Full disclosure: I stole the title of this blog from the title of a book by an Irish neurosurgeon named Shane O’Mara.
I ran across several YouTube interviews with him recently because YouTube apparently knows everything about what’s important to me in my life at the moment. I wrote a blog last week that mentioned walking and boom! Next thing I know, I have 34 walking videos suggested for me when I open YouTube. The lack of on-line privacy is a topic for another post I might not ever write though, because it would be too much complaining about something I can’t do a dang thing about.
Back to Dr. O’Mara’s book…
I haven’t read the book, but the interviews I saw were interesting. The subtitle of the book is A New Scientific Exploration. The book description says Dr O’Mara invites us to marvel at the benefits walking confers on our bodies and brains, and to appreciate the advantages of this uniquely human skill. He reveals how the brain and nervous system give us the ability to balance, weave through a crowded city, and run our “inner GPS” system. He explains how walking is good for our muscles and posture; it helps to protect and repair organs and can slow or turn back the aging of our brains. With our minds in motion, we think more creatively, our mood improves, and stress levels fall. He also described how walking together to achieve a shared purpose (as in protest marches) is also a social glue that contributes to our survival as a species. There are things he mentions about walking that, frankly, I never thought of. And that, to me, was fascinating.
I thought back to when I joined the Air Force. For 4 months in basic training and tech school I walked everywhere I needed to be. I remember being in the best physical condition of my life, not because I was in the Air Force physical conditioning programs, but because I was walking so much. Truth be told, I only graduated from the physical part of basic training because of an obstacle course technicality that worked in my favor. I was allowed to skip, for safety reasons, every dry obstacle following every water obstacle. This is because I am so physically inept, I fell into every single water obstacle and was too slippery to then navigate the dry obstacles. Thank you, Lord, for small miracles.
But I digress….
In the early months of joining the Air Force I worked myself into the best physical condition of my life. That doesn’t mean I was coordinated, but my weight was the lowest it’s ever been as an adult. My muscle tone and cardiovascular health was terrific. I was probably as mentally sharp as I’ve ever been in my adult life during those months too. It was an amazing time for me (physically) even though I was in my late 20s, not at the end of my teenage years as so many military recruits are.
My sister, Lisa, was here this weekend and we went for a two mile walk on Sunday morning. I barely noticed how far we’d walked or how much my knee ached while we were having a great conversation. When I’m alone on my walks I’ve rediscovered music. They say music has the ability to conjure up vivid memories and trigger intense recollections from the past. For many, this ability is stronger than for other senses, and can provoke strong emotions from those earlier experiences. Thanks to Amazon Music on my smartphone, I can queue up a playlist for, say Crosby, Stills & Nash, or Journey, and recall with joy those carefree years when peace and love reigned. The years before full blown adulting took over.
Just being outdoors to walk is good for both the body and the soul. Yes, in Florida we have to be mindful of when and where to walk, but planning well allows a walker to soak up a boatload of Vitamin D and sweat out some of those body toxins. My mood improves when I’m outside. There’s a little park just down the street where Randy and I can walk along paths around 2 small lakes. Out in the open like that we get a great breeze and that helps a lot with keeping us cooled down.
One surprising thing Randy & I learned is taking several shorter walks may be better for us than a longer walk every day. As I mentioned last week, I got a pre-surgery instruction to walk 40 minutes a day. We wondered if we need to strive to build up to the 40 minutes once a day or if 2 20-minute or even 4 10-minute walking segments would do it. Turns out that the shorter times are just as beneficial, and may be more helpful if lowering blood pressure or honing overall mental and physical health is a goal. There is even a cool name for shorter exercise periods…fractionalized exercise. It definitely is more convenient to work in 2 20-minute walks per day for me, and because my knees are so bad, the shorter walk is easier on my body.
Walking is incredibly good for us humans, but no one’s found a way yet to make a fortune off of urging us to simply walk for physical and mental health. Wouldn’t it be great if that’s what our government put at the top of their list of public service health announcements? Imagine a PSA that says “Get outside, soak up some sunshine, move! That will keep most of you healthy and you won’t need drugs and vaccinations and surgery. Let’s all help put big medicine and big pharmaceutical companies out of business!” Not gonna happen in my lifetime.
I’ve only had this walking routine going for 10 days now and it’s still not easy for me, but it has been very good for me. I’m starting to plan how to keep this up once the requirement to be accountable to medical people is no longer valid. Let’s see if feeling better and weighing less is enough motivation for me to keep going.
P.S. I’d appreciate your prayers next week as my cancer surgery is scheduled for May 1, the day before next week’s post will be published.
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