It started with a dead car battery.
I don’t mean metaphorically. My car actually died on a Tuesday morning two years ago. I took the bus to work, annoyed. Walked from the bus stop to the office, even more annoyed. By the time I arrived, something had shifted.
I wasn’t more annoyed. I was calmer.
That was confusing enough to make me pay attention.
The reluctant experiment
I didn’t replace the car immediately. It felt like a waste of money right then, so I told myself I’d manage for a few weeks. Take public transit. Walk where I could. Get the car fixed eventually.
“Eventually” kept getting pushed back.
At first, I noticed the inconveniences. Getting groceries was harder. Rain days were miserable. Some errands required elaborate planning around bus schedules.
But underneath all that, something unexpected: I was sleeping better. I felt less anxious. I was arriving at places in better moods than I used to.
The walks, I realized, were doing something.
What walking gives you
It’s not exercise. I mean, it is—technically—but I wasn’t walking to get fit. I was walking to get places. The exercise happened as a side effect.
What I actually got was time.
Walking takes longer than driving. That sounds like a disadvantage, but think about it differently: walking to work gives me thirty-five minutes of guaranteed transition time. No traffic stress. No finding parking. Just me and the sidewalk and whatever’s on my mind.
Those thirty-five minutes became surprisingly valuable. I process the day ahead. I decompress from the day behind. I notice things about my neighborhood I never saw from inside a car.
The small discoveries
When you walk the same route regularly, it becomes yours in a way that driving never allows.
I know which trees bloom first in spring. I know the cat who sits in a specific window every morning. I know the bakery that puts out day-old bread at 7:15 AM. I know the exact crack in the pavement I need to step over on the corner of Third and Pine.
These aren’t important things. But they’re my things. My path. My texture of experience.
You don’t get that zooming past at 40 kilometers per hour.
The pace of thought
Here’s what surprised me most: my thinking slowed down.
Not in a bad way. In a useful way.
When I drove, my mind raced to match the speed. Quick thoughts. Impatient reactions. Everything compressed.
When I walk, thoughts have room to unfold. I start thinking about something at one end of a block and I’m still with it at the other end. Ideas connect. Problems untangle. Sometimes I arrive somewhere with a solution I wasn’t consciously looking for.
I’ve started walking when I’m stuck on anything—work problems, personal decisions, creative blocks. Not always with a destination. Just walking.
The practicalities
Let me be honest: this doesn’t work for everyone.
I live in a city with decent walkability. My work is about three kilometers from home—doable on foot. I don’t have kids to shuttle or equipment to carry. Some people’s lives aren’t shaped for walking.
If yours is, though, here’s what made it work for me:
Good shoes. I spent actual money on comfortable walking shoes. Every day, same pair. Worth it.
A backpack. Not a bag that hangs off one shoulder. An actual backpack that distributes weight. Groceries, laptop, whatever—it all goes in there.
Realistic timing. I add ten minutes to any estimate. Usually I’m early. That feels better than arriving rushed.
Weather acceptance. I own a good rain jacket. I use it. Some days I arrive slightly damp. The world continues spinning.
The car is back
I should mention: I did eventually fix the car. It sits in a parking garage now. I use it occasionally—long trips, heavy cargo, terrible weather.
But my default changed. When I need to go somewhere, my first thought is: can I walk there?
Usually, the answer is yes.
A different relationship with distance
Walking recalibrated how I think about “far.”
Three kilometers used to feel like a distance that required a vehicle. Now it feels like a pleasant walk—maybe forty minutes with my usual pace. That shift opened up the city differently. Places I’d never go because parking was difficult are suddenly accessible. I just… walk there.
My world got simultaneously smaller (I stay closer to home) and larger (everywhere nearby became reachable).
What I’m trying to say
I’m not suggesting everyone sell their car. That’s not realistic, and it’s not really the point.
The point is: walking gave me something I didn’t know I needed. Transition time. Observation time. Thinking time. Time that used to disappear into car rides now belongs to me in a different way.
If your life allows it—even occasionally—try walking somewhere you’d normally drive. Not for exercise. Not because it’s virtuous. Just to see what happens when you move through the world at three miles per hour.
I’m about to walk to meet a friend for coffee. It’ll take twenty-five minutes. I’ll probably figure out what I want to tell them by the time I arrive.