January 15, 2022
THE WALKING CURE:
Has lockdown got you down? How walking in nature saved a depressed British pub manager's life: Jake Tyler had decided to end his life, but a timely call to his mother brought him home, where he started going out for walks (Bhakti Mathur, 15 Jan, 2022, SCMP)
At his mother's insistence, he started taking the family's black dog, Reggie, for walks. "We started going for short walks along the river. Soon this became my daily routine and gradually I started feeling better. My posture started improving, my confidence was returning, and I often found myself in a state of quiet appreciation of the stillness and the simplicity of nature," he says."Being outside wasn't just about fresh air and earthy smells, it gave me the mental space I needed to let go of poisonous thoughts, to recognise that, as insufferably painful as my life had become, I had never actually wanted to die, I had just needed to remember what it was like to feel alive."One day, when he realised that he had hiked for 12 miles (19.3km), he headed to a bookshop and bought a map of Great Britain. At home, he began circling every section of natural Britain he could see - national parks, trails, beaches.Tyler envisaged himself hiking through the Lake District (a scenic upland area in northwest England), the Scottish Highlands, along the rugged coast of Cornwall (in southwest England)."I connected all the circles I'd drawn with a thick black line. What appeared before me was a giant loop, a lap of Great Britain."Tyler planned to circumnavigate Britain on foot, but feared no one was going to take him seriously. "Imagine an overweight, depressed barman with flat feet and a coke [cocaine] habit attempting a 3,000-mile walk. I decided to stop thinking about whether it was possible and began believing that I would succeed."
Posted by Orrin Judd at January 15, 2022 12:00 AM