WALKING MEDITATION

I really believe that meditation is one of the most important skills that anyone can learn. When I meditate – even for 10 minutes, it completely changes my day. The constant noise of my incessant “monkey mind” begins to still so I can actually gain some perspective on my often chaotic day, realizing what’s important and what’s NOT! In that moment of fleeting stillness, I often acquire a wisdom that is seemingly not my own – whatever one calls it: God, Higher Power, Great Spirit, Buddha, Jesus, or even just intuition – many of us have had moments of blissful clarity where we hear what we need to. The challenge for me is carving out the time in my day to actually do it. It need only be 10 minutes, but that precious meditative window too easily slips to the bottom of my priority list until I realize that it’s been a few days! I’ve found a great compromise if I just can’t sit still, or if I’m taking 10 minutes (ha ha!) to figure out if I should exercise or meditate, is to do a walking meditation.

I always used to think that you had to kind of walk along like a snail in a trance, feeling every muscle in your foot as it touches the sidewalk, to be doing it properly. There absolutely is a time and a place for a traditional “Walking Meditation“, however, sometimes taking a really brisk, sweaty/heart-pounding 45 minute walk can do the trick.

The first 15 minutes of the walk, pounding along, I just air out my thoughts – get a bit of space between them. If I have a particular gripe with someone, or dilemma, I might create the intention that I will have an answer by the end of the walk. The rhythm of a past-paced walk stirs up my creative juices too,  and really helps me to problem-solve. Some of my best ideas have come from long, long walks. I totally understand how Shakespeare apparently wrote many of his plays (mentally,) as he was walking – which they did a LOT of back then – you can hear the rhythm of a walk in his poetry – after all the ta-dum of iambic pentameter can best be taught to kids as a walk (I used to teach Shakespeare).

I digress, whether or not you’re trying to access a deeper creativity, or you just want to find a way of unraveling your jumbled mind, a walking “mediation” can be a very positive thing. Moreover, scientific studies have recently proved that walking briskly improves memory-loss as we age, overall brain-function,  and helps prevent strokes in women. So whether you live in the rolling hills of Vermont or a grimy downtown city, it only makes sense to get out from behind your desk at least 3 times a week and do what our bodies were clearly designed to do – the mind will naturally follow.