Mindful Walking: How to get BETTER IDEAS
Transforming walking from A to B into a habit with which to practice mindfulness will evolve it into a restorative process that connects the body and the mind. During or after each mindful walk, we usually feel more connected to the world and (better) ideas start to appear on their own. Because we’re more present in the here and now during a mindful walk, we feel more relaxed and we’re not trying to force solutions and ideas into existence anymore. We can finally notice them by clearing the mental fog and the expectations.
We can start practicing mindful walking by:
one:
Noticing how our body moves.
Being self-conscious about our body is normal, but we can rather point our attention towards how each part of our body feels when engaged in walking.
How are the arms moving? The legs? How does the wind feel against the skin?
two:
Observing each step.
We notice as the left leg takes a step. And then the right leg.
three:
Notice the contact between the feet and the floor.
Left leg, right leg. Anchor your attention on this feeling of alternating contact. Left leg, right leg.
four:
After a while, start to notice the surroundings.
By having anchored our focus on something, we don’t judge everything else as much. Our mind starts to quiet down.
Left leg, right leg. We start to feel like a part of our surroundings. Left leg, right leg.
five:
Try walking like this for 10 minutes and see if you’ll feel more at ease and connected.
Congratulations, you’ve just practiced walking meditation!
Walking allows us to re-center. Most of us have had situations where talking a stroll helped us figure things out. A lot of people already use walks as a means to calm down and getting an idea on how to resolve something as a result of unclogging the mind. If we take it one step further and approach walking as an intended meditative activity, we start to consciously influence our mental and physical well-being.
Having a system where better ideas appear as an additional reward surely doesn’t hurt.
“The funny thing about the mind is that if you ask a question
and then listen quietly, the answer usually appears.”
― Yongey Mingyur, The Joy of Living
P.S.:
If you’ve found a bit of peace within the exercise, consider practicing it daily!
You can find a far more experienced meditation teacher, but I’ll still gladly help anyone
with the first steps to pass on what I’ve learned from 4 years of daily practice.
Don’t hesitate to reach out.