Look Up, Down, All Around

Welcome. Where does this moment of time find you? What is your body and state of mind telling you today? I invite you to take the next few minutes to explore these questions through a guided walk that will leave you reflective and aware of the cohesion between your body, mind, spirit, and surroundings.

Although this meditation invites physical movement, it is an inclusive practice first and foremost. If you find yourself unable to stand or walk due to your current environment or circumstance – maybe you are stuck in a 10 hour car ride whose driver insists on not stopping, perhaps you are recovering from an injury, or something else prevents you – if you are seated or laying down, no matter the why, you are still welcome to take a visualized walk.

In fact, imagery is a tool top athletes harness to align body and mind in training. The same regions of the brain that are stimulated when their physical bodies are in motion within their given sport are activated when just visualizing their bodies’ detailed movements. They see, feel, hear, and smell the conditions they will encounter, helping them enter the playing field performance-ready with a clear mind-body connection.

Letting go of any need for perfection, a specific goal, or ideal today…

With a spirit of openness to all of the senses available to you…

No matter if you are an athlete, a mother of three trying to carve a little time and space for yourself, or someone who just wants to experience your body’s relation to the here and now….

I invite you to “stand,” even if just visualizing your body upright.

Allow your arms to fall heavy to each side. Feel your feet firmly rooted. They are your foundation. Take a deep breath in through your nose. Exhale, let it out through your mouth. Inhale in. Exhale out. Continue this steady inhale-exhale throughout your practice.

Maintain your breath and imagine roots connecting the bottom of your feet to the earth. They travel into the ground and bring forth energy that floats upward into the rest of your body. Feel a warmth rise from the earth into the soles of your feet, toes, heels, and arches. Then up it goes into your ankles, shins, calves, knees, quads, hamstrings, over and across your pelvis, hips, glutes, low back, and belly.

Now pause and allow this light to sit within your mid-center.

Inhale, Exhale.

Feel its presence light your front, back, and side-body.

Inhale, Exhale.

It moves onward up your spine, across to your heart, chest, lungs, both shoulders, down your arms, and out your fingertips. Let it journey back up your arms, shoulders, collarbone, neck, jaw, ears, cheeks, nose, the space between your eyebrows – your third eye, the seat of your intuition – across your forehead and temples, into your hairline, and out the crown of your head.

Inhale, lift your arms above, reach your fingertips to the sky, ceiling, universe. Raise your chin and gaze up. Audibly exhale, sigh out, let your arms fall back down to your sides.

Bathed, enveloped, and protected in this warm glow… wrapped in light, you are ready to take your first step.

Place your right heel forward with toes lifted, slightly flexed. Slowly lower the rest of your foot down onto the earth, toes the last to touch. Shift your weight entirely onto your right foot, slowly peel your left foot off the ground behind you, starting with your heel, then all the way up to your toes. Step your left heel in front of your body. Shift your weight onto your left foot. Peel your right foot behind you and step it slowly forward. Continue this measured and unhurried walk. Peel the left foot behind, step forward. Peel the right foot behind, step forward. Left, then right. Left, then right.

Inhale and exhale. Inhale and exhale.

Keep going. Slow and steady. What does it feel like to step deliberatively but with no set destination in site, just you and your body in space, each foot propelling you forward, one moment at a time?

Take note of your surroundings and their relation to you. Are you outside or indoors? What does the air feel like? Are you hot, cold, somewhere in-between? What about the fabric on your skin? The feeling of your feet hitting the pavement, soft earth, sand, snow, carpet, or hardwood floor? Is the sun shining or hidden behind the clouds?

What do you hear?

What do you see?

What do you smell?

What do you taste?

Register your surroundings that change from one moment to the next as you live and move from one second to another. Let an observation float in, then let it float out. Not holding onto one or the other as each comes in and each goes out. Inhale, exhale.

Does your body feel called to walk faster? Let it.

Play with tempo, while maintaining awareness of the relation between your feet and the earth, your body and space.

Keep walking. Turn your head to the right and allow your body to follow. Walk in this new direction and perspective. Take note of your view. Is it different from what was before? What is new? What is the same? Look up, look down. Look all around.

Turn back towards your original front-center. Walk a few steps. Now turn to your left. Walk in this new direction and perspective. Take note of your view. Is it different from what was before? What is new? What is the same? Look up, look down. Look all around.

Turn back towards your original front-center. Pause.

Step your right toes to the earth behind you, ground your entire right foot to the ground. Shift your weight back, lift your left foot, bend your left knee, step your left foot behind you. Then step your right foot behind. Left, then right. Left, then right. Inhale and exhale. Inhale and exhale.

Continue walking backwards, taking note of your body’s need to adjust to this uncommon movement. Which muscles activate that weren’t as directly felt in your walk forward?

Does your body feel called to walk faster? Let it.

Observe this perspective and tempo. What is new? What is the same? Look up, look down. Look all around.

Gradually and incrementally, slow your walk.

Now pause wherever you are. Take an intentional clockwise circle from where you stand, turning first to your right. Observe what is there using all of your senses. What do you see? Smell? Hear? Feel? Taste? Turn to what is behind. Observe what is there. Keep turning. And observing. Turning and observing. Gradually, come back to where you started.

Inhale, raise your arms overhead, reach up to the sky. Exhale, let them drop, look down towards the earth. Raise your head back to center.

Look all around you.

Thank your surroundings and body for taking time to notice the ever-changing moments in your internal self and relation to your external environment.

As you shift from one moment to the next, moving forward, sometimes backwards, or at times even in circles, so does mother nature. With a breeze or a wave, a moment comes in and then it goes out.

Inhale and exhale.

Through life’s ups, downs, and all arounds, no matter if you are walking, standing, or sitting still, can you visualize movement and alignment between mind, body, spirit, and earth by observing your perspective at each moment with a simple, “What is new? What is the same? Look up, look down. Look all around.”