Walking: A Journey Back to Self

Walking is healing.

Whether you are simply stepping out to the shop and back each day, or crossing three hundred kilometres of Spain on a pilgrimage, the walk does the same thing.

It brings you back to yourself.

It is one of the most powerful things we can do.

It does not need a destination.

It does not need a goal.

People who walk without a plan, simply for the sake of walking, are often the most connected and grounded because they are in tune with nature and the universe.

Perhaps that is the real point of walking? Not fitness or discipline. Certainly not the number of steps you do. Just a slow, steady return to ourselves, one step at a time.

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I walked The Camino De Santiago - have you done it?

Walking is a physical response, a mental response, and an emotional one. The physical comes first, which makes sense. You’re moving your body. Step by step. And the longer you walk, the harder your body moves. You start to go through layers. Your muscles complain. They stretch and strengthen. But when they’re too tired, other muscles step in. You begin using bits of yourself you’d forgotten existed.

I was in agony a week into my walk. I found it almost impossible to get myself to the loo from the bed!

Eventually, the pain shifted. My bones ached, cartilage cracked, and joints grumbled, but I found a way to keep going. Shifting my weight, walking with a limp, swinging my hips, singing, crying, laughing…you name it, I did it.

We call this suffering, yet we celebrate it in athletes! Those who have pushed through all of those layers to reach their edge, their capacity, their peak.

I celebrated myself on that walk. Over and over! Because I had never done that with my body. I’ve pushed my mind, my voice…I’ve challenged myself to learn things I thought were beyond me. Ideas? Yes. Creativity? Overflowing!

But I have to remind myself. I have a body. And it’s mine. I chose it, after all. So the least I can do is honour it. Nourish it. See how far it can go.

Maybe with a few shifts, a few stories rewritten, a few old beliefs dropped, I can change the shape of my body. I can strengthen it. I can find pride in it and push myself to my edge, once again.

Walking is medicine

I salute the ones who walk with power and peace. Since my Camino, I’ve realised how essential it is. Walking gives me something deeper. It’s when I think clearly. When I channel. When I download. When I flow.

Walking is when I’m most me.

After the physical layer of walking comes the mental layer. And this is the part that matters. Your mind will tell you to stop long before your body does. The thoughts you repeat, the little stories, the excuses, the inherited beliefs, they’re what cage the body. Not the other way around.

And when we start to move through those stories, the emotions come. The old pain. The inner child. The upbringing. The relationships. The grief. The shame. The comparison. The guilt. The heaviness we carry in our organs, in our hips, in our bellies.

We feel it. And as we walk, we release it, and it’s one of the most powerful things we can do.