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Category: thinking

Breathe In, Breathe Out

Breathe In, Breathe Out

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A nascent meditation program at the office has me listening to guided exercises that instruct us to “breathe in, breathe out” and to exist in the present, because that’s all we have.

The irony of doing this in the workplace does not escape me — future-oriented as it is and has to be — but my neck and shoulders constantly remind me that I need to chill out, so I close my eyes and try to float in the moment.

I concentrate on the breath, on the inflow and outflow, the filling up and the releasing. It’s true, the present moment is really all we have. There is a seat on Metro, there is a journal I can write in. And, later, there is a walk that will take me where I need to go.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Blog, in a Nutshell

Blog, in a Nutshell

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Sometimes it all comes back like the rekindling of an old passion — the reason I started this blog, which is the walking and what it leads to, the new ideas, a fresh way of looking at something. Though I post about books and music and writing and more, it was walking that started it and walking that energizes it still.

No surprise this came to me yesterday, when the air felt more like spring than fall and a pair of doves rose up and fluttered off as I strode too close to them. I heard geese, too, a flock that has decided to winter here, I guess.

The light was soft and the scenery, to quote Hemingway, a movable feast, and I gobbled it up as I ambled past. Thoughts floated by, some of them even worth keeping. So I rushed home and wrote them down. And there you have it — the blog, in a nutshell.

Contemplative Tasks

Contemplative Tasks

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A walker in the suburbs spends a lot of time thinking. So does a writer in the suburbs (or the city, depending upon whether I’m working at home or at the office).

I think best, though, when I’m doing something else. And I was thinking the other day (see?!) about how certain tasks are perfect for contemplation.

This will come as no surprise to monks and nuns who pray ceaselessly whether they’re hoeing a field or baking a fruitcake. They’ve long since realized how much physical labor lends itself to thought and prayer.

Walking, of course, is one of the most contemplative occupations, which is a large part of why I do it. Others include weeding, mowing, sweeping and ironing.

Each of these deserves its own post (and some have them), but I’m focusing today on what they have in common, on the pulling and the stretching, the pounding and the smoothing — on all the repetitive motions that exercise the muscles so the mind can roam free.

(Once freed, a mind can go anywhere.) 

The Thinker

The Thinker

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For the walker, what you do with your feet is simple. You put one in front of the other and move forward.

Much trickier is what you do with your arms. If you’re fast-walking, you pump them until they look like the connecting rod of a steam locomotive or the blurred, dust-kicking feet of a cartoon roadrunner.

If you’re a bit slower, you swing them at your side, freewheeling, in time to the music in your ears or the rhythm of your heartbeat.

And then there is the meandering, meditative walk, which is best accomplished with arms behind and hands clasped behind the back. It’s open, stilled and expansive — and it, more than the famous seated Rodin, is the true posture of the thinker.

There’s only one problem: When I walk with my hands clasped behind my back, I feel much wiser than I actually am.

(Photo: Pixabay)

Late-Day Stroll

Late-Day Stroll

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Copper and I had a delicious late evening walk the other night. There was a sliver of a fingernail moon just setting in the west, along with the sun.

There were birds darting everywhere, finishing up their late-day chores before bedding down for the night. There were bats, too, I suppose, just starting their day, though we didn’t see any.

Mostly, we just strolled at the pace that has become our own, which is to say much slower than either of us goes individually. He sniffed, I mulled. It was meditative, like pacing a labyrinth.

It was the perfect way to end the day.

To the Corner and Back

To the Corner and Back

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After weeks of wimpy walking, nursing a case of plantar fasciitis, trying not to go too far or too fast, supplementing the strolls with 20 minutes on the basement rowing machine, I’ve realized something I’ve known all along but recognize more clearly with each passing week.

And that is … I’m not just walking for my health.

Even a slow stroll stimulates thoughts and ideas more than the most energetic rowing session. When I’m rowing, all I think of is, when can I stop. When I’m walking, I never want to stop.

This link between mind and feet is something I’ve written about often, and I’m not the only one. A New Yorker article lists fact after fact about how and why we think more clearly and more creatively when we’re ambling along a city street or woodland trail.

So if I have to raise my heart rate on the erg, I’ll do it. But walking will remain — even if it’s just to the corner and back.

Foot Feel

Foot Feel

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“Nor can foot feel, being shod.” 

I was barefoot this morning when I ran out to retrieve the newspaper, and this Gerard Manley Hopkins line came to mind. My feet feel all too much because they are shod, and when they suddenly aren’t, every speck of gravel is an ordeal.

But my feet have adapted to the world I live in, just as the rest of me has. If tiny pebbles affect my soles, then how much does the rest of it — the clatter, the commute, the deadlines — affect my soul?

More than I can imagine, I think. Which is why I write this blog.

Missing Fob

Missing Fob

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It wasn’t in the inside pocket of my too-small purse. And it wasn’t in the roomier confines of my tote bag. It wasn’t on the desk or in a drawer. Which meant one of two things: Either I had lost my fob, my entry ticket to this office suite, or it was in my pants pocket.

It’s the latter, I just learned. And I’m filled with relief. Which makes me think about how closely we hew to the small landmarks of our routine. How the absence of one tiny item can unsettle and disrupt. Today I’ll use the front door instead of the rear, and plan trips out to coincide with receptionist availability.

But maybe this is a good thing, something to keep in mind when routine ossifies. That we are only a loss or two away, not from inconvenience — but from liberation.

Tick Tock

Tick Tock

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The house is as quiet as my house can be, which means that in addition to the blood rushing through my ears I’m also listening to the twitter of parakeets and the steady tick-tock of the cuckoo clock.

The “cuckoo” part of the clock has been long since been disabled, but the ticking mechanism remains. The metronomic beat of this timepiece is the soundtrack of my life.

On the rare day when the clock’s not wound, the stillness is deafening. I can hardly hear myself think.

Which raises the question: What has all this ticking done to my brain? Has it weathered it with pockmarks? Or has it smoothed and polished it, eroding those pesky irregularities that often stand in for real thought?

Things to Come

Things to Come

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Well, the jig is up. The summer jig, that is. It’s in the 50s as  I write these words on the deck, swaddled in my warm winter robe, the fuzzy white one. No slippers, only my outside crocs. I could use a pair of fuzzy socks, too.

Copper, however, is in his element, prancing in the bars of sunlight that stripe the back yard at this time of day and year.

He responds just to the weather at hand, which, if it were the prelude to a hot summer day, would be just fine, no problem. But I know what he doesn’t: that this is just the beginning of the chill, that there will be rain and snow and early darkness.

Sometimes I long for an animal brain.