The first step was silence. The second was action. The third is weight.
Silence opened the door. Action forced me through it. But weight is what waits once you are inside. And unlike silence or movement, weight does not come in a single moment. It lingers, it presses every day, especially when no one is watching.
For me, weight often comes in two forms. The first is fatigue. The kind that sits in your body after a long day of work, when your head feels heavy and the last thing you want is to keep discipline alive. And the second is family life, the storm of children growing, changing, and testing. My younger son still looks at the world with open wonder, but the older one is stepping into adolescence with all the moods and hormones that come with it. It is not quiet, and it will never be quiet. To carry that weight, I must not only be strong but also keep control of myself.
Sometimes the weight comes sharper. There are moments when I feel I am competing with my stepson for the attention of my wife. That is someteing that shakes me. But paradoxically, those are also the moments that have made me stronger, because strength is no longer just muscle or stubbornness. It is resilience of the soul. Each day that I rise again, I feel my spirit harden, not into stone that cracks, but into steel that bends and returns.
Musashi wrote: “Today is victory over yourself of yesterday. Tomorrow is victory over lesser men.”
This is the battle of the third step. It is not loud. It does not end in applause. It is the quiet endurance of standing, even when the easier choice would be to bend. I used to be a tyrant to myself. Every slip was failure. Every weakness was a crime. I pushed as if a whip was on my back, dragging a stone I could never put down. But now I understand that perfection is not the goal. If I give everything I can in the day, and end with the thought I have done my work well, then the weight has already served its purpose. I no longer carry the lash. I carry the rhythm.
Ignore the weight, and it will not go away. It will only grow darker. For me, not standing is not an option. I would have to be dead to stop rising. But when I share the weight, whether with my family or within the circle of brothers I trust, something shifts. A heavy stone becomes lighter, not because it disappears, but because it is carried by more hands than mine. Sometimes sharing means a hard conversation, other times it simply means listening. But every time, it leads to realization.
From the tower of the fortress, I can see how my relationship with weight has changed. Criticism that once pierced me now rolls like distant thunder. The gate I once locked is lowered for those I trust. And in the courtyard, where shadows once ruled, there are now flames, small, steady fires of self-compassion. The third step shows me that strength is not in flawlessness. True strength is in carrying the weight of your life, day after day, with sword in hand, even if the blade stays sheathed.
But not all weight is the same. There is a difference between the weight that forms you and the weight that suffocates you. Sometimes the suffocating weight comes from my own thoughts, pressing me to do more, to bring hidden ideas into reality faster than time allows. Time is the sharpest weight of all. With hockey season beginning, weekends vanish on cold rinks, and weekdays leave me with maybe two hours of true freedom. That scarcity forces me to handle time like a blade, carefully, deliberately. Too much pressure, and it snaps. Too little, and nothing is cut.
So the question is not only whether I will carry weight, but what kind of weight I will choose to carry. Will it be the endless load of perfection, or the steady discipline that shapes me? The third step whispers that the wiser choice is not to drive myself into the ground, but to carry with reason, to walk forward without crushing myself under my own expectations.
Your task this week:
Choose one weight you will carry each day. It does not need to be massive. One page in your journal. Five minutes of silence. A short walk. Something that does not bend, something that is never skipped. At the end of each night, write one line: Did I stand, or did I bend.
And then ask yourself:
When does weight appear in my life most sharply?
What kind of weight strengthens me, and what kind suffocates me?
Who in my life can I trust to help me carry part of the load?
What weight can I lay down, not out of weakness, but out of wisdom?
This is the third step. Not perfection. Not applause. Endurance.
Who is helping me on my path? Read this post