POTTSTOWN PA – A “Labyrinth Walk,” intended to calm the mind and body, and help focus on walkers’ intentions for the new year, is scheduled for New Year’s Day (Jan. 1, 2026; Thursday) from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Pottstown, 565 S. Keim St.
The event is free to attend (although donations will be “gratefully accepted”) and open to the public. Children may attend from 11 a.m. to noon, and adults from noon to 4 p.m. The last walker will be admitted to the labyrinth at 3:40 p.m.
The walk also will feature the music of local harpist Betsy Chapman, from noon to 2 p.m.
The fellowship, on its website, invites visitors to “enjoy this opportunity to walk, journal, meditate, or simply rest by the indoor, candlelit, Chartres-style labyrinth.”
For more information, send an e-mail to CJRhoads@HPLConsortium.com.
Photo by Fabrício Severo on Unsplash, used under license
A Brief History of Labyrinths
A labyrinth is a component of Greek mythology, a May 2021 article in Psychology Today reports. The word “labyrinth” is of pre-Greek origin that originally referred to a place of royal power, according to a current-day attraction called “Labyrinth Park” on the Greek island of Crete.
It is not a maze. Mazes often have multiple (multicursal) paths, dead ends, and are usually intended to be confusing. Traditional labyrinths, on the other hand, have one path (they are unicursal) that lead to a center.
“Medieval labyrinths were not simply ornamental, but represented the spiritual path to God,” Psychology Today adds. “Today, labyrinths are increasingly found in therapeutic settings as an aid to meditation and mindfulness,” it states.
Binghamton University in Binghamton NY owns a labyrinth that is available for public use. It offers these observations:
- Labyrinths are “used world-wide as a way to quiet the mind, calm anxieties, recover balance in life, enhance creativity and encourage meditation, insight, self-reflection and stress reduction;”
- To prepare, participants “may want to sit quietly to reflect before beginning (a) walk;”
- In walking “towards the center, take time to quiet your mind and release your troubles. Become aware of your breathing. Relax and move at your own pace;” and
- “Each labyrinth experience is different.”
Labyrinths were not limited to Greece. Earliest discoveries also found them in Egypt and Italy. Later research also placed them in the Americas, Asia, and Africa.
Above photo by Fabrício Severo on Unsplash, used under license
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