There doesn’t seem to have been a time in the whole of human history where people weren’t called to walk…

That’s hard to admit. Sheesh! Walking out? Uhh. That’s not generally acceptable behaviour. You could tell me 20 reasons in the next 30 seconds why you can’t do that: it’s crazy thinking, you have too many responsibilities, the kids need you, you have to work, you don’t have the time or the cash. I know. Me too. And – you CAN go.

Perhaps you feel like you could just walk out the door and start all over.
Perhaps you’ve always wanted to go on that special trip “to find yourself”.
Perhaps you can’t afford international travel, and just wanna GO somewhere.
Perhaps you have responsibilities that keep you local, but you want to journey.
Perhaps you walk all the time and are starting to feel bored with the same old, same old and want to find more meaning in the practice.
Perhaps something is troubling you and you sense you need to walk it out.
Perhaps you lead walks that are wanting for . . . something more.
Perhaps you just bought that mid-life crisis motorbike and don’t know where to go.
Perhaps. . .

Walk your way through grief or anger,
Walk to bring meaning to your work, to learn to love,
Walk to lose weight and get stronger, to find answers to burning questions,
Walk to find yourself, or, to lose yourself!
. . . . and then come back home more fully . . . .

“The larger the problem, often the bigger the breakthroughs. The bigger the creativity”
~ Rupert Sheldrake, Evolve Love

It’s an important urge. It may well be that the greater the urge, the more uncomfortable it feels, the more likely something important to you is trying to break through. And it may be that it’s having trouble breaking through because of routines or other ways in our lives we get stuck. Walking, movement, can help you to relax in the midst of the discomfort.

And further to that, the urge may be part of greater spiritual yearning, a calling that we need to sit up and pay attention to – stand up, walk out, walk on, pay attention to, and then, come home!

“I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s very silly not to do some form of pilgrimage. It would be the slowest possible way to get through a break through or something you are trying to change! Any break through: job, career, money, self-love, relationship, creativity, emotional upset, confusion, illness, self-image, . . . . One of the best ways to nourish, fuel, or bring about a big breakthrough, is pilgrimage.
~ Alex Baisley”

Here’s the cool bit – you can walk for 10 minutes or a couple hours and that may be enough. Or at least it may be a start, the first step on a path to allowing that break through.

As the urge to “just go” comes over you it might feel like wanting to escape. It might feel like . . . . .. It might feel like your body screaming for your attention and saying, “Let’s take a hike so I can tell you something important!” You will be able to hear that “something important” if you are able to stay with that feeling and move: walk, bicycle, drive, scooter, roll your chair, skip, surf or dance. “Walking” can be a fast track to opening up enough to hear what is calling. Approaching walking as pilgrimage offers the challenge you are having space to be what it is instead of what you think it might be. Typically many of us sit and think, and then spin on those thoughts and THAT can keep you stuck, especially at first.

I know in my heart of hearts that in order for humanity to shift forward to be sustainable and resilient we need to honour what calls us! Not knowing where you are going, could be the most important opening.

As I’ve heard my friend Tenneson Woolf say, “Start somewhere, follow it everywhere.”

There is a universal awakening happening right now—all around us. Many of us have caught ‘glimpses’ of divine connection—perhaps while meditating, or while cradling a child, or during a walk in nature. Our greatest challenge is to experience that sense of oneness on a daily basis, not just on ‘special occasions.’
~ Marc Gafni, iEvolve Center for World Spirituality