How To Go On A Good Walk

Going for a good walk is one of my favorite things. In fact, I would say that I'm pretty darn good at it. Yep. That’s a resume booster alright.

I love walks because, for me, they are more than a little exercise – they are an opportunity to see differently. It is a time to take myself out of mundane things, and instead, just look. Look for beauty. Look for wonder. Look for any little trail of crumbs and follow it. I find that when I do that, almost always, there is a story that unfolds.

Try one, or some, of these ideas next time you go for a walk.

1) Actively look for beauty, mystery, delight.
2) Don't plan where you are going to go, and don't go somewhere you always go.
3) Listen to your intuition when you are deciding which way to turn. Decide with your feeling instead of logic or reason.
4) Pick up something you like and carry it in your hand
5) Entertain the idea that you might have an interesting interaction with another being while you are on this walk. (Person? Dog? Snail?)
6) Stop and look at things
7) Make up a little song that you can sing while you walk (don't be embarrassed!)
8) Look at your neighborhood as if you were a visitor and had never been there before.
9) Let the route you follow be guided by what you find interesting. Go exactly to the things you find most engaging.
10) Look for things you didn’t know about wherever you are.

Here are a few more for the really committed wonder-walker:

11) Jump over at least one fence
12) Find a way to be in more than one type of space – cross a boundary of some kind. (commercial/residential/rural/woods/train tracks/behind the mall/inside an office building/beach/fancy neighborhood/poor neighborhood/in a crowd/solitary, etc.)
13) Make something out of things that you find on your walk
14) Choose a place you know of, but don’t know how to get to. Walk there without consulting a map.
15) Find a secret passage (They exist.) and follow it.
16) Get yourself lost, and then, get yourself un-lost.

There are a million soul-stirring adventures that can begin the moment you step out the door.

Let me know what you find!