As regular followers of this blog will know I am a keen walker who has been maintaining a photo diary of my walks for the last 5 years. However the last six months of 2010 saw me only completing 7 walks due to injury and as this was at a point where my work live was about to get incredibly stressful the timing was awful.
Walking is my way of dealing with stress and it doesn't matter if, like today, it is just a couple of miles around our local streets I always feel better afterwards. Not being able to walk much further than the short distance to our postbox and back over the last few months has been challenging. I have missed the best autumn on the hills for a long time, which I found incredibly frustrating. More importantly I had no real way of de-stressing at the end of the day, other than a glass of wine. As I'm currently working somewhere between 10-12 hours, 6 days a week and about 8 hours on Sunday I really did need to unwind somehow. Before I was injured even if I didn't stop work until 10:00 pm I'd often go for an hour's walk, as it really helped me unwind and get things straight in my head. Not to mention the obvious fitness benefits.
Thankfully I've now been given the green light by my physio to start walking again and wow what a difference it makes. My workload is no lighter but having the time away from the desk with just my thoughts certainly helps me get my priorities sorted and makes everything somehow seem more manageable. I'd also forgotten how many ideas come to me whilst I'm out walking and the sheer pleasure I gain from admiring the world around me, like today's wonderful sunset.
Health permitting I'm determined this year to walk at least 1000 miles as a way of getting fitter. That works out at 19.23 miles a week or 2.74 miles a day, which should be relatively easy for me to achieve. Before I was injured my average daily stroll was between 3 and 4 miles long, I have measured it using Memory Map. Combine that with hill walking, where anywhere between 300 to 500 miles per year is easily attainable it shouldn't be too much of a challenge. I just hope I stay injury free.
Walking is my way of dealing with stress and it doesn't matter if, like today, it is just a couple of miles around our local streets I always feel better afterwards. Not being able to walk much further than the short distance to our postbox and back over the last few months has been challenging. I have missed the best autumn on the hills for a long time, which I found incredibly frustrating. More importantly I had no real way of de-stressing at the end of the day, other than a glass of wine. As I'm currently working somewhere between 10-12 hours, 6 days a week and about 8 hours on Sunday I really did need to unwind somehow. Before I was injured even if I didn't stop work until 10:00 pm I'd often go for an hour's walk, as it really helped me unwind and get things straight in my head. Not to mention the obvious fitness benefits.
Thankfully I've now been given the green light by my physio to start walking again and wow what a difference it makes. My workload is no lighter but having the time away from the desk with just my thoughts certainly helps me get my priorities sorted and makes everything somehow seem more manageable. I'd also forgotten how many ideas come to me whilst I'm out walking and the sheer pleasure I gain from admiring the world around me, like today's wonderful sunset.
Health permitting I'm determined this year to walk at least 1000 miles as a way of getting fitter. That works out at 19.23 miles a week or 2.74 miles a day, which should be relatively easy for me to achieve. Before I was injured my average daily stroll was between 3 and 4 miles long, I have measured it using Memory Map. Combine that with hill walking, where anywhere between 300 to 500 miles per year is easily attainable it shouldn't be too much of a challenge. I just hope I stay injury free.
5 comments:
Wow I knew you walked but didn't realise how much! You are a true inspiration. I am so unfit and def need to do something soon. x
That's an amazing amount of walking (says she who considered the daily walk to the bus stop her exercise). Hope this year is filled with good health and happy walks~
I wish you luck and good health so that you can pick up those walks again. That's my main form of exercise too and I think I'd go nuts if I couldn't get a good one every day!
Hooray for getting the green light on walking again! :D Destressing is SO important.
How great for you that you can take up walking again and do domething to destress. Wishing you a happy and injury-free new year!
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