Available in 15, 30 and 60 minutes versions below.

15 minutes – Guided Walking Meditation for Beginners

30 minutes- Guided Walking Meditation for Beginners

60 minutes – Guided Walking Meditation for Beginners

The audio versions of all guided meditations is available to download as an MP3 for Patreon supporters. If you’d like to support, check out https://www.patreon.com/updevelopment

Become a patron

Walking meditation is important, because the purpose of meditation is to train the mind to be attentive and mindful in all circumstances. Therefore, we should train ourselves not only on the cushion, but while walking. You will soon see that walking meditation comes with its own set of advantages and challenges. Practicing it will increase your mind’s resilience and greatly deepen your overall meditation practice.

Walking meditation helps us bridge the gap between formal sitting practice and daily life. Eventually, this will lead to the cultivation of a meditative state of mind throughout the day, whether we are on the cushion or not. By maintaining the continuity of our meditation practice, we will progress faster and reap more profound and enduring benefits.

There are many ways to practice walking meditation, and we will explore more advanced walking meditation techniques in later stages. For now, we will learn a simple and useful walking meditation technique that can be practiced in public without attracting attention. While it is easier to practice in calm and predictable environments, you can practice walking meditation anytime you walk. In fact, you can practice this technique without walking, while waiting for the bus or sitting on the subway.

Here is how we will practice walking meditation:

1. Present moment. Become aware of the present moment. Open yourself to your surroundings. What sounds can you hear? What colors do you see? What smells can you discern? How do you feel? Let yourself appreciate this moment.
2. Sensations. While you stay aware of your surroundings, bring your attention to the sensations in your feet. Center your attention on the rapidly changing sensations in your feet. Can you feel the weight of your body shifting from one foot to the other?
3. Introspective awareness. Inevitably, the mind will wander away, either distracted by a sound, a sight or a thought. Like with sitting meditation, when you notice that the mind has wandered away, take a moment to appreciate this newfound awareness. Then, bring attention back to the sensations in your feet.

Practicing walking meditation in this way is excellent mind training. With eyes open and a changing environment, the mind’s natural tendency is to jump from one thing to the next. By bringing our attention back to the sensations in our feet, we will strengthen our “mind muscles”, and this will help us both in daily life and during sitting meditation. As walking requires that we remain conscious of our surroundings, we will further develop our peripheral awareness and clearly discern attention and peripheral awareness. These benefits will stay with us on the cushion: our introspective awareness will be clearer and more stable.

I recommend you practice walking meditation a few times per week, as your schedule and activities allow. Personally, I use walking meditation whenever I walk or wait. In the latter case, while I don’t actually walk, the same technique applies : I mindfully observe the sensations in my feet while I stay aware of the environment. Practicing like this, I can make the best out of waiting periods. Instead of seeing waiting as boring and annoying, I see it as an enjoyable opportunity.

Where and when to meditate

The easy answer to where and when to meditate is “wherever, and whenever you can”. And while this is true – in fact, it will become increasingly relevant as you progress – there are ways to make your meditation session more enjoyable and productive.

In terms of where to meditate, you should find as quiet and peaceful place as you can. You can sit cross-legged on a cushion if you want to, as that posture tends to be especially conducive to meditation. If you’re not comfortable sitting cross-legged, simply use a chair on which you can sit upright.

If possible, you should meditate in the same location each day. That will reinforce the habit of meditating. Eventually, simply moving to that location will put you in a meditative state.

This brings me to the second point of when to meditate. I recommend meditating daily. Like with any skill, daily practice, even if only for a few minutes, will yield more benefits than meditating for longer but infrequently. Once again to reinforce the habit of meditating, I recommend that you meditate at the same time each day. Personally, I find the early morning especially conducive to meditation. Setting aside some fixed amount of time each day to meditation will eventually feel easy natural. You will even look forward to it!

Useful tools and equipment

While not mandatory, here’s a list of all the “stuff” I use when meditating.

• A timer. I use the free app Insight Timer, which has a simple meditation timer that automatically keeps track of your daily sits.
• A cushion. I sit on a simple meditation cushion filled with buckwheat hulls, similar to this one. When it gets too soft due to prolonged use, I add a few scoops of hulls.
• A blanket. I use a blanket that looks like that one when meditating. The weight of the blanket is comforting, and provides warmth when meditating in the cold Canadian early mornings.

That’s all. Meditation is a frugal activity.

Refer to Mahasi Sayadaw’s excellent book “Manual of Insight” for (much!) more detailed instructions.

Available in 15, 30 and 60 minutes versions below, on Insight Timer and YouTube.

15 minutes guided meditation

Insight Timer link

30 minutes guided meditation

Insight Timer link

60 minutes guided meditation

Insight Timer link

The audio versions of all guided meditations is available to download as an MP3 for Patreon supporters. If you’d like to support, check out https://www.patreon.com/updevelopment

Become a patron

This guided meditation is also available on Insight Timer here.

This guided meditation is also available on Insight Timer here.

Recognizing Agitation and Dullness

Learning to identify agitation and drowsiness is the first step in overcoming them.

Agitation occurs when the mind is unbalanced, anxious or stressed. An agitated mind jumps from one thought to the next with such speed that it may seem impossible to slow down. In meditation, agitation usually occurs in the form of excessive thinking, but can also arise in emotionally as worry, stress or anxiety.

Dullness occurs when the mind becomes lethargic, drowsy or tired. A dull mind can give us the impression of being narrowly focused on our meditation object when, in fact, it is slowly drifting into drowsiness. In meditation, dullness makes our meditation object more fuzzy and “dream-like”, while shutting down peripheral awareness of our posture and environment.

We must train our mind to work with and overcome these obstacles, because by giving in to them, we actually train the mind to be agitated or to be dull. Therefore, as soon as we notice a hint of agitation or dullness, we must apply the antidotes below. The stronger the obstacle is, the stronger the antidote should be.

Antidotes to Agitation

These antidotes to agitation are ordered from light to strong.

Antidotes to Dullness

These antidotes to dullness are also ordered from light to strong.

The sooner you notice agitation and dullness, the easier they will be to work with. By applying the right antidotes to the challenges we face, our meditation sessions will become more enjoyable and fruitful.

This guided meditation is also available on Insight Timer here.