Want to be more productive? Go out for a walk.
Walking makes us more creative, healthy — and happy. Have a problem? Just walk and solve it, step by step. It’s magic!
It’s a December morning.
We’re approaching the shortest day of the year in the UK, and I want to enjoy every bit of the light. So I am up at 6.30am, walking through my small coastal town in the dark to reach the sea. I pass by the squat stone circle of Deal Castle, then follow the shoreline to the rather grander castle at Walmer. Commissioned by Henry VIII, these buildings have stood guard over this stretch of the English coast for over 500 years.
I’d hoped for a repeat of the previous two mornings, when the dawn coloured both sky and sea in glorious shades of red, pink, purple and gold, and the gulls rose up from the beach in noisy, joyful crowds to greet it.
But this morning daylight creeps in without drama.
The clouds are low and heavy. As I walk, the sky simply fades from black to a bleak, metallic grey. Most of the birds remain on the shingle, drowsy and confused.
Still, it’s a mild morning, so at the castle I turn up the steep, muddy track that leads up to the chalk grasslands of Hawkshill…
