Fridays are very hectic for me - two yoga classes to teach plus a lab meeting, in addition to morning practice. Knowing that I mostly likely will not have time for yoga nidra in the evening, I tried a walking meditation, based on the instructions taken from
here. The method is based on bringing mindfulness to the mechanics of walking, concentrating on the feelings in the feet and the movement of the foot. One is supposed to name every part of the walking process, such as "lifting, pushing, pressing down" or something like that. Eventually, with experience, one should be able to divide the process into even smaller sections, name them and keep pronouncing the name during the process. Let me tell you something - you can't walk fast while doing this meditation! Moreover, the walk becomes somewhat robotic, when you lift your foot and then get stuck in the mid-air, trying to remember which name goes with this part of the movement. But it was interesting, nevertherless. I tried it yesterday, spending 10-15 minutes on working out the details, and actually liked it a lot. Probably entertained some of my fellow NIH co-workers,too.
Today I had a lot of walking done - first to Dupont circle to my accupuncturist, then to Georgetown to get haircut-manicure-peducure, and then home, to Foggy Bottom. I left home well in advance, giving myself plenty of time for the robotic walk. But the meditation went well, although only with 3-part naming of the step. It was somewhat difficult to keep the attention on the walk, because the weather was amazing and the city looked so pretty early in the morning. Nevertheless, I did get 20-30 minutes of pure meditation done, and it felt interesting. The rythm of walk and relentless repetition of the same words puts you in a some kind of trance, not altogether unpleasant. I will explore it a more!
I like my new haircut! It is a little shorter than I had before, and a little sassier. Of course, it will look completely different tomorrow, when the effects of the blowdry are gone, but I can enjoy feeling pretty today, right?