Sunday, December 6, 2015

Joy of Walking

     Walking is one of those very common things in life that we do without thinking about. We don't notice the importance of walking until it's gone or impaired. 

      Many experts claim that walking is the best activity for many things...fitness, weight loss, and many more.

     We also don't notice how much of our daily activity includes walking even if it's inside.

     One of my main winter activities is walking. I don't mean a fantastic amount of walking. I try to walk everyday, but weather sometimes limits walking. I have a 2 km route that I follow and I usually walk in the evening. I don't use a pedometer although I have one.

    Over the last couple of years I've had a few brief nagging irritants in my walking. I've also noticed that I've slowed down and my stride is shorter. Balance is sometimes a problem.

    So I was thinking recently that I better do something about these conditions. The  book I recently read on Parkinson's had some basic suggestions on walking. So very simply, we lengthen our stride a little bit and speed up the steps. One simple thing is swinging the arms. The arms help to balance the body as the arm swing is opposite to the leg swing. I found this really works to improve balance. I had noticed before that my right arm didn't swing. This book made me look at other information on walking.

    Good posture is crucial when it comes to walking. So straighten up. Try this . It really works. One site suggested that you should be able to draw a line through the ear , shoulder, hips ,knees and ankles. 

    Don't forget about the good shoes.

    So my suggestion is to look at a good site on walking and then put as much of it as possible into practice. 

   I took my bird group out this afternoon and yes, we walked. However, I don't know how far we walked but we did see many birds. There were hundreds of white winged cross bills. They only show up about once every five years.

    How about you? Do you have a regular routine for walking? What tips do you have?



      The micro Manager has the green backpack. Notice the lady in the black coat has a cane! This was one of the Sunday afternoon bird walks.