Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Walking Notes

Lots of people these days walk with earbuds, a soundtrack playing in their heads. It's what the iPod--ever smaller these days--was made for. It's a habit that began, I think, at the gym: on the treadmill; or while running. We take exercise to be a physical activity, where bodily motion is repetitive and essentially separated from the mind; the mind then needs entertainment to go along, needs to be kept occupied while the real work goes on belowstairs.

In other traditions--largely non-Western, these days--there are practices to align body, mind and spirit--walking meditation, for one. Bodily discipline is not radically distinct from the training of the mind and the realization of the sacred. Traditional cosmologies often have an aesthetic component that invites the contemplative engagement of the person (walking the labyrinth may be the closest we still get). Exercise--the kind that needs a soundtrack--takes place in infinitely extended space.

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