Thich Nhat Hanh leads a mindful walk at Plum Village in France in 2014. A screening of "Walk With Me," a documentary about the Zen master's life, will be held on Saturday at 5 p.m. in Hanover. Prior to that, a mindful walk will take place. (Wayne Gersen photograph)
Thich Nhat Hanh leads a mindful walk at Plum Village in France in 2014. A screening of "Walk With Me," a documentary about the Zen master's life, will be held on Saturday at 5 p.m. in Hanover. Prior to that, a mindful walk will take place. (Wayne Gersen photograph)

Hanover — After Wayne Gersen and his wife, Gail Kuhl, attended a September showing in Concord of Walk With Me, a film about Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh, “we left with the sense that it was more of a meditation than a documentary,” Gersen said.

Upper Valley residents will have an opportunity to experience that sensation during a screening of the film on Saturday, at 5 p.m., at the Loew Auditorium in Hanover. A 4 p.m., a “mindful walk” will begin at the Howe Library and lead to the Hopkins Center for the Arts.

“Hanover’s a walkable town,” said Gersen, an educational consultant and retired School Administrative Unit 70 superintendent who is a facilitator with the Heart of the Valley Mindfulness Practice Center in Norwich, about the decision to hold the walk.

Dharma teacher Richard Brady, who taught high school mathematics at Sidwell Friends School in Washington, D.C., for 34 years before retiring in 2007, said the walk will encourage “coming into the theater with an energy of mindfulness,” and “set a meditative tone for watching the film.”

While the film is considered a documentary of Hanh, it also details the monastic life at Plum Village, a Buddhist meditation center in the south of France, where Hanh practices.

It provides an opportunity for “people to look into that in a way that is normally not possible,” said Brady, a founding member of the Mindfulness in Education Network who will see the film for the first time Saturday.

Brady recently coordinated a conference on mindfulness for educators that included a mindful walk. While looking at evaluations from conference participants, he found “the experience of walking in silence with a group of others in a mindful way” was one of the activities that had the most profound effect on them, he said. “I think it will be important for those who come early (to the film) to do this.”

Brady, along with former Plum Village resident Fern Dorresteyn, will take part in a Q&A afterward. Tickets for the film are $8 and can be purchased at https://hop.dartmouth.edu/Online/walk-with-me. For more information about the free walk, contact Gersen at wgersen@hotmail.com or 603-643-9487.

Liz Sauchelli can be reached at esauchelli@vnews.com or 603-727-3221.

Liz Sauchelli can be reached at esauchelli@vnews.com or 603-727-3221.