Maybe I should titled this Random Thought, "Take Some M & Ms, IV."
Anyway, no, I'm not dismissing you when I say, "Go take a walk." I was in a
brief discussion on FaceBook, about a Washington State professor who outlaws
the use of "offensive" terms, among which are "male" and "female," in her
class. You can read about it at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/09/02/washington-state-university-class-bans-offensive-terms-such-as-illegal-alien-and-tranny/
At a superficial glance, among some of the discussants, it seems to be PC
gone amok. And, I don't totally agree with, though I understand, the reported
threatening grade-impacting tone supposedly used by this professor. But
thinking about it, while I'm still thinking about being labelled "for your
age," I wonder if that professor is trying to get the students sensitive to the
fact that how we label both ourselves and others is the foundation of our value
system; it is how we both live and identify others; that how we identify
ourselves and others determines how we relate to ourselves and others; that how
such labels conjure up images that are really illusions; that how such
illusions blur things so we don't see things or people as they are; and, that
how these illusions, in turn, create fogged-in delusions that are barriers to
insight. They are, in effect, a mirage of things that are not there, but we
believe are. When we trust these delusions, we become judgmental; we engineer
our own misperceptions, misbeliefs, misconceptions, false expectations, errant
assumptions; and, then, we place our trust in them and clutch them tightly to
our breasts. These distorting and misleading labels, categories, stereotypes,
generalizations--that academically include "student," "honors," "don't belong,"
"faculty," "professor," "administrator," "staff,"-etc- that suck the life out
of people, strip them of their humanity, of their dimensions, of their
wholeness, and of their individuality. Too often, unquestioningly accepting
these falsehoods as gospels, we do not even realize what we're doing. We don't
even realize what we are not doing. Until we do, we can't ask the seminal
question first posed by the ancient Greeks, if we question in the first place,
"How shall I live?" For me, no path serves me better to address that question
then my walking route.
How do I describe what fast walking the sidewalks and streets alone 6
miles every other dawn or early morning at slightly less than a 14 minute per
mile pace mean to me. Here goes. Physically, it's stamina building and
keeping my lower body in shape time. Mentally, it's a clearing out of cobwebs
in the attic. Emotionally, it's a a settling down and calming time to keep me
spiritually in shape. It's my detox time of getting outside so I can get
inside. It's my mental and emotional therapeutic time. It's my renovation,
invigoration, and restoration time. It my time of peace, clarity, and
conversation. I learn to quiet the mind and open the heart and to remember in
that stillness what really matters. It is one way I perceive, manage, and
balance my life. My route is almost a sacred path for me to accept getting
older without growing old. It's a time and place, as I once said recently, I
open up to where I can contemplate my human spirit, its delights, its
revelations, its complexity, and its mystery. It's my wellness time. It's my
soulful time. It's my stepping away time. It's my noticing of things usually
unnoticed time . It's my beginning-of-the-day massage time. It's a time I
quiet my mind and open my heart to remember in that moving stillness what
really matters.
Meditative and mindful fast walking are my way of enveloping myself in
a calmness that slows down the hectic motion that is all around me. With each
breath and each step, I feel I am on a threshold; I feel I am being invited in
by me. In the inner stillness I can hear movement; in the inner silence I can
feel sounds. There's a joy in that quiet and stillness when I filter out the
outside noise and static. That time is a time of being distracted from every
day distractions. This is a time of forgetting in order to remember. It's a
form of turning off in order to get turned on. It's a time for quieting
outside activity and exciting inner stimulation. It's a kind of joy that
doesn't depend on doing anything or anyone. Aside from being in the arms of my
Susie and around my children and grandchildren, nothing makes me feel calmer,
sharper and happier. Like recharging plugs for smart phones and laptops at an
airport, like recharging stations for electric cars, the silence and quiet of
my six mile are recharging stations for my soul. We need that recharging time
to make better uses of our devices. In this case, the device is ourselves.
It's an irony, to unplug in order to plug in, to disconnect in order to
connect. It could say, "It's a time to be alive," but when what time isn't.
So, it's seventy-five mimutes of "re-imagining,"redefining, renewing,
recreating, and "re-spiriting." Often, its a time of finding the breakthrough
"cans" in those obstructive "cannots." It offers the message that I hear
throughout the day.
Meditation and mindfulness are realization knives that cut through
these lurking opaque curtains of illusionary, delusionary, and depersonalizing
categorization, stereotype, generalization, labeling. It's a time when, as
Thoreau might said, my moving legs paddle the flow of my thoughts and feelings
around that seminal question, "How shall I live?" I am focused; my mind and
spirit are a clearing house; they're a distilling place. I have serious, more
authentic, more flexible, less stuffy, heart-to-heart talks with myself. I
daydream, I imagine, I create, I reflect. I examine. I question. I discover
and uncover. I acknowledge. I struggle to confront and deal with. I struggle
to change. Stuff pops into my head. No distraction, interruption, or
intrusion; no music going; no getting up for another cup of coffee, no working
crossword puzzles, no checking e-mail, no Facebooking or tweeting or
linkedin-ing; no bathroom break.
I am always was amazed at how my walking seems to be a battering ram
that topples foreboding mental blocks. or be a pair of wings that takes me
soaring over such barriers into the clouds of inspiration. I sometimes feel I
do more during that 75 minutes on the streets than at any other time during the
day. Now I may know why. I came across a very recent study by Leiden's
Lorenza Colzato that found people who "get away" and go for a walk or ride a
bike four times a week, that's about three and half hours worth (I walk every
other day and get over four and a half hours), aside from being physically
healthier, think and feel more deeply, see and listen more penetratingly, are
more imaginative, and are able to think more creatively than people who are
sedentary.
Now, walking as a meditative and mindful practice sound simple, but its
not easy. I takes a lot of practice, a lot of persistent practice. I had to
learn to focus on the sound and rhyme of my breathing or the pace and sound of
my footsteps to stay focused as a preventative when my thoughts threatened to
carry me away. I strengthen my mind and heart, both physically, mentally, and
emotionally. It is this practice of training my attention, my alertness, my
awareness, my otherness, my mindfulness that makes meditation so powerful.
Using other reinforcing exercises and methods, when I am not on my meditative
walk, I kept focusing my unconditional caring attention on the personhood of
each student in the classroom, undistracted by judgments, perceptions,
assumptions, expectations, stereotypes, labels, generalizations.
So, I understand what I hope is the aim of this professor at Washington
State. She trying to get her students to embody a new way of existing. If we
commit to such a "de-labeling" practice, if we live into it, our attitudes and
feelings are shaped by that involvement. And, as our attitudes are shaped, we
engage in a way that fosters faith, hope, love, support, encouragement, and,
above all, respect. I purposely select faith, hope, and love because they
root me in welcoming, caring, kindliness, embracing, supporting, and
encouraging. They are my sacred "yeses" which give me an awareness, alertness,
and otherness. They push and push and push my life in a positive direction of
thinking, feeling, acting, committing, enduring, and persisting. They step
past difficulty; they energize weariness; they strengthen and encourage; they
leave excuses, explanations, and rationales in the dust; they feel the peace;
they harvest the richness; they reach out and touch; they change the world;
they alter the future.
Think about all this. Meditative and mindful walking is a cost-free
wonder drug. It can help cure illusion and delusion. So, get outta here. Get
out there. Take a good dose of this mental, emotional, physical, spiritual
health treatment. Go take a walk.
Make it a good day
-Louis-
Louis Schmier
http://www.therandomthoughts.edublogs.org
203 E. Brookwood Pl http://www.therandomthoughts.com
Valdosta, Ga 31602
(C) 229-630-0821 /\ /\ /\ /\
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/ \ / \
/ \/ \_ \/ / \/
/\/ / \ /\ \
//\/\/ /\ \__/__/_/\_\/
\_/__\ \
/\"If you want to climb
mountains,\ /\
_ / \ don't practice on mole
hills" - / \_
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