Walking Backwards - Throwing Myself A Changeup

I don’t know about you, but I can get into ruts

Monks around the world

Walking in forests, mountains

My sidewalk, my path

I have taken to walking backwards* periodically when I take my daily walks around the neighborhood. Sometimes, I also try to sidestep for a short distance, which is less successful and rewarding than either backwards or forwards walking, but it’s worth giving it a go now and again. The purpose of walking backwards is to try, in a modest way, to cross-train parts of my body so I don’t go through the exact, same routine every day, strengthening some muscles and not others, stretching some parts and not others, and developing balance in one way but ignoring others.

Walking backwards is not just beneficial for my physical balance though. Walking backwards, which I always undertake on long, straight, empty stretches where I’m less likely to stumble or run into anyone or anything (like a car), is interesting in several ways. 

1. First, I have to be totally present. Unlike regular walking, where my mind can wander, I must be right on it and fully aware. 
2. Second, I see things differently when I’m stepping backward. Instead of whatever I’m approaching becoming larger and larger, whatever I’m leaving becomes smaller and smaller. I feel differently, even, when I’m leaving something behind instead of approaching ever closer.
3. Third, people give me quite interesting looks. I figure, at this older age, just having someone look at me at all is a plus. 
   
4. Fourth, it adds variety to the hour or two I’m out and about. 
5. Finally, it helps me to not take myself too seriously. No matter how many times I walk backwards, I am quite sure I will still be a novice at it.  Sometimes, the silliness of it actually makes me laugh.
   

I don’t know how healthy walking backwards really is, but I like it. In a certain way, it is not much different than a changeup pitch in baseball. The changeup looks the same as a fastball, but heads the batter’s way much slower than expected, causing a miss or a lower quality hit. Walking backwards surprises all of me (even though I’m making the choice to do it). It is a walking changeup. It is a new walking practice, and will take some adjustment time.

Walking backwards is also part of a larger goal, which is to remind myself not to take myself too seriously. Ed Bacon, in 8 habits of Love: Open Your Heart, Open Your Mind, proposes “play” as a habit. If we take ourselves too seriously, he says, “we lose the perspective necessary for creative problem solving” (p. 95), and “when we take ourselves too seriously, it is because we are afraid of failing to measure up to expectations—our own and others” (p. 95). It is “freeing” he says, to be open-hearted, to use humor and humility, and to laugh at ourselves.

I don’t know about you, but I can get into ruts. I can take people for granted. The way I go about my life can become rote, my decisions and actions put on auto-pilot. One practice of practices is to throw ourselves a changeup practice now and again.

“We first make our habits, and then our habits make us.” 

~Commonly, but inaccurately, attributed to John Dryden 

*Be sure to check with someone who actually knows something about your health before actually doing this yourself.  Falling when walking backwards isn't for everyone.

References

Bacon, E. (2012). 8 habits of love: open your heart, open your mind (1st ed.). Grand Central Life & Style.