A functional walk, is how it starts out. The first half of it is agonisingly slow. Polly isn't keen on the idea, she never is when we're here at home. It's a different story when we're in the Lakes and we walk a different route each day. Although she is getting on a bit now, so we give her 'rest days', which usually involve lying around in the pub (all of us).
What motivates me to walk? What motivates Polly? The Lake District? Is desire a motivator? It can be, if it is strong enough. I may have a desire to lose weight, but if the desire for cheese and wine is stronger, I won't. A desire to walk can be motivating, but so can the sofa. For me, motivation changes with time, place, and throughout an activity.
Initially, the motivation for the 'get-up-and-go' is Polly. I have a duty and a responsibility to keep her exercised and healthy. Each morning I go through the ritual of getting ready and we set off with a ball, a chucker, and biodegradable poo bags. I call her, persuading, coaxing, shoo-ing the laziness out of her as she steadfastly refuses to keep up, four legs planted in stubbornness. If I were to turn around and go get her, she'd turn around first and head for home, so I have to keep a little way ahead and rely on the fact that she panics when I disappear from view. Hedge-hiding is effective. As is a dog lead. Not half as challenging or anywhere near as much fun.
My overriding motivation for walking is that I like it and I like what happens when I walk. That is all. I'm essentially an outdoors person. There are many sorts of outdoors people but I am the type who enjoys being outdoors just because of the outdoors and not because of what I can do in it, for me it's an autotelic experience, therefore, everything I do in it, brings me joy. Swimming, walking, climbing, seeing, sleeping, cycling, eating...being. Although I enjoy all of these activities independently, it is the setting which brings me joy and inspiration. Intrinsic motivation. I can walk, swim, eat and sleep indoors, but I'd rather be out there, no matter what the weather.
So my motivation starts with a desire to be outside and to keep my furry darling healthy. I start out with stiff, creaky joints. I do a bit of a warm up jog, Polly keeps up with me at this point. Her doggy brain believes that if she lets me out of her sight she'll never see me again. I take advantage of this to keep her moving in the right direction - meany. I like to walk quite fast, a long easy stride, but this doesn't happen immediately. Too many distractions for both of us; other dog walkers, vehicles, rubbish. Once we're out on the quiet open pathways though, I get into my stride. My legs are warm, I'm walking rhythmically, effortlessly. I'm unaware of my body, except for my steady breathing and my feet. I'm walking as I like to walk, to the best of my ability, with enough challenge to keep me focused, and the skills to meet the challenge. I am in Flow state.
We're over 'the hump', (which for Polly, is the turning point for home, and her sat nav identifies this point exactly, regardless of which route we take), Polly takes lead position. I no longer have to wait, yell, coax, cajole; she's happily trotting ahead - even though home may be over an hour away. We walk in silent companionship, we don't need to talk to each other. We are both in Flow.
Now my motivation is pure enjoyment. What happens next is magical. No longer hindered by my creaky knees or my canine companion's escape tactics, I'm permitted to wander to my surroundings. Subtle tendrils of energy, vibrating at a higher frequency, entice my senses. I am a Noticer of Small Things. Shining pebbles, tiny pools of reflective water, minute specks of white peeping through the fulling buds on the blackthorn. The mud is drier than yesterday. Tiny, intricate patterns. Small clouds of insects in the hazy sunshine. The melting frost, forming dancing prisms of opal light on dark brown crisped sloe branches. Astonishing ice crystals. It's February, there are no leaves, but slashes of vibrant lime green here and there as the foliage threatens to burst forth and hide things...but not quite yet. I see and hear all the birds and their chattering busyness. A sky lark distracts the intruder, a skyward decoy. The skies are a constant ever changing source of fascination and my eyes are glued in an inspection of colour, form, depth, speed, and direction. What's coming? I am an Interpreter. Immersed in the iridescent clarity of my surroundings. Invading my brain with an almost hallucinogenic quality. I am pulled up by Mother Nature to pay attention. I am a Worm Rescuer.
The question I find myself asking any walking companion, probably to the point of their boredom, is, "Did you see/hear/feel that?" The answer is usually no. Why not? How do you escape the sensory melodrama? The question should be why would the other person see, hear, or feel what I experienced? Our realities are our own individual entities, existing only in our own time and space. Out togetherness may bring our realities close, but never converging. Distance measured in millimetres and nanoseconds, might as well be a different dimension. And there lies one answer. If I've walked 25km and my hips are screaming at me to stop, my motivation is the seat and the beer at the pub. In this moment, though, I am a very different being. I am a Super-sensitive Sponge. A Soaker Up-er of all things nature. Intense capillary action. I am a Tree Hugger. Sometimes I have 'super shiny' days. Intense colours, tree auras and all things magical.
In my last career, I was regularly encouraged to attend a mindfulness course. I declined with equal regularity. They thought I wasn't interested. They couldn't possible have known how full my mind already was and that there is so little room left in there for anything else unless I tip some out first. The difference between the concepts of mindfulness and 'being mindful' went unrecognised. I am Mindfulness. I have no choice, I am an Empath, you see.
The Flow state: the gateway to my acute sensory awareness, the opening of energy pathways which take me beyond my humanness. Walking; this essentially human activity is the hub of my motivation and inspiration for many of my creative ideas. Magic happens when I walk. I escape the space capsule and I am free. Weightless. My internal Dictaphone flickers into life. Words begin to flow. And flow. They keep on flowing and they don't stop. I am a Walking Writer. Uncorked, unleashed and without consciousness. I don't know where they come from, but it is effortless, I am out of myself. I have reached my optimum state of performance; the point of Superfluidity. It is a deeply eudaimonic experience. I 'wrote' three chapters to my novel, last summer up on Silver Howe. It took me two days to record what spilled out while I was walking on the mountain, as the words and ideas clattered into each other in a pile-up at the red light of the Microsoft interface, speed limit imposed. I have yet to finish it, but it was all there, every word, perfect.
When I arrive home from my walk, I am asked, where have you been? My motivation for walking up that last hill is food. I describe the physical geographical route, and the phenomena which bring me to the point of writing this, and other pieces, but I know nature and walking trigger the process. It unleashes creativity within me and unhooks ideas; rituals which lead to the Flow state and the unblocking of the out-roads from deep within my mind.
All I have to do is open myself to the gifts around and within me, allow this energy to flow through me; be grateful to the Universe which forms me and the molecules I share with this planet; take care of myself, our world, and everything in it, and She will take care of everything else. Everything I need. Today I am a Walking Writer.
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I am a freelance artist and writer, regrettably slow in releasing my innermost thoughts to the world, mostly because of an historical lack of confidence and fear of being seen as a bit cuckoo. I have files and notebooks full of unpublished poetry, musings, half-written novels.
Recent life events have led me to adopt a firm 'now or never' attitude. I lost two friends, both at way too young an age. Two beautiful, inspiring, creative women. I feel the pain of their parents, their husbands, and their children. What if I too run out of time? Stop waiting. It's only writing, a tiny speck of insignificance in the Universe. I hover over the 'Publish Post' button for too long. I re-read and edit, losing some of the essence and momentum with each draft. Do it now, oh queen of procrastination. Why are you still waiting?
Time is not ours to keep. It doesn't wait for us. Love it, live it, use it, and be grateful.
And so I hit Publish, open myself to the world, and thank you for your generosity and willingness to read to the bottom of the page, as it is, whether it makes sense or not.
*Note: The link on the word Empath takes you to the most expressive, most beautifully written, and accurate definition I've ever read. In it, there is not one single word of negativity. Thank you Christel Broederlow, "What is an Empath?" ThoughtCo, Aug. 23, 2018, thoughtco.com/traits-of-empaths-1724671.