Joys of the solitary walk, the spirit bow’d yet proud, the
suffering and the struggle?Freud was known for his speedy walks around Vienna’s
Ringstrasse after his evening meal. The composer Gustav Mahler
spent as much as four hours a day walking, using this time to work
through and jot down ideas. Ludwig van Beethoven carried sheet
music and a writing utensil with him on his walks for the same
reason. Dorothy Day was a lifelong walker, and it was on her strolls
along the beach on Staten Island in the 1920s that she first began to
feel a strong sense of God in her life and the first flickerings of the
awakening that would put her on a path toward sainthood. It’s
probably not a coincidence that Jesus himself was a walker—a
traveler—who knew the pleasures and the divineness of putting one
foot in front of the other.
How does walking get us closer to stillness? Isn’t the whole point
of what we’re talking about to reduce activity, not seek it out? Yes, we
are in motion when we walk, but it is not frenzied motion or even
conscious motion—it is repetitive, ritualized motion. It is deliberate.
It is an exercise in peace.
The Buddhists talk of “walking meditation,” or kinhin, where the
movement after a long session of sitting, particularly movement
through a beautiful setting, can unlock a different kind of stillness
than traditional meditation. Indeed, forest bathing—and most
natural beauty—can only be accomplished by getting out of your
house or office or car and trekking out into the woods on foot.
The key to a good walk is to be aware. To be present and open to
the experience. Put your phone away. Put the pressing problems of
your life away, or rather let them melt away as you move. Look down
at your feet. What are they doing? Notice how effortlessly they move.
Is it you who’s doing that? Or do they just sort of move on their own?
Listen to the sound of the leaves crunching underfoot. Feel the
ground pushing back against you.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Consider who might have walked this
very spot in the centuries before you. Consider the person who paved
the asphalt you are standing on. What was going on with them?