Another simple way of meditating while you walk is to question yourself, ‘‘Does my I appear to be merely labeled or not?’’ It does not appear to be. ‘‘Does my action of walking appear to be merely labeled? Do the road, sky, cars, people, cats, dogs and ice-cream all appear to be merely labeled? Does whatever I see appear to be merely labeled by my mind or not?’’ No, all these things do not appear to you like that at all. Therefore, it is all like a dream, a hallucination. You are walking as if in a dream; the road, sky, cars, people and trees, your walking itself, are like a dream. (Even though I am saying this correctly, ‘‘like a dream,’’ it is more effective for our minds to say that it ‘‘is a dream; I’m dreaming.’’) Why meditate like this? When you practice mindfulness in this way, there is no clinging, no grasping, because you understand that everything is a hallucination, a dream, unreal. You realize that in fact, all those things that appear as something real coming from out there—a real I from out there, a real road from out there, a real sky from out there, real walking, real cars, real people, real trees, real enemies, real friends—are merely imputed by the mind. When you understand this, attachment and anger are less likely to arise. Thus, this practice brings peace to your mind immediately; your mind becomes detached and free, patient and without anger. When you walk with the mindfulness that everything is a dream, you understand in your heart that everything is not real, does not exist. If you relate this understanding to the I, action and object, and so forth, that appear from there, you can see that they are empty. When you meditate that everything is like a dream, no matter what you see—the various shapes of people’s bodies or the billions of other phenomena that you designate as ugly or beautiful—you know there is nothing to cling to, nothing to get angry at, because there is nothing to hold onto; in your heart you know that they don’t exist. Seeing things in this way helps you to let go.
Therefore, just like the analytical meditation on emptiness while you walk, all the walking you do while meditating on everything as a dream also becomes a method to cut the root of samsara, a remedy to the entire cycle of samsaric suffering, including problems in your relationships, being treated badly by others and so forth. Walking with the mindfulness that everything is a dream eradicates delusion and karma, the fundamental cause of samsara, the main cause of suffering.
This is how to make walking the cause of ultimate happiness, complete liberation from samsara and its cause.