Walking Meditation and Finding Your Zone

What is your comfort zone? I have spent years in a lively and lovely comfort zone. 

With my feet propped up, reading to learn more about a need of the day and leaning into what comes next. 

I also realize that walking alongside each of these were times when I could find discomfort as I also saw myself standing up to do more than I thought possible. 

What did this look like over the years? 

Propping up my feet could look like I was taking time out from a checklist of things to do, or it could be making time to act on one or two things that became second nature to me. 

Meditating is one of those things that became a part of me.

Meditating is one of those things that became a part of me.

It became part of how my comfort zone came to show that it could become a way of every moment in my day. 

There were three steps I took to bring this part of me forward. 

First, I learned to calm my breath. 

Breathing in then breathing out with consistency as the world around me swirled and whirled. 

I found that breathing was key to meditation while I ran the roads in the city. 

Then, taking a breath was what helped me create a walking meditation as I flowed in and out of medical appointments with a small one as he grew. 

As he grew and the medical world became more complex as our son recovered from his first illness and the walking meditation became a part of my breath. 

Finally, I found that meditation is in each moment. 

Even when standing in place with my feet planted and next steps tentatively taken. 

Taking a step seemed to take me back to my first calm breath and the three steps would begin again. 

This is how walking meditation began and continues.

This is how walking meditation began and continues for me. 

This second nature stays with me now.

Regardless of how uncomfortable I am as our son is no longer with us. 

Alongside the discomfort that also props me up when deep moments of learning come to show me what I can do next. 

With the grief that is here, ongoing, tentatively showing me what can happen with love, missing and resilient joy.  

Resilient joy is now not something I create with a checklist in front of me. 

It is something created and found with small glimmers of everyday moments. 

When I take time to look up to see clouds float over a mountain, blue sky with bright white light just after sunrise, or one bird that stops to say hello in the morning. 

Moments that come through when I’m in a zone of learning, leaning in with curiosity.

Moments that come through when I’m in a zone of learning, leaning in with curiosity and possibility. 

Could it also be a time learning the power of yet? 

When I don’t know how to do something then that is a time to say I can learn more knowing that there is still time. 

That I am resilient, can embrace challenges and persist. 

Doing this with a walking meditation is what I now know can bring more to a comfort zone. 

It is also what I am doing now as I remember that strength is built in more ways than physically.

Being strong allows me to be strong physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.

Amazingly and joyfully, this all has brought me to a place where I am living with daily walking meditation in a comfort zone. 

A zone that also allows me to walk through whatever comes next. 

May you also find your space and place with resilient joy and strength.