Insights on Walking

A journey of thousand miles begins with one step --Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

Health and fitness experts often say that walking is the best exercise. They say it reduces all the risk of disease related to sedentary lifestyle, such as diabetes and heart disease. True, indeed, for virtually all muscles are moving in unison, complementing each others' function to reach a common goal. Blood circulates well, heart beats a little faster, the brain focuses on each step. This chorus is a phenomenon of movement, a kinetic miracle that has made human being a powerful moving force.

The ability of upright walking is characteristically human. With this evolutionary ability, we are able to discover the world we live. Our human ancestors traveled the world by foot, long before the wheel was invented. This piece of prehistory adds to the grand insight of our spiritual evolution. As we have walked and traveled on the whole face of the Earth, we have left the footprints of our Soul.

Apart from the common health or physiological reasons, walking has a greater gift. If breathing is a sacred link to the Divine, walking is the movement towards it.

I have observed in many instances that most of my astounding insights lit up my mind while walking. And it was again while walking that this insight on walking came to me.

I often hear people quip that walking slowly is like following a funeral march, when the dead is brought to its grave. I found this culture like an analogy of how we walk through life: we are afraid to slow down, because it's like following death. Or we can look at it otherwise. In processions of saints (a common Filipino tradition), people walk slowly, with candles lit in their hands. This time, they follow the saint, not the death. I would like to see these two thoughts on walking upside down. First, to walk slowly is to follow the death of this fast-paced world, and bury those that keep us forget what it means to walk with Life. Second, we walk slowly as we follow the examples of living a sacred Life, where we bring our Light in our hands and call others to do the same.

To walk is not just to use the feet and go somewhere else. Each step is a journey to the unknown trails of our psyche. Walking itself is a metaphorical verb of how our Soul travels. There is always an inner learning, much like how Aristotle taught his students through peripatetics. Walking (while having soulful conversations with someone) allows our minds and hearts to meet each other, in each others' dimension of awareness. There is much exchange, and it can go on without exhausting. I have my own share of experiences, where walking has bonded friendships and connections much stronger.

There is a great difference when we walk mindfully, while we offer each breath as our foot lands on the ground. Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh has a similar practice, and encourages us to do the same. We have tried walking so hurried, and we end up with deep cuts in our feet - reminds us of an old Filipino proverb. Our outer lives are so fast-paced that we have forgotten to slow down. We begin to walk within ourselves, tracing back our steps, in circular fashion like that of a labyrinth, meditating on how our walking speed imprints the memories of our souls.

My friend, Joemar Obejas, has done it literally, walking from northern Philippines up to Manila, traversing some 300 miles, surrendering his hurdles to the spirit of kindness of both nature and people. At some point he had thought that he could not accomplish it, yet his unwavering determination conquered not just the long stretch of Luzon, but the distance between his dream and his soul.

In turn, every walking is not just on smooth paved highways, which are only designed for wheels to run. There is a much greater challenge, where the trails are uphill, filled with mud, rocks and thorns. We hike on our seemingly insurmountable selves. It is the only way to reach the summit of our own potentials, and see that the whole universe before us is astoundingly immense.

Together, we are all pilgrims, finding and treading our own paths. There is a camino we can follow, until the forked road of our choice, until the trail's dead end. At this point we are bound to make a greater choice, either to stop, or choose another path, or make our own trail. In our endless peregrinations, we can find ourselves tirelessly walking in the vast frontiers within.

Abraham Lincoln once said "I am a slow walker, but I never walk backwards." There are times that for every two steps we make, we have one step backwards. Nonetheless, this is not contrary to Lincoln's insight. For every step we make, even though we think we are not moving, or not seeing our steps, is always a sure way to our destination: that our walking journey is where we arrive, when each Loving step is always a giant leap, and leaving the trails of Love on the uncharted heart of humanity.