One step at a time; spiritual walking practice

Posted on Jun 14, 2025 in Healing, Spiritual living, Uncategorized

One step at a time; spiritual walking practice

A couple of weeks ago, my partner, our collie companion, and I set off on a ten-day walking holiday, each day unfolding spontaneously from the base of our camper van. The deep restoration we felt – body, heart, and spirit – moved me to write this reflection on a spiritual walking practice.

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I walk, and my body sings. There’s a rhythm in my hips, a primal pulse rising up from my feet. Step by step, I fall into the ancient poetry of motion – one foot, then the other, again and again. It soothes. It centres. It returns me to myself.

If you prefer to listen to a spoken version of this article, play the video below. Otherwise, read on.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmEafV4vty0&t=2s&ab_channel=SemeleXerri

We are made to move. Our bodies are shaped by centuries of seeking. Once, our ancestors walked to live. Miles upon miles in search of food, of water, of warmth, and safe shelter. They conversed with the land like an old friend, followed the arc of the sun and the cycling of seasons. The map was imprinted in their bones, long before paths and roads had names.

Now I walk for a different kind of sustenance. No longer pushed by survival, I walk to remember. To return. To realign. My mind unravels its knots in the vast breadth of the landscape. My body, this animal self, at once awakens and softens. I check in with its strength, its stories, its balance. Sinew and spirit hum in unison. The earth welcomes me as one of Her own.

There is something sacred in the act. The early church honoured walking as worship, and called it pilgrimage. The Oxford dictionary defines it simply as “a journey to a holy place for religious reasons; a journey to a place that is connected with somebody/something that you admire or respect.”

For me, the land is holy. Every walk is a prayer, each footfall a blessing pressed into soil, rock, and sand. My soul and my sole touch the ground in gratitude. Sometimes, I seek out the old places – secluded stone circles, ancient churches echoing with forgotten hymns, mounds and tombs alive with ancestral memory, springs sparkling with the free-flowing elixir of life. They pull me by unseen threads, these sacred sites.

Ancient oak tree; spiritual walking practice

But often, the divine finds me unexpectedly. A thousand-year-old oak calls me to rest my brow upon its bark, its deep fissures holding stories of life endured and surrendered. I’ve held my breath as a hare hopped into view, stopped for a moment to set its direction. I’ve gasped as an owl, pale and silent, swept low through the ghostly dusk. The sky, too, speaks. Cloud spirits form and dissolve, both fierce and tender. And sometimes, it’s a stranger on the path whose words touch a forgotten place in me.

Each landscape brings its own medicine. When I’m tangled in thought, when complexity overwhelms, I climb. The hills call me up to a higher view. Raven and kite circle above, crying reminders to see through their eyes. Confusion clears like mist burning off under sun. Clarity is unveiled.

When sorrow clings or something within cries out for release, I seek the sea. There, by the amniotic waters, I am home; a droplet in the infinite, a child of the tides, a part of All That Is.

For hope and healing, nothing soothes my spirit like a soft, still night. Under starlight and moon glow I know divine love is constant. The wheel turns inexorably, and this too shall pass.

For revelation, I go into the woods; that wild, shadowed threshold of initiation. The fairy tales are true; death and danger prowl there. And when I make it out, I emerge transformed.

Every day, I walk. At least an hour. Not to arrive anywhere, but to inhabit the mystery. My feet trace circles and spirals; routes familiar, yet never the same. The path changes me, and I change it. We are in dialogue, the land and I. A communion of presence. An exchange of essence.

Sometimes, I choose the unknown – a new path, untrod terrain. It trains my spirit for these uncertain times. I practise surrendering to not knowing, my senses alert, my heart open. I bring my full presence to all that crosses my path.

Because whatever I long for, wherever I’m meant to go, however my soul is asked to serve, the way we discover and move towards the more beautiful world we know is possible. It’s always the same. One intentional step at a time.

Here are a couple of resources to get you started on your own spiritual walking practice, and help you discover what calls to your soul. These are in the UK, but it should be easy to find similar sources wherever you live. Or, you could just step out your front door and see where your feet take you…

National Walking Trails UK

Rambers Association walking routes

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Semele Xerri

© Semele Xerri is a psychic intuitive guide, healer, animal communicator, and Reiki Healer / Master Teacher. To find out more about her and her services, go to her Work with me page.
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