An outdoor walking meditation.
You can use this meditation walking anywhere but I am recording this in the countryside barefoot so if you have that opportunity I highly recommend it.
So we begin our walking meditation by just dropping into our breath before we begin our walking so just take a few breaths,
Settle.
So you're starting to tune into the rhythm of your breath and then when you are ready you may begin walking.
Whether or not you have shoes on or your barefoot just feel each step as you plant each foot on the floor.
You can roll the foot to the floor from heel to the front of the foot.
You can allow your walking to drop into a rhythm with your breath.
So it may be that as you raise a leg up you inhale and you exhale as you plant the foot down.
It may be that you inhale one foot forwards,
Exhale the other foot forwards.
It doesn't matter what the rhythm is just let it occur naturally.
As you walk you are just focusing your vision either directly in front of you or perhaps ahead of you on the floor but we're not getting drawn into looking around us as we would normally do when we walk.
We are just simply drawing ourselves continually into our centre,
Into the experience of walking.
We're fully feeling the body,
We're fully connected to our breath,
Our breathing.
We're feeling the sway of the hips,
We're feeling the movement of the arms,
We're feeling the contact with the floor beneath our feet.
We can feel that contact even through shoes but if you are barefoot then there is a sensitive contact that you can feel,
The different textures beneath your feet of the ground,
The variance in temperature if you are moving between shady and sunny areas,
The hardness or softness of the surface.
Just allow yourself to walk in total absorption in the act of walking.
Your breath is a continuous anchor point in your practice.
We fully experience each and every breath,
Each natural pause in the breath.
Perhaps there are sounds around you.
We can allow those sounds to enter into our experience without being pulled by those sounds,
Without trying to particularly identify them.
We just allow all sensory aspects of this walk to come in.
There is nothing that we leave outside of the experience,
There is nothing that dominates the experience.
Allow your facial muscles to remain relaxed,
Soft across the forehead,
Releasing the jaw.
The shoulders are relaxed and the natural sway of the arms may encourage the release of your shoulders.
There is a natural lift through the chest.
Don't try to do this,
Just notice how when we inhale there is a natural rising up.
And we can keep that buoyancy within the chest.
So You may notice the breeze of the wind.
On your skin or in your hair.
All of our sensory observations in this practice are a means of just being awake in this moment.
Nothing more,
Nothing less.
There is no destination.
We are just walking.
If you wish to,
As you place each foot to the ground.
You may visualise or imagine or feel that you are planting peace down through the earth.
Peace that comes from contact,
From connection.
Or you may wish to just have a sense of overall peace within the body.
That is not confined by the body,
It's not limited to the body.
But it is expanding out into your environment around you.
The breath being your continuous support.
Even friend.
So this guided meditation is now drawing to a close.
You may continue onwards with your walking meditation if you wish.
And then when you are ready to bring your meditation to a complete close,
You may stop.
Feel the contact with the earth through both feet.
Allow a soft rising up through your body from your feet towards the crown of your head as you breathe.
And you may take a couple of deeper breaths as you draw your meditation to its conclusion.
Thank you.
Namaste.
