The slow death of purposeless walking (2014)

There were times in my life (thesis writing) where I'd go and sit in the library all day to work and come home in the early evening. The psychological stress on me during that time was tremendous. Every evening, after coming home, I'd have a small dinner and then go for a one-hour walk, always the same route. At that time, I lived in a small town, and my route would take me down a dead-end street, across another one, and then on to the fields where there weren't any cars and hardly any people. Just a wide space with a bit of a view. This was usually just before sunset. Continuing on, I would eventually get back to a different part of the town I lived, I had to climb up some stairs and walk through a quiet neighborhood before getting back to my own street. All in all, it took around one hour to walk that way.

I believe that this process really helped me save my sanity during that time of extended mental stress. I could literally air our my brain, and also get some mild physical activity after sitting in the library all day. I tried really hard not to think about my thesis, but just to take in the scenery, the light, the wind. Sometimes it rained. It was really healthy.

In contrast, I remember a former co-worker telling me about a road trip they once did. I think it was in Arizona, but I might be wrong. Anyway, after driving for many hours, they decided to take a break and just to walk down the road for a few minutes before hitting the road again.

So they pulled over and started walking. Sure enough, in no time, they get stopped by the cops who inquire what the heck the are doing! They weren't walking on the road or in any otherwise dangerous fashion -- but apparently in that area, just being out and about on foot was enough of a reason to be considered suspicious. :-)

I walk insane lengths as it clears the mind and fosters creativity. I talk into my phone during that; either to colleagues or to a recorder and then type it in at home (no, speech to text does not work; if someone wants to work with me to get that working, that would be great but for now, it does not even work a bit; only gibberish comes out; it seems to have something to do with my way of talking which I am trying to fix but I type faster than I talk anyway). Because I walk so much (through the mountains here) and my brain works better while walking, I really work on programming on the go. I want to be able to program while walking and besides discussing code with a colleague while there is internet (which is not everywhere in the mountains) I cannot code while walking which annoys me. I get ideas and want to try them right away. Now I have to sit down, get out my pandora and try it. I want to try it while walking. I believe I will find a way of doing that eventually but everything I tried (from primitive AR to Scratch like programming languages) doesn't really work well. The thing is ; I can text chat fine while walking so why not coding... I know why but I try to somehow resolve it anyway.

The purposelessness here is the time between I want/need to write code or talk; that's most of the walk.

Edit: one of the findings is that you basically should not need any scrolling/dragging within small distances; like scrolling to a part of code and dragging your cursor to make changes for instance. This includes dragging/dropping the Scratch visual code; it doesn't work while walking.

I keep nail clippers in my desk exactly for this reason.

I hate the feeling of rough bitten nails which became an unproductive distraction in itself.

Now, I clip instead. My nail grooming has become on point.

I've been walking about 10kms per day for decades now without wearing any shoes at all. No detrimental effects so far. But then I'm a featherweight, which might help.

Anyway: walking is absolutely essential to me. I do most of my work outside, walking and thinking.

Wasn't this already posted on hackernews? I've already read it, and I was a little curious because that's a little what I started to do last year (my apartment and school started to feel like a prison cell).

I just walk in my city to explore, preferably greener, quiet areas without car traffic, but I always plan a zone I'll go to. I use offline openstreetmap (OSMAND) on my smartphone. I try to go to different places when I can, but it's difficult as green places are too remote. Public transport can boost me, but I usually take off from home and try to make a looped route.

To me it helps "loosening" my focus, so I can think a little more creatively. I just talk with myself. I don't have a time where I know I have to go home, I don't plan. Walking is a physical exercise (at least for me, I sleep better), which make the blood flow, so you're not as much anxious when you sit for too long.

I don't want to sound like a crazy hobo, but cubicles, houses, apartments and dense urban areas can feel like prisons. It's not just about the physical exercise, it's about being in the large outdoors and not controlling your behavior because there are civilized people around you. If all you do is work and gym, it won't feel very good.

Maybe all of this is in my head, and my unconscious just pretends it's good. But I know that I can't be creative at home.

Also try to watch that speech about creativity by the monty python head guy. He gave really good insights about how to put oneself in a position where you can be creative. You need large spaces, relative silence, freedom from behaving like you want, etc.