When I have a tangled plot line, I walk to sort it out.
I walk and mull.
I am not exactly thinking about my writing as I walk,
but the question is there, posed by my mind to my body.
My body, which carries a knowledge deeper than my mind,
has answers for me as an artist and a person.
- Julia Cameron, The Right to Write: An Invitation and Initiation into the Writing Life
The connection is not as visible for me as it is for Julia Cameron, but I know what to do when I'm not productive, when I'm distracted, when I feel fragmented and my thoughts are coming in quick half-breaths. Find the trail. Melt into the woods. Let the green scrub me clean.
As my legs move, I can find my own heart's rhythm again.
I do not know why. But I have realized that walking nourishes the ability to create. I have become a walker, because I was a thinker and I wished to think more precisely.
Our modern world gets me going too fast. Walking slows me down. It's a corrective. Who has not encountered a footbridge over a rippling stream without taking in a breath and seeing the light glance through the canopy above? To see the light is to let it in.
Many of our greatest writers were also walkers. I know how even though I cannot say why.
My own inner writer is fragile. She is a glass feather. She has a tendency to grow brittle and stiff.
To stay flexible, she must move.
To move, she must stay flexible.
So that I do not set like a piece of glass as it cools, having been wrought from the earth and baked in the furnace of trials, I must move, and in moving remember how to breathe. For that's what writing is: breathing.
I breathe in the images and I breathe them out as words.
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This post was created in partnership with a book discussion at High Calling Blogs on Mondays.
Please note: I am still working to restore my comments button. If you would like to send me a comment, you can leave me one on Twitter or send me an email.
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On this post, I will publish the comments sent to me below the post itself :
1. from Glenn at Faith, Fiction, and Friends on Twitter: "Charles Dickens was famous for walking everywhere -- and look at the body of work he produced."
2. from Janet at Janet Obeholtzer on Twitter: "I've always said my brain works best when my body is moving - so I love this post."
3. from Laura at The Wellspring on High Calling Blogs today: "I was distressed that your comment button is not working ! I’ll just say it here. That walking and writing connection – yes! I love how Cameron points out that many of our favorite poets were walkers. Those are feet I want to follow. C.S. Lewis is famous for his walks. It does help the body slow down, which–I suppose–goes back to that body of experience thing."
4. from Michelle at Graceful on Twitter: "Gorgeous writing. . . My favorite line: 'let the green scrub me clean.' "
