Walk for 30 Minutes

Calm your limbic system with this One Clear Step

One Clear Step

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One Clear Step

3 min readApr 27, 2022

Manage mild depression more effectively

Major Depressive Disorder is a mental health diagnosis that is best treated by a professional. If you are not currently benefitting from professional guidance with this issue, use the phrase “local mental health resources” to search online for professional support or call 9–1–1 in the case of a mental health crisis.

Defer to the recommendations of your mental health provider over and above One Clear Step, using this Step as a basis for discussion and consideration, not as a replacement for treatment by a mental health professional.

Walk for 30 Minutes

🐝 What To Do

Just walk.

First, choose a safe area to walk in. If you need some good company to feel safer, take a friend, family members or a pet. (I guess I mean your dog if you have one. Your goldfish won’t be able to keep up probably.) Don’t walk through an open field in a lightning storm, across thin ice, in a tornado, through the fairway of an active golf course, or in a wildlife sanctuary dedicated to predatory animals. You’re probably getting the idea I want you to be safe.

If you don’t have a full 30 minutes to walk then walk with whatever time you have. Thirty minutes will help you get more benefit, but don’t let having less time dissuade you from getting out there anyway.

Make Walking a Routine

⏰ When to do it

The effects of walking at any time have been shown to provide global benefit to one’s mood, physiological health, and neurological balance. Like many of the One Clear Steps, a routine that puts the step at the same point in the flow of your day has a better chance of becoming a habit.

What’s are the scientific benefits of walking?

🔑 Why it works

Authors of one study found “that walking led to a decrease in alpha activity over occipital cortex compared to standing.” Alpha activity has been considered a valuable marker of inhibition of sensory processing and shown to negatively correlate with neuronal firing rates.

The study indicates that moving through space outside naturally causes the eyes to track laterally from side to side, a pattern of eye movement which the growing popularity of EMDR utilizes to calm the limbic system (the part of the brain connected to the flight or fight response).

Additionally, physical movement and basic exercise are essential components of good mental health. Walking simultaneously introduces a variety of stimuli, all of which help when we feel lost in the labyrinth of toxic sadness (aka depression).

Being outside naturally introduces a sense of expanded space, counter-acting the feeling of being boxed-in that often accompanies depression.

Moreover, while walking we tend to breathe more deeply, and inhaling outside air can raise the oxygen levels in your body and well…oxygen is good!

Walking is affordable and easy to prepare for

👜 What you’ll need

The beauty of this literal “step” is that anyone can do it anywhere at any time. You don’t need equipment, preparation, money or permission.

OK, yes, you’ll need your shoes, unless you’re vacationing on a beach, in which case please enjoy walking barefoot in the sand for everyone else who lives in Nebraska.