Tap Your Inner Wisdom on a Stroll

One of the unique hallmarks of bilateral activity is that it gives access to the whole brain, making walking and other forms of bilateral movement useful for enhancing creativity and problem solving.  Resources and strengths, helpful learning and experiences that date from childhood are available when walking, and can be brought to bear on current problems or creative endeavors.

Walking is a ground experience, a step-by-step, moment-by-moment contact with the earth.  Whether by some mystical force or some as-yet-unexplained psychological phenomenon, perhaps deeply rooted in our genes and stretching back over millions of years of evolutionary ancestry, feeling connected with the earth produces a liberating experience for most people.

Walking also provides us with a break from the state of normal everyday existence.  Looking at the same walls, the same furniture, the same place and people often anchors us to a particular state of mind.  When we go out for a walk, that state is broken, and new states of mind and emotion provoked by new sounds, sights, smells and sensations offer access to new ways of knowing and understanding ourselves and our problems or opportunities.

The process of walking to solve problems or encourage creativity is straightforward.  Decide on the issue you're going to bring to the walk, whether it's solving a business problem or figuring out how to finish a painting,  Then, while walking, keep returning your mind to that specific issue, at the same time allowing it to freely roam in the intervals between your internal mental reminders.  Letting your mind wander "randomly" yet at the same time "intentionally" bringing it back to the issue/problem at hand as often as you remember to, provides the space for both conscious and unconscious creative processes.

In his 1888 autobiography, Ecco homo, the famous German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche tells the story of how the concept for his masterpiece Thus Spoke Zarathustra came as he was walking - something he did throughout his life when in need of inspiration.  Nietzsche wrote down the core concept of the book during a walk in 1883, and added "6000 feet beyond man and time."  A few weeks later he sat down and wrote the entire first part of the book in ten days.

Describing how walking would activate his creative processes and cause concepts to fall into consciousness fully formed, Nietzsche added: "One hears, one does not seek; one accepts, one does not ask who gives; like lightning, a thought flashes up, with necessity, without hesitation regarding its form - I never had any choice."

Another quick technique that can aid in both problem solving and enhancing creativity is to ask the creative part of you to participate in the walk.  This is essentially what Nietzsche did - whenever he walked ho fully expected the creative part of his mind to make an appearance.  Although this may sound a bit odd, try this simple exercise right now and you'll discover how real and useful it can be:

After you finish reading this paragraph, close you eyes and ask yourself, "Is there a creative part of me in here?"  Do it now.

Nearly everybody will hear or sense some sort of a "yes" answer to that question, because we are complex being with different internal mental and emotional aspects of ourselves that have taken responsibility for different tasks in our lives.

When you're going to walk for problem solving or for encouraging creativity, before you go on the walk ask the creative part of you if it will participate in the process by presenting possibilities and helping you see or hear or come up with new ideas as you're walking.  You may also want to ask if there's a part inside of you that has taken responsibility for the creative project or problem you're trying to solve.  When that part of you agrees, ask if it is willing to receive some help from your creative self.  Again, the answer is almost always, "yes!"

-Massage Magazine, March 2007