If there’s been a consistently positive force throughout my life, it’s been walking. Ever since ancient Chinese and Roman times, experts have extolled the value of walking in improving everything from cognition to digestion. My personal experience reflects that as well.
My wife and I are fortunate in many ways. Two of them are that she can walk to work and that I work from home most days. So for much of the last 2-1/2 years, I have walked with her to her office, returning home to start my work day. That gets me about 5,500 steps, so a threshold of 7,000 steps is easy most of the time. On days I have to work in an office or visit a client site, I tend to either take the train or park some distance from my destination, either of which builds walking time into my day. That, coupled with hikes I take on occasion, means that I’ve walked an average of more than 13,000 steps since I got my smart watch more than a year ago.
With that in mind, why set such a low threshold of 7,000 steps? As Andy Warhol said, there’s a world of difference between doing something every day and almost every day. On days with bad weather, lots of driving, or piles of meetings, it’s all too easy to make walking an “almost every day” habit. The 7,000-step level isn’t a goal, it’s an absolute minimum. If it means going to the mall on a rainy evening or doing laps around our dining room and kitchen just before bed, so be it. But I won’t let anything get in my way. There’s also a special incentive for walking over the next four weeks. My wife’s employer is running a wellness challenge that includes three categories: walking, meditation, and gratitude. To reach the top tier – and who would aim for anything less? – we each need to walk at least 10,000 steps each day. That kind of accountability, whether to a program or to a person (or, in this case, both) is an exceptionally powerful tool for making habits stick.