Every day I try to take a 3-mile walk. I often walk by a lake with a beautiful scenery. There are all kinds of birds chirping; a nice breeze. The trees sway with the wind. It's so peaceful.
I take that time to meditate. I kind of slow things down a little, and just enjoy the scenery, the sound of the water, and the wind moving through the tree leafs, and I watch the people walking by with their dogs, and I smile and say hello to some.
There are many benefits to my daily walk, including getting some exercise, of course. But equally important is being able to take that time to meditate, to be away from the "noise" and phones, and radio, TV, and traffic.
As I walk and look at the scenery, and notice the calmness and the beauty, I contrast it to all the "noise" and the confusion in our society today. Conditions that have been artificially created, on purpose.
And sometimes I think about what would happen if most people engaged in this type of reflection. Just stop everything, disconnect from the mass media, and from the phones, and computers, and facebook, and twitter.
As part of my meditation I try to imagine a moment in time when people have become aware of the root causes of our social dysfunction, and have acquired a collective consciousness enabling them to take meaningful action.
Right now there is a mist, a fog that prevents us from seeing and understanding reality as it is, and instead creates an alternate, absurd reality.
What will it take for people to finally wake up? As I reach the 1.5 mile stretch of my walk, I look down the hill on my left, through the tree leafs, and see the water, and birds, and the occasional fish jumping and splashing... And today, I noticed something else: Frogs croaking. A cacophony. I was amazed at how loud they were; but it actually sounded beautiful. I usually don't like to stop walking at mid-point, but today I did. I stopped and listened to the frogs croaking for quite some time.
And of course, that metaphor of the frogs boiling slowly came to mind: "The story is often used as a metaphor for the inability of people to react to significant changes that occur gradually."
At that moment, I kind of let that thought sink in for a while, and then I turned around, stopped thinking about anything and just enjoyed the rest of the walk. It was a good workout.
P.S. I took that photo during my walk today...
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