with grounded love, try this 14-minute practice.

Sit with your spine strong and long. Tuck your pelvis slightly and feel your sacrum like a tuber root plugged into the ground. Place the tip of your tongue on the roof of your mouth and press with enough pressure so that you feel your heart activate and the back of your throat open.

While rooting your sacrum deep into the earth, begin to breathe into the back of your throat. With each breath, allow your throat to widen and your neck to lengthen. Focus on opening the throat for the first minute of this practice. Breathe so deeply into the back of your throat that you feel the back of your head & mind activate.

After a minute, allow this opening in the back of your throat to drift down into the back of your heart, beginning to widen the back of your heart. Feel the space behind you with the wide open back of your heart. Continue to widen your heart to the size of your chest cavity. Make it so wide that your ribs activate.

After a few minutes of this, take your hands, open them about a foot wide, and place them in front of your second chakra, just below the navel. Then use your diaphragm and intercostal muscles to press your heart into your groin - your root - and from there, root into the earth.

Then on the inhales, allow your hands & arms to open about 4 feet wide, and on the exhales, bring them back to 1 foot apart. Combine this with your root, so on the inhales, allow the "tuber root" of your sacrum to become wide, and on the exhales, root into the earth. Feel the energetic pulse between your hands. Feel your perineum and root chakra opening. Root your sacrum into the earth. Root your heart into the earth.

Then without losing that wide root, open your arms out wide from your heart with your fingers pointed down toward the earth, so it's almost as if you could plug your fingers into the earth. Continue to breathe down through the back of your throat, your heart, your belly and your root, allowing your heart and chest to widen as you press your fingers down into the earth.

Become connected to the pulse of the earth through your breath, fingers and root, and make your heart as wide as the desert. Then allow your crown chakra to open, so that you feel the beautiful blue sky through the top of your head. Make your body a bridge between heaven and earth. Fill your entire home with your heart. Send your heart out through your arms, blessing everyone in your home and neighborhood.

In the final few minutes of the practice, on the inhale, you will scoop the energy with your hands & arms from the earth, through your neighborhood, and up to the sky; and on the exhale, you will send the energy down through your body while pressing your hands down toward the earth. Then, after your hands arrive back at your 2nd chakra, you will press your elbows into your ribs, take another inhale in, and then on the exhale, open your hands and entire body, allowing that energy to spread wide. Create a dome of energy, filling your entire home & neighborhood with embodied, grounded presence. Then fill the dome with blessings and deities to hold everyone in your life.

Disclaimer: Although anyone may find this practice to be useful, it is made available with the understanding that we are not engaged in presenting specific medical, psychological, emotional, sexual or spiritual advice. Nor is anything in this practice intended to be a diagnosis, prescription, recommendation or cure for any specific kind of medical, psychological, emotional, sexual or spiritual problem. Each individual has unique needs and this practice cannot take these individual differences into account. Each person should engage in a program of treatment, prevention, cure, or general health only in consultation with a licensed, qualified physician, therapist or other competent professional. Any person suffering from a sexually transmitted disease or any local illness of his or her sexual organs should consult a medical doctor and a qualified instructor of sexual yoga before practicing the sexual methods described in this practice.