Applauding FERRIS JABR author or the most comprehensive popular article on walking.
Published on 9/3/14 in the New Yorker: Why Walking Helps Us Think looks at the many sides of how walking influences our lives. I'm thrilled it also validates what I've been experiencing on our "Walks With Bliss" since we launched in 2010. It's a fascinating article, well researched and even delves into walking's influence on great literature.
Here's an excerpt:
Many experiments have shown that after or during exercise, even very mild exertion, people perform better on tests of memory and attention. Walking on a regular basis also promotes new connections between brain cells, staves off the usual withering of brain tissue that comes with age, increases the volume of the hippocampus (a brain region crucial for memory), and elevates levels of molecules that both stimulate the growth of new neurons and transmit messages between them.
Here are a few highlights from the article on how walking helps us think:
- [Improved] "memory by increasing the volume of the hippocampus (a brain region crucial for memory)",
- “[Having the] space to spread my mind out in.” "[because walking doesn't require conscious effort, it allows us] a kind of mental state that studies have linked to innovative ideas and strokes of insight."
- This benefit that I call "walking at the speed of human" they say: "The way we move our bodies further changes the nature of our thoughts, and vice versa. Psychologists who specialize in exercise music have quantified this . . . "
- "Psychologists have learned that attention is a limited resource that continually drains throughout the day. . . walking [in nature] can rejuvenate the mental resources that man-made environments deplete."
You can read much more in the full article here
Let us know your experiences by leaving a comment!
HERE'S ANOTHER ARTICLE ON THIS TOPIC, FROM Inc. Magazine (online):
Why You Do Your Best Thinking While Walking
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