I always thought that meditation meant sitting quietly, alone, in a
darkened room, with nothing but my thoughts (which I was supposed to
ignore) for company. Not only did this method of practice send me
screaming from the room within two minutes, but it usually kept me from
sitting down to meditate in the first place. A dear friend and long-time
meditator tried to help me by sitting with me, giving me some pointers,
and telling me to start with just five minutes; how could I tell her
that I couldn't even make it to two minutes?
Then
one day I was leading a weekend retreat on dreams, and was entrusted
with a labyrinth to use during the weekend. At that point I didn't even
know what a labyrinth was, let alone how I might use it in the retreat,
but I took it and, on the ride to the retreat center, I read a little
about labyrinths, and this labyrinth in particular.
Labyrinths,
though they initially look like mazes, have no blind alleys. There is a
path (usually with a single entrance), and it always, always, leads to
the center of the labyrinth, no matter how many twists and turns there
might be. Once you reach the center of the labyrinth (and, in theory,
yourself), you can stay in there and continue your meditation by
standing or sitting, or you can immediately come back out. No matter
what, you will not get lost. Labyrinths of various shapes and sizes are
found in almost all cultures, and are springing up all over the planet
at clinics, churches, and even people's back yards. Though their
original intent is not known for sure (many of these are centuries old),
some think they were used by people who couldn't travel as a metaphor
for the journey of a pilgrim. Nowadays they are used as
meditation/deepening/healing tools.
In the course of my reading
about the labyrinth I had been given for the weekend, I discovered that
it had been made for a clinic by a grateful patient. She had painted a
Chartres-style labyrinth on strips of dark blue canvas, which were held
together by Velcro. I realized we were going to have to assemble this,
and it had to be done correctly, or we would have a maze on our hands.
It
turned out to be quite easy to put together, with all of us helping.
And, once it was complete, I was inexorably drawn to the entrance and
immediately began what turned out to be the first of about ten walks I
would complete over the course of the weekend. As soon as I entered the
labyrinth, everything else fell away: concerns about how to use it and
how the weekend would go, thoughts about meditating, sounds from outside
the building in which the labyrinth was housed. Without even knowing
it, I had gone into a meditative state; I was in the present moment, and
there was nothing but the path and me walking the path.
After
that weekend, I felt bereft; I had discovered a way for me to meditate,
but the tool which facilitated this wasn't mine, and it turned out that
it would be several months before I found another labyrinth, and then a
couple years before I encountered another. (My favorites are the ones
which are out-of-doors.) But I discovered that there are other forms of
moving meditation, all of which engage me much more easily th`n sitting.
Tai chi and qigong have a variety of moving meditations, and the
simplest moving meditation is just putting one foot in front of the
other, slowly, while keeping one's complete attention on the movement.
Still, the labyrinth remained my favorite moving meditation; what to do?
I
eventually discovered that there are finger labyrinths-smaller versions
of the large, walking labyrinths-made out of paper, wood, glass, and
fabric. Many of this kind of labyrinth could be found at the entrances
to churches in the British Isles; apparently they were used to center
oneself before actually entering the sanctuary. While these don't
provide exactly the same experience as the walking labyrinths, they are
often found to be of value by someone (like me) who cannot do a
traditional seated meditation. The trick is not to race through it, but
to focus on the movement, and the feeling of the movement, and of one's
finger on the paper, wood, glass, or fabric.