children and mindfulness

Spontaneously I developed a routine with the children to walk outside in our garden, no matter which weather it was.

In the summer we would walk after dinner. The sun low near the horizon, casting long shadows from the trees and plants.

In winter we just took the chance whenever the children wanted.

All my children remember these precious small walks.

This is interesting, because other children go for long walks in the woods, and mine just walked the few metres in the garden.

But plants and animals really came alive.

We studied each plant carefully. Looking for new leaves in the spring, flowers in the summer and fruit in the autumn.
Even in the winter there was enough to see, as leaves on the ground changed colour and slowly disappeared, branches changed and the promisses of spring could be seen.
And the animals... they were there too, either the birds, singing their songs of spring, the wonderful butterflies during summer, the hedgehog in autumn, or the small winterinsects beneath a tree with a fluffed up bird.

Every walk was an exercise in being together in a peaceful way, focussing the attention, and enlarging the attentionspan. Even observationskills were trained.

But most of all:  memories were created.
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