Can walking turn you into a poet or an artist? Can it bring forth the innate creativity that lives in you? It just may, says a Stanford April 2014 study, published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition. The study was performed by recruiting 176 participants comprising of college students and other adults and was divided into four experiments. Led by researchers, Marily Oppezzo and Daniel Schwartz, the participants completed standard tests of creative thinking such as coming up with alternate uses for common objects and thinking of complex analogies for sentence prompts.
The four experiments took place in four different conditions. As a part of the first condition, participants walked indoors on a treadmill facing a blank wall. In the second, they sat indoors facing a blank wall. The third condition involved walking along a selected path in the Stanford campus. The fourth one included being pushed on a wheelchair (for a sense of visual movement) along the same selected path in the campus.
The study findings reported that participants were a whopping 60 percent more creative in ‘divergent thinking’ (in a test to come up with alternate uses for common objects), when they were walking as opposed to when they were sitting. In the experiment where participants had to come up with novel analogies, 100 percent of the walking participants were able to come up with at least one novel analogy as opposed to 50 percent of the sitting participants! Both indoor and outdoor walking worked equally well in this study and the effects of the walking lasted for a while after the activity stopped.
Commenting on the research conclusions, lead researcher Dr. Oppezzo, in an interview with the New York Times explained that walking may have a role in redirecting energy that would otherwise be spent on raining on one’s own creativity parade. Essentially, walking helps you get out of your own way and “may allow the brain to break through” some of its own, hyper-rational filters”, she said.
Walking, the channel for William Wordsworth’s Transcendental Poetry
William Wordsworth is said to have walked around 175 thousand miles during his lifetime. Whether it was the epic twenty thousand miles he walked along with his class-fellow Robert Jones (instead of studying for his Cambridge University exams) to the Alps, or the daily 12 mile walk from Dove Cottage to the ‘post’, or the pacing back and forth in the premises of his own garden muttering the words “bum, bum, bum, stop” in his latter casino online years, walking was a way of being for the poet.
In a paper titled Poetwalker, author Polly Atkins writes that for Wordsworth, “the act of walking is indivisible from the act of making poetry. One begets the other.” His poems were a “rhythmical creation of beauty” (thanks Edgar Allan Poe) that he felt during his walks.
From The Prelude
“The earth was all before me. With a heart
Joyous, nor scared at its own liberty,
I look about; and should the chosen guide
Be nothing better than a wandering cloud,
I cannot miss my way.”
From The Solitary Reaper
“I listened, motionless and still;
And, as I mounted up the hill,
The music in my heart I bore,
Long after it was heard no more.” – The Solitary Reaper
Wordsworth’s walking was integral to his poetry. Walking was poetry and poetry was walking for him.
What is Left to Say
To walk is to experience the sacred. To walk is to walk towards joy. To walk is to walk away from the cares of the world. To walk is to connect with the earth. To walk is to become a part of the landscape. To walk is to shed your identity. To walk is to feel oneness. To walk is to heal. To walk is to be.
Sometime late last year I started going on long 6 mile walks on a nearby nature trail with my husband on Sunday mornings. When I look back on 2014, those long walks have been some of my most cherished times of the year, they were sometimes intense, sometimes serene, but always wonderful. I noticed that I wrote more during that time. Who would have thought that the simple act of putting one foot in front of the other would bring such joy, peace and creativity?
This is my first post in the New Year. I don’t make resolutions but this year I have a prayer, I pray for chances to walk more. Hikes, short strolls, long walks, slow walks, fast walks, challenging steep uphill walks, tumbling down the hill walks, and even pacing up and down my garden (or my living room) muttering, “bum, bum, bum, stop” will all be considered blessings.
Happy walking and creating. Have a wonderful 2015!
Further Resources:
Courageous Creativity; Walking as Creativity
Sources:
The New York Times; Want to be more Creative? Take a walk.
Stanford University; Stanford Study finds Walking improves Creativity
Brown University; The Legs of William Wordsworth
Academia; How Did Walking Serve as an Integrative Activity for Wordsworth?
Poemhunter; William Wordsworth
