I must have spent £100s, possibly even £1000s over the years on productivity and business apps and software. Show me a course on productivity or a snazzy new app that promises to revolutionise my working day or streamline my content creation and I’m all over it.
Nothing sparkles with more promise than the ultimate hardcopy business planner complete with freshly sharpened pencils and a vat of coffee in my favourite coffee shop.
But lately I’ve come to realise that my best business tool, by a country mile is my beaten up pair of trainers.
Recently I was stuck on something. Nothing as complex as algebra or bringing about world peace but it was something I’d been mulling over for days and I felt as though I couldn’t move on with my other work until I’d solved it. All day I’d sat at my desk, as well as in the aforementioned coffee shop but the words just wouldn’t come.
The odd idea swam into my head and then floated off before I could even try to journal on it. Put simply, I was stuck and frustrated.
Back at home and with dinner in the oven I shoved on my trainers and went for a walk with my husband. Walking in companionable silence, each mulling over our day the idea suddenly came to me.
It was a perfect, brilliant light bulb moment and suddenly I knew exactly what I needed to do, as though someone had laid out a yellow brick road right in front of me. I didn’t even need to stop and make a note on my phone for fear I would forget it. The idea was so clear and perfectly formed it was as though it already existed.
Thinking back, this is definitely part of a pattern and there’s definitely something that works for me in the simple repetitive soothing motion of walking. Something that calms my frazzled brain and helps me to make sense of the world around me. It’s no coincidence that during the Covid lockdowns our daily walks were the one thing that kept me functioning.
I can’t meditate to save my life. Just the thought of sitting still and deep breathing makes me want to twitch but simple, slow, mindful walking works for me every time. And I’m not alone. I found this wonderful article recently which sums it up far more eloquently than I could. It seems there is some solid science to explain the link between a good long walk and creative ideas.
I’m not ready to ditch the laptop and the coffee shop just yet, but I might just shove my trainers in the boot of the car for a pre-work walk around the block first.
