This week’s submission is from a congregant of MCC San Diego, Tim Gibson. His powerful insight in discovering God while walking in nature is refreshing and inspirational. Enjoy! Pastor Dan
“If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the things itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.” – Marcus Aurelius.
Meditation has been practiced since ancient times as a part of numerous religious traditions and beliefs and there are dozens of individual styles of meditation that historically have an intimate bond with religion, or a spiritual belief. The word meditation may be difficult to define and has a broad sense of a type of discipline to get beyond the reflexive thinking mind into a deeper, more devout, or relaxed state.
In western culture meditation is sometimes thought of in two broad categories: concentrative meditation and mindfulness meditation. A practitioner of meditation may focus intensively on one particular object or on all mental events that enter into the field of awareness. Mindful meditation has been defined as a moment to moment non-judgmental awareness, with scientifically demonstrated benefits in the body’s ability to heal, to move away from depression and anxiety and toward happiness, relaxation and emotional balance.
Obviously, during walking meditation I have to be aware of things outside of myself, objects or people I might walk into or trip over while keeping my awareness on the experience of walking. For myself personally, and what I can tell you about is that walking meditation is a form of prayer that allows me to get in touch with, and deliberately reflect upon the revelations of God, as I understand God to be.
One thing I do know is that when I allow myself to connect, when I gave myself permission to “stop thinking and start feeling” I go to the place God tells me to go and I rediscover the power and compassion that is in the story of faith. Life is so much more than my eyes may be seeing and I do know that when I allow myself to feel the connection of Creation through walking meditation I become more centered, grounded and mindful.
Walking meditation is a place where I find peace of soul, a place of beauty, contentment and pastoral pleasure. It is where I go as often as I can and it is a place where I can review my soul and my body and allow myself to rest in grace. I touch base with all the wonders of nature away from the noise of life, away from the thinking to the feeling. When I practice walking mediation I am mindful of and give blessings to the sun upon my skin, I allow myself to completely feel a gentle or a brisk breeze to move the hairs on my arms and legs in mindful meditation. I bless the air that fills my lungs and the muscles that move my body and I give blessings to the sound my feet make as I move across the earth. I am thankful that I am alive and able to walk. I bless the water that hydrates my body and the journey it made to my lips. I bless and give thanks for the wonders that unfold around me and the reawakening of my faith in a Divine and Spiritual Creation as I walk in mindful meditation.
Walking mediation allows me to be healed and nourished, and is an enjoyable tool that awakens my spirit. I am reminded that there was an age in time when my body was not here, and sooner or later my body will be gone, but right now I am blooming and preparing my spirit to walk. I open myself up to feeling and I find myself face to face with breathtaking mystery, through walking meditation the world becomes a wonderland of revelations and my senses feel animated. I am related to everything and everyone, and there is a love of just being that is like coming home, and if I know nothing else, then that is all I do know.
Rev. Dan Koeshall is the Senior Pastor at The Metropolitan Community Church (The Met) in San Diego, California, themetchurch.org
