The great miracle is not flying to the moon, but walking on Earth.
Meiho Missen Michel Bovay
Kinhin is practised between two zazen sessions. It involves walking in time with one’s breathing. As with zazen, it is essential to focus on every aspect of one’s posture. During kinhin, the left thumb is tucked inside the left fist, with the base of the thumb pressing against the solar plexus. The right hand encircles the left fist. The forearms are horizontal and parallel to the floor, the shoulders relaxed. The back is straight, the chin tucked in, the neck extended, the gaze lowered at an angle of forty-five degrees. Whilst exhaling, one presses firmly into the floor with the base of the big toe of the front foot and with one’s entire body weight; the knee is taut. As in zazen, the exhalation is long, deep, silent and powerful. It brings about an expansion below the navel and creates great stability in the posture. At the end of the exhalation, the body relaxes; the inhalation occurs quite naturally, whilst at the same time taking half a step forwards. Kinhin cultivates within us a posture of great dignity and nobility. The repeated practice of Kinhin, just as with zazen, influences our lives and enables us to attain balance and an upright gait in all our everyday actions. In a dojo, one is taught the basic postures that become the source of all everyday actions – sitting, standing, walking, lying down – to return to the source and to recreate one’s life from that source. In this way, everything becomes the fruit of Zen.
When you move your feet forwards, right here and now, there is neither near nor far. The slightest doubt separates you by a distance as great as that between a mountain and a river.
Sekito Kisen
