Walking Intensifies
As all of these changes to my medications, sleep, diet, alcohol consumption and more were taking place, there was one constant amongst it all, and that was my persistence in going for walks.
Only now, my walks had become more like hikes.
When I first started my recovery, I remember barely managing a 700m walk.
I’d had to learn about sunburn, and portable hydration.
I’d pushed through the embarrassment I’d felt wearing shorts, and being seen walking, sweating, gasping for breath and found a confidence.
Albeit hidden beneath my hat, glasses, and earphones, my walking gear had become a sort of costume, a suit of armor that I could comfortably hide beneath, whilst exploring the seemingly foreign outside world.
And I kept fighting and sweating and learning, and in time those 700m had become 3km which became 5km…
I contracted covid, and lost a great deal of my progress…but once recovered I persisted.
And so after a step back to 3km, they quickly became 5km once again, which then became 6km, became 7km…
I suffered a couple of injuries, and so there were a couple of days where I found myself limping, dragging my injured leg furiously through gritted teeth and pouring rain…
But this was to me, the foundation upon which I was rebuilding the rest of my life.
Walking had also provided me somewhere to ‘put’ my anxiety.
In the past, when I was experiencing large emotional responses I found it difficult to endure, I’d immediately and without hesitation race to the nearest source of alcohol, and bury myself in intoxication.
However now that I had the option of walking, I found that I could suit up in my protective armor, grab my water bottle, and walk the anxiety out.
I had somewhere to channel that nervous energy, and I had a…sort of time out from the world.
I had an hour or more to just…be with my thoughts, to sort through the clutter that had accumulated in my mind, and if any thoughts were particularily frustrating, or distressing, I could just pick up the pace and ‘walk it out’.
I found that I could charge up a steep incline at a swift pace, and it created in away a similar sense of the self flagellation I got from drinking.
It could feel, in a way, destructive, however it was inevitably quite the opposite.
The more I walked, the fitter I became.
and, even better, muscles when exercised release “happy chemicals”, primarily endorphins, which are natural mood boosters and pain relievers, and also myokines which can act as natural antidepressants.
So I was inadvertently carving for myself the time to have this medititive space with myself, to sort through the chaos of my often obsessional thinking.
To touch on hopes and fears, regrets and goals, or just sort through the miasma of every day life.
and should those thoughts create a sense of stress or worry, I found myself picking up the pace, giving the anxiety and stress a place to be channeled, in a way that had the familiarity of the self-flagelative behaviour I was used to, whilst my muscles in response released their own brand of anti-depressants produced in response to the physical stress of exercise.
It had become an invaluable resource in being able to reduce the noise in my head, which had in turn profoundly reduced my need to self medicate with intoxicants, and that of course has a feedback effect of further reducing the noise….reducing the need….I’d inadvertently created a positive feedback loop, a form of meditative escape where negative emotional responses where channeled into physical activity which in turn produced positive neurochemistry.
Holy Fuck.
And so 7km became 8km, became 9km, then 10km.
I’d changed my route entirely by now, no longer wandering through the quiet suburban streets, I’d begun venturing much further out, exploring the local gardens, touring local cemeteries, venturing into bushland and eventually, I’d decided to take on a hike up to the summit of a nearby mountain range.
And though daunting, and despite the persistent incline, I’d made it.
In fact all in all it came in at 9km, a tremendous distance further than the 700m I had started out on all those months ago.
And it had all been just one foot in front of the other, a mantra I’d repeated to myself when I found myself struggling, just keep walking, just one more step, one foot in front of the other.
And, whilst on one of my walks, reflecting on the progress I’d made, I’d eventually realised it was that approach I’d taken to the other aspects of my life as well.
Waking up, I’d turned my alarm back 30 minutes, become comfortable waking at that time, then turned them back 30 minutes more, if 30 minutes proved too much, 15 minutes would do…. all I really needed was just one more step, it didn’t have to be huge.
It just had to be one more step.
It didn’t have to be perfect.
It just had to be progress.
and sometimes, progress was just….not going backwards.
sometimes, just standing fast in the new space I’d created for myself, was all the progress I could manage, and it was important to remember, that was progress all the same.
And with my diet, it started with just a teaspoon of capsicum shredded infinitesimally small, hidden amongst a large bolognese.
and then 2 teaspoons.
and then 3.
and then cut into slightly not so small pieces.
and then, some space to get comfortable, to stand still in the growth, to give myself some space to acclimatize….
and then 4 teaspoons.
And with my drinking.
It was just one less drink,
and then the next time, just one less drink than last time.
and this week, just one more sober day.
It had all come down to one thing, one philosophy one action.
Just one foot in front of the other.
Just one step.
Just progress, not perfection.
No matter how small.
And I found that I’d begun utilizing a form of the sunk cost fallacy.
The sunk cost fallacy is often predominant in individuals who’ve foudn themselves the target of a pyramid scheme, it’s a phenomenon whereby a person is reluctant to abandon a strategy or course of action because they have invested heavily in it, even when it is clear that abandonment would be more beneficial.
and though abadonment would no have been more beneficial in my case, it was still a great many aspects of myself which I had already invested heavily in.
Not all at once.
And in some cases, not even entirely meaning to.
The sleep had been a happy accident of the medication, which I’d leaned into.
The drinking had been disrupting my capacity to lose weight, and maintain a regular walking schedule.
I didn’t just wake up one day and say
I’m going to stop drinking entirely, and start hiking mountains, and fix my life long dietary problems, and lose weight, and start waking up earlier than I ever have before.
the very idea of that would’ve been so daunting, I never coould’ve imagined myself achieving it.
but by focusing on just the one goal, just…going for a walk every day, just putting one foot in front of the other, and when I turned to reflect upon my progress, I could see all those steps had added up to the achievements I never could’ve imagined myself undertaking, let alone simultaneously.
Once I made the decision to start walking, a number of other things had seemingly fallen into place around me.
That’s not to say that it didn’t take effort, and a modicum of discipline.
Some days I hated the idea of going for a walk so much, I could have sworn I’d just give in, but if I did nothing else, I told myself, I’d just go for a walk.
That’s all I had to do, I told myself.
Just go for a walk.
It mention this because it all of this progress wasn’t just the result of a happy accident that I’d lucked into.
When I was deep in my depression, searching for answers in the experiences of others, I hated stories like that, it was like someone celebrating winning the lottery as their own personal success.
Walking had for me however, been the precursor to it all, and upon it I’d built the foundations for all these other aspects of my life in which I was making progress gradual, yet steady progress.
and the progress kept me motivated, even just a little bit of progress, was progress all the same. even if I wasn’t going fast, I was at least going in the right direction.
Progress felt good.
In fact, I’d become somewhat comfortable on my walks.
Hidden under my cap, behind my sunglasses, buried in the parasocial chatter of podcasts or regular beats of music, I’d found a rhythm, a familiarity, a comfort.
I’d even occasionally pause my headphones, so that I could listen instead to all the strange new birds singing to the afternoon sun.
Achievement Unlocked: Beat the Mountain!