Few of the skills a person can acquire over the course of a lifetime are as underestimated as walking. And with that I don’t just mean (and we’re getting already to the core of the issue) being able to move on your feet in general, for example from the living room to the kitchen. Most people can do that of course. I mean more than that. I mean walking even long and unconventional distances, using it as a versatile tool to solve all kinds of crucial challenges in life. Once you really get involved with walking, it can give you so much.
Perhaps walking is underestimated because it is usually part of the basic equipment that is available for human beings from the first year of their life onwards. As such it stands in contrast to other skills which have to be learned consciously and with effort – such as singing, juggling or video editing. After in retrospect almost banal skills, such as recognizing your own hands as these or the ability to turn from the back to the stomach without help, it is already the turn of learning to stand upright and shortly afterwards its mobile version, walking. Since walking can be taken for granted for almost most of us, this counteracts the idea of walking being a great treasure.
But once you have mastered walking physically and mentally, given enough time literally the entire world is open to you. Physically speaking, humans are in many ways inferior to many land creatures in the world. The only thing that makes us stand out in a positive way is our endurance. Humans are able to travel up to 200 kilometer in 24 hours using their feet. Walking may not be as fast as running, but for a trained person it is relatively easy and can be used day by day almost to an unlimited extend. Walking was the foundation that enabled our species to reach even the most remote corners of the world. (With the exception of the occasional assistance of boats, as walking on water so far was reserved for Jesus exclusively – at least that’s what is rumored in various churches.)
When it comes to getting around on land, over time for humans many alternatives came into play, which by far exceed walking in terms of speed: mounts, bicycles, cars, motorbikes, airplanes and helicopters and many more. However, they all have a decisive disadvantage compared to walking when it comes to terrain. Riding animals are of less use, when the vegetation becomes denser, steep mountains are completely unsuitable for them, and even so-called off-road vehicles only work off-roads if the terrain at least has the basic characteristics of a road. Aircrafts are very fast, but can only take off and land under very special conditions. A person on two legs (with the occasional help of its arms), on the other hand, may be very slow, but will always find his/her way anywhere.
Once you become aware of this, walking comes with an intoxicating feeling of freedom. “I can go wherever I want and I don’t need anything to do it!” If you subject this idea to a reality check, walking only becomes more powerful, since you usually don’t really want to get to the most remote corner of the world, but of a sudden you can access an enormous number of places in your immediate surrounding; whether in an industrial area, on the roof of a residential building, in a forest, in a cave, in the mountains or on a coast. The density of places around you increases, the world feels much bigger and has so much more to offer. Unlike sitting inside a means of transportation, when walking you are not separated from the world, but rather connected to it; receptive, open to interaction. Instead of isolating your senses from the world, they are stimulated. And you would be surprised how much there is to discover almost everywhere and all the things that can happen once you dare to leave the beaten path and just freely follow your feeling.
Walking is not just physical, to a high degree it is mental. Sometimes you have to have a lot patience and strength to walk long or difficult routes. Especially when you’re not used to it, sometimes it feels almost wrong, it takes way too much time and is too tiring. Without the protection of a vehicle, you may feel vulnerable to the dangers and unpredictabilities of your surrounding. Sometimes this requires courage. No question, it takes a lot of effort and it takes time to get used to it. But the most valuable things are often the most laborious and when in return you finally receive the hypnotic feeling of the whole rolling past under your feet, everything else is of no importance anymore and is replaced by nothing but peace. All the previous efforts become irrelevant.
Walking doesn’t just stand for itself. It is also the foundation of another skill that recently is becoming increasingly underestimated, since it is being replaced by electronic aids – orientation. The general feeling for where you are, where something that you are looking for might be and a feeling for how best to get there is fundamentally within each of us. However, like anything else, the more you practice it, the better it works. Walking, in turn, provides the most fertile basis of data for this purpose. Every step into the unknown is a new experience that can be used to better achieve our destination the next time. You would be amazed at how close some places are to each other and about all that you can find in the space in between if you would just walk the distance connecting them.
Last but not least, walking is not just an individual asset, but a practice that has serious significance for social interaction. It determines how we are perceived by others. Just as evolution has taught us to read, interpret and act on the smallest nuances in the facial expressions and voices of the people around us, humans also read the gait of others. It’s internalized to such an extent, that it goes without any conscious action. For example in the eyes of strangers the way you walk may determine whether you belong somewhere or not. A confident walk with a raised head might be interpreted as self-confidence and integrity, while a lowered head, a slinky walk, arms close to the body suggest insecurity and vulnerability, an excessive walk with swinging arms may come across as arrogance – to outline just some simplified stereotypes in this regard. It’s not for nothing that “How is it going?” is probably one of the most common and fundamental questions that we ask each other every day.
Walk the way the person you want to be would walk and you will get a lot closer to him/her.
