Walking is useful Physical activity / WHO Newsletter for health, and ideally you need to walk every day. But often we find a lot of reasons to refuse a walk: bad weather, not enough time, no mood, nowhere to go. In such cases, you will need additional motivation to force yourself to go outside. Try to find a suitable option that will be an incentive for you.
When it's gray or cold outside, tell yourself that you will go out for a walk for only 5-10 minutes. Then the brain will not resist as much as if you immediately decided to take an hour-long walk. And after five minutes on the street, agree with yourself that you will walk a little more.
Most likely, you will begin to enjoy the movement, and as a result, your walk will last longer than the originally designated time.
Not only pigeons and sparrows live in cities. In parks, forest areas, and sometimes right at home you can meet a variety of birds. Combine watching them with walking.
Count how many birds you will meet along the way, look for species unknown to you, listen to the singing and watch scenes from bird life. Maybe you will get so carried away that it will become your new hobby.
Usually we walk the usual route from home on business and back, but we pay little attention to the city around us. Try to feel like a tourist. Go to an area where you rarely visit, and take a walk around it, trying to notice the details and look for curious corners. If you have a friend who lives nearby, ask him to become your guide.
In many cities, there are also QR codes on historical buildings, by scanning them, you can find out something interesting about the place. They are a good substitute for a guide and will also help you diversify your walk.
If you want to try meditation, but are repelled by the need to sit still, try meditating on the go. To do this, you need to concentrate on your steps. Try to feel how the feet touch the ground, and then break away from it, how the muscles of the legs work.
After some time, you can add to this a breathing exercise: stretch the inhale for four steps, hold your breath for the next four steps, and then exhale for four steps. This will help you calm down and be in the present moment, and not in your thoughts.
Instead of breathing, you can also concentrate on the sounds, smells, and the touch of air on your skin around you.
It can be thematic, dedicated to photographing beautiful buildings, unusual signs, animals. Or maybe — documenting your typical day, native area or favorite park.
Go on such a walk with friends or agree that you will go separately and compete who will take more pictures, for example, seals .
Research confirms M. Oppezzo, D. L. Schwartz. Give your ideas some legs: The positive effect of walking on creative thinking / Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition that walking promotes creative thinking. So if you need to think about a plan of action, find a non—trivial solution to a problem, or conduct a thought experiment, a walk is the perfect time for this.
Walk on the other side of the street or in the opposite direction to the one you always walk. Surely you will notice details that previously escaped your attention. Or maybe you'll even feel like you're walking through an unfamiliar area.
You can arrange an orienteering tournament with friends or just imagine yourself as a traveler from the past. In any case, you are guaranteed new experiences.
And how do you motivate yourself to walk more? Share your ideas in the comments.
