Walking for health, wellbeing and the environment

In this episode we are joined by Orla and Jeff, who featured in our 2021 Humans of the Walk exhibition. They share their reflections on the huge impact walking has made to their health, work and everyday life. 

Our Humans of the Walk exhibition shared life-changing stories and powerful portraits exploring why walking is so important to the people of Scotland and how it can help us live happier, healthier and greener lives. 

You can view the full exhibition of portraits in our online Humans of the Walk gallery and share why walking is important to you on social media using #HumansoftheWalk 

Transcript

Introduction 

Welcome to Voices of the Walk, Paths for All’s everyday walking podcast. Our mission is to get Scotland walking: everyone, everywhere and every day. In this podcast series, we’ll be hearing from a variety of Scotland’s walking champions, who are helping make our vision a reality. In this episode we are joined by two of our Humans of the Walk from 2021. Last year, Paths for All’s Humans of the Walk campaign sought to showcase how walking helps people to live happier, healthier and greener lives by capturing portraits and stories from people across Scotland who champion the life changing impact of everyday walking. Let’s hand over to Orla and Jeff, who share with us how walking has changed their lives for the better.

Orla

 Hello, my name is Orla. I live in Stirling with my husband and two young kids. Walking has been a pretty critical part of my life for a while. When I first moved to Stirling, I was a new mum and I didn’t really know the area, I didn’t really know anyone. And I joined a local buggy walking group and that was a real lifeline, getting out and about and meeting new people and finding out about the area. Really important time for me and I ended up volunteering for that buggy walk group in the end, I knew how critical it was for the local community. And it’s still going, it’s continued throughout the pandemic.

Jeff 

Hello, I’m Jeff Saczynski. I’ve lived in Inverness on and off for the past 30 years and it’s really a great place to go walking. I really only discovered that ten years ago, when I decided I wanted to get myself fit before I turned 50. At that point, age 48, I was very overweight, I was almost 20 stone. My doctor diagnosed me with high blood pressure and told me that I was in the high-risk category for things like diabetes and strokes and all sorts of other horrible things. More than that, I was so unfit that I was finding it difficult to keep up with my children when doing something as simple as running and chasing them on the beach. That summer, I began walking up a steep hill near where I lived. It was one of the old military roads, the old Wade roads in Inverness that lead into Davy Woods. It was hard at first, very hard, but each day I managed to get a little further, until by the end of the first two weeks, I was making it to the top of the hill. And after that there was really no stopping me. 

Orla 

Of course, my kids are now much older, you know, I don’t push them about in a buggy anymore, I can’t use that as an excuse to get out. Before the pandemic, I had quite a long commute, I would walk to the train station, it was about a 30-minute walk to the train station to get my train to work and then the same journey back again. So, I was getting decent steps in everyday, you know, that was the only exercise I got to bookend my working day, really. And then the weekend running after the kids. But now I’m working from home, I’m at my desk in a little office in my house and I don’t have that excuse to go out walking anymore, so, I need to, kind of, carve out my own time myself, and I really need it. I found it such a necessary break in the day, you know, we’re at home so much more now, my house at the moment is either spending time with the kids or sitting at my desk doing work or sometimes doing both at the same time, while also thinking about what you’re going to cook for dinner and when you’re going to get the next supermarket shop in. 

 All of the usual things and it’s all happening here, and I never get a break from it. so, that’s why, with walking, particularly during the pandemic, has been really important for me. So, I just take the time out in the middle of the day whenever I’ve got some space between meetings, I’ll disappear off. I’m really lucky in Stirling that it’s such a wonderful part of the country. There’s so many great local walks and even flat walks or hills. I can challenge myself if I want to or not and just great scenery. Yeah, I really enjoy my time, I usually walk alone, and I’ll listen to podcasts or something and I just, you know, I disappear off into another world and really switch off from the demands of what’s going on in the house. 

Jeff 

I love getting into those woods, breathing in the forest air, and sometimes I would listen to music through my headphones or an audiobook. Sometimes, I even put on military marches to get myself going a bit faster. But other times I just enjoy the sights and sounds around me, I even spotted a deer or two. I lost weight, about a stone a month actually. And by the Christmas of that year, I was five stone lighter and feeling so much better; physically, emotionally and even creatively. I used the thinking time on those walks to write and plan my first book. And I remember the elation I felt when trying to work out the plot point of a novel I was writing, and how, 20 minutes into the walk, I came up with a brilliant solution, or so, I thought, and I always skip the rest of the way. Well, that book wasn’t published, but my next one was. I do think there’s something that happens to your brain after walking for more than 20 minutes; I don’t know if it’s chemistry or mindfulness, but it works for me. walking for more than an hour is a good way to burn calories and certainly shifted a lot of my blubber. But these days I do it because I enjoy it. I used to count steps, but that’s not important to me anymore.

Orla

I think it’s quite interesting, with so many people now working from home and continuing to work from home, in the before times when you were in the office you would be, you know, walking to different buildings between meetings and having casual conversations with people in corridors or popping out for coffee. And that just doesn’t happen anymore, and some people feel that there’s this expectation that you’re going to be sitting at your desk, meeting after meeting, back-to-back with no real relief. You’re just walking to the kitchen to grab another cup of tea and back to your desk again. Which isn’t what used to happen, there was much more fluidity in your day, and different things happening and different distractions. And so, you need to force yourself to have those distractions now, so, that’s why I don’t feel guilty about going off during the day. I’m lucky my employers aren’t, you know, watching me at my desk, trying to make sure my lunch break isn’t only one hour long or whatever. 

 You know, I have that, kind of, freedom to make these choices, but I think it’s important to do that, I think it’s important for employers to do that. And support their, encourage their employees to get a break from the desk, that break from the desk is the time where you can mull over things, and you come back with a clear head and you’re better at making decisions and moving things forwards than you would have been if you were just sitting, staring at your laptop and trying to make these difficult choices. So, the walking for me is actually a really critical part of the day to give me that headspace that I then can make those difficult decisions, whether it’s a work thing or a home life thing.

Jeff 

I have no doubt that walking changed my life, and it might even have saved it. And when certain points of the year, I feel my clothes getting a little tighter, I now feel confident I can get back in shape just by walking up that hill. And also saving on expensive gym membership too! A couple of years ago, I suffered another health setback. I was diagnosed with mouth cancer, which was scary, and I had to undergo major surgery, all sorts of graphs and things. My body was fairly hacked about, and it was a good month or two before I felt strong enough to get back out on the road. But when I did, I immediately felt the benefit. My energy levels began to return and my self-confidence too. I had been given speech therapy lessons, exercises like tongue twisters. And it was a lot easier to do those out loud with only the birds and the cows and the sheep to hear me. 

Orla 

I think the thing that’s worked particularly well, for me, with walking is that I’m doing it for myself. I’m not necessarily doing it for a particular activity, you know, to go to the post office or pop to the shops. I’m just going on a walk and, like I said, I’ll listen to a podcast or whatever. So, it’s definitely just for me, and that’s, I think that’s made me love it even more rather than it being part of a chore or something that has to be done. And so, yeah, that has definitely influenced me and encourages me more every day to go out and have that time that’s for me. I know that’s not always easy for everyone to find that time in the day. 

I would suggest that teaming up with someone might be the way to do it, so, asking a colleague or asking a neighbour, or, you know, someone that you wouldn’t necessarily even engage with that much. And say how about we, you know, once a week we go out for a walk. That could just be the thing that starts you off on a new path in getting out and getting walking and then it can become a more everyday thing that happens in your life. It can be difficult, but yeah, just go out and enjoy it. Don’t be put off by the weather either, wrap up in whatever was you need to and just get out. You’ll feel better for it when you get back.

Jeff  

My advice for anyone starting walking? Well, at this time of year, get a good waterproof jacket and a hat, and maybe even carry a small rucksack with some water and a snack inside. Because apart from anything else, it makes you look less suspicious, it makes you, kind of, look the part. Or if you’re going to walk alone, tell people where you’re going and when you’re planning to be home. It stops a lot of worry. And just stick with it, because the hardest part is actually getting out of the house. Especially when you look out the window and the weather’s a bit bleak. But once you’re out there, no matter what the weather, I promise you, you’ll love it. 

Outro 

For more stories showcasing the power of walking to change lives, and to view our previous Humans of the Walk campaigns, you can visit our websites at www.pathsforall.org.uk