Walking Meditation

One of the everyday experiences of our time here is walking. Lots of it. At annual conference this year I finally joined the Amazing Pace pedometer program. I really didn’t want to be that calculating about this part of my life but I still recall the stern comments of a D.S. (from another district) who questioned why I had not. So I count the steps and the walking is still good.
We did a walking meditation as part of the Buddhist retreat day. I had been introduced to the practice at the Episcopal House of Prayer. It was my least favorite practice. Walking is something I need to do without thinking or being mindful. The act of concentrating and being deliberate about this “natural” movement almost caused me to lose balance. I did a little better with it at the Nan Tien Temple but still did not find it to be meditative. I have some hip trouble that causes me to want to get the weight off that painful hip side rather quickly. After the walking mediation exercise I saw Nick, still walking slowly and artfully around the temple grounds.
Then today I read Barbara Brown Taylors words about walking in “An Altar in the World.” She opens the chapter called The Practice of Walking on the Earth with these words from Thich Nhat Hahn “The miracle is not to walk on water but on the earth.” She described the beauty of a walking mediation as observed in a Buddhist monk, saying, “To watch a Buddhist monk practice walking meditation is like watching a lunar eclipse. First the bare heel extends over the earth, coming down so slowly that not even a dry leaf is displaced. Then the arch begins its long descent, laying itself down like a cat. Finally the toes arrive, beginning with the s mall one and ending with the big. Imperceptibly, the arrival turns into a departure as one heel rises and the other comes down.” She quoted St Augustine "Solviture Ambulanda"; it is solved by walking. She says, “if you want to find out what ‘it’ is, you will have to do your own walking.” She spoke of walking labyrinths, which I too have valued and been taught by. She spoke of the hajj and of La Via Dolorosa. I remember that walk in Jerusalem as well. I try to be mindful of this as we have walked in a rainforest, and up Keira Mountain, and along the beach, in the waves, on sidewalks, into shops and cafes, to bus stops and rail stations, and into the places of rest at the end of the day. Remembering that we are walking into each others lives, walking on holy ground…always.
I think we are planning another walk this evening.