'Tis the Season...

...for Walking Meditation!

Image from eattheweeds.com

Autumn has come to our little town by the Chesapeake Bay. The air is chill, the leaves are a symphony of colors, and the time has come for some serious walking meditation.

What’s walking meditation? It’s simply meditating while walking. It’s all about finding your stride and letting it take the place of your seated position during sitting meditation. Walking peacefully and in touch with the beauty of our surroundings, we fall into a rhythm, our feet making gentle contact with the earth. We become aware of everything: our breath, our heartbeat, the earth and sky. We take in the distinctive aromas of fall, the dappled sunlight, the bracing chill of the late October air.

The object is not to achieve anything; we simply want to be aware: aware of what is happening inside us and all around us. Some walking meditation practitioners count their breaths and cultivate an awareness of how those breaths grow deeper and longer throughout the walk. Others sync up their steps with their in- and out-breaths, silently repeating a mantra all the while. Others find that this distracts them too much from the beauty of their surroundings: they miss too much by over-concentrating. On the other hand, you don’t want “monkey mind” to set in, letting your thoughts fly to the future and the past. Whatever keeps you rooted to the present moment is recommended!

In this, my favorite season, it’s very important to me that I not miss any of the sights, sounds, and smells unique to this time of year. I’m reminded that the leaves of the trees are beautiful in death, and that death is not extinction. Rebirth will occur in the spring; like the leaves, I will eventually fall to earth, providing food for new life to grow. Seen in this way, a death can be as beautiful as a birth. All this I’ve intuited (and it’s become undeniably real to me) while doing walking meditation on autumn days near the Chesapeake. Autumn afternoons and evenings are like poignant poems; they are to be savored, and are made even sweeter by the knowledge that winter is close on their heels.

Copyright Ⓒ 2013 by William K. Ferro

All rights reserved

Samhain Approaches!

The Precursor to Halloween

What are the roots of Halloween? How did the celebration get started?

It all began with the pagan celebration of Samhain, a word meaning “Summer’s end” in the Brythonic branch of Gaelic. The pagans of the British Isles saw the date as the official end of summer, and one of several “thin times” of the year. By “thin,” they meant that the veil between the world of the living and that of the dead was more porous than usual; spirits could easily pass through the veil and interact with the living. This, and the fact that some in these agrarian communities might or might not survive the winter (depending on how successful the harvest had been) accounted for the death-related themes of the holiday. This obviously continued in the Halloween (All Hallow’s Eve) holiday that Samhain preceded.

When the tribe gathered around the bonfire on Samhain night, the flames

would attract bats. With the fire being the only source of light, they resembled capering spirits, reinforcing the belief that the spirits of the recently dead were crossing over into the realm of the living. While the pagans worshiped gods and goddesses, there were still strong remnants of ancestor worship among them. They believed that the spirits of family and friends had to be appeased to ensure good fortune-- something that could easily be a matter of life and death. This is where the practice of going from house to house and asking for treats came from: children (and not a few adults) would offer to make sacrifices to the gods and the recently dead on behalf of each household they visited in exchange for treats.

When Emperor Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire (outlawing pagan practices in the process), the Church appropriated Samhain and turned it into All Hallow’s Eve, a Holy Day of Obligation when Christians were to appeal to the saints for the quick release of their deceased loved ones from purgatory. The house-to-house begging that would eventually become known as trick-or-treating took on this new aspect: the children at the door promised to pray for the release of the household’s recently dead from purgatory in exchange for “soul cakes.”

The death-related themes have persisted into modern celebrations of Halloween. It is the one day of the year when we are allowed to mock death and make it entertaining. If you were to put up the traditional funereal Halloween decorations outside the house any other time of year, you would run a real risk of being arrested!

Copyright Ⓒ 2013 by William K. Ferro

All righs reserved

A Blending of the Ancient and the Cutting-Edge

A Glance at Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy

Image from pro-psychcentral.com

Most of us have heard or read about the efficacy of meditation in the treatment of depression. In fact, it’s probably a safe bet to say a great many of us have experienced it firsthand. But how does it work? What can psychology and the other cognitive sciences tell us about the effect of mindfulness practice on the mind of someone who’s chronically depressed?

Recently a team of psychologists at Oxford University staged a study to answer precisely this question. Their results confirm that combining ancient forms of meditation with current cognitive behavioral therapy can indeed benefit depressed individuals-- even those whose depression is recurrent and severe.

The Oxford team have dubbed this new approach Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT), and have published their inital findings in the Journal of Behavioural Research and Therapy. In the study, 28 patients who had suffered from depression and suicidal thoughts in the past and were currently experiencing symptoms were randomly divided into two groups. One group received traditional therapy and treatment, while the other were introduced to Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy as well. A statistically significant number of participants in the MBCT group experienced a marked reduction in symptoms, while the control group’s responses to therapy were in the normal range.

MBCT includes mindfulness meditation tutorials and tools for mood management, especially when feelings of despondency threaten to overwhelm the patient. According to lead researcher Professor Mark Williams of Oxford’s Department of Psychiatry,

"We are on the brink of discovering really important things about how people can learn to stay well after depression. Our aim is to help people to find long-term freedom from the daily battle with their moods.”

Instead of being caught up in disturbing memories of the past or anxiety about what the future may hold, Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy helps people to live in the present moment. This lies at the heart of MBCT, just like ancient meditation methods. The team at Oxford is currently carrying out a larger study that will compare the new approach to traditional cognitive therapy. What’s clear is that meditation can be highly conducive to mood management and the treatment of depression-- and its counterpart, anxiety.

Copyright Ⓒ 2013 by William K. Ferro

All rights reserved