Walking is a way I can escape my busy life and clear my mind. At first I recite all the responsibilities in my head, go through all the things I have to do and schedule a way to complete them. I go over past conversations and recall recent events. But once this bundle of confusion is out of my mind, my head is free to wonder and enjoy the landscape. The aim of the walk is to think of nothing at all, to get lost in my mind and the landscape. The aim is not to think but I have to get all the thinking done first. It is a space for me to shut my mind down. And then my thoughts and attention wonder to the objects around me. A large shaped rock with neat creases along one side, a stick with beautiful moss taking over its form, an old fence blending into the forest green. And I begin to notice more and more things that I would not normally see. When you begin to look for objects, you clear your mind and focus on those objects and see things you would not normally. This is when my mind gets lost in the landscape, searching for something that I do not know.
“There are known knows. There are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns. That is to say, we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns, the ones we don’t know we know”
Rebecca Solnit, A Field Guide to Getting Lost
So I would describe myself as wanderer. Wandering and roaming not worried about getting lost as that’s the most exciting part. When you no longer have a clue where you are. But this does not happen very often, most land has previously been walk and there will be someone at some point who you will bump into. But for a few minutes you can be lost in unknown territory, and this excites me.
In (Walter) Benjamin’s terms, to be lost is to be fully present, and to be fully present is to be capable of being in uncertainty and mystery. And one does not get lost but loses oneself, with the implication that it is a conscious choice, a chosen surrender, a psychic state achievable through geography. That thing the nature of which is totally unknown to you is usually what you need to find, and finding it is a matter of getting lost. The word “lost” comes from the Old Norse los, meaning the disbanding of an army, and this origin suggests soldiers falling out of formation to go home, a truce with the wide world.
Rebecca Solnit, A Field Guide to Getting Lost
I think this passage really sums up what the walking means to me and why I do it. It is at these times I am fully present in my mind but lost at the same time. To be able to lose yourself in the landscape is difficult but upon walking, it come naturally for me.