15/08/2021
‘Formal education teaches how to stand, but to see the rainbow you must come out and walk many steps on your own.’ Amit Ray.
Sunday Book Review:
In Praise of Walking - A New Scientific Exploration.
Something more pedestrian. We often speak of the miracles of sight, of hearing, of taste, touch and smell. Of breathing, of the heartbeat, of photosynthesis, of reproduction, of sunsets. But seldom do you hear chatter about the miracle of walking.
Only humans walk with an upright spine, so we can walk and talk, walk and eat, walk and think, walk and look back and then turn and see the horizon. We can even walk on the moon.
Let’s explore this miracle of walking from my perch as a physician, a wide berth of readings and keen observer of the human condition.
Heads up: All that follows are haphazard memory recalls and associations, and reflections as I slowly read the wonderful book, In Praise of Walking - A New Scientific Exploration by Professor Shane O’Mara, a world renowned neuroscientist based at Trinity College, Ireland. And an intrepid walker, to boot (!).
1). In 2001, I was called urgently to the Trauma Intensive Care Unit at Milpark Hospital. I walked fast as I could to meet the patient. A young 26 year old Indian man was driving a motor car with his fiancée of three months, and the wedding was in twelve days. The car crashed into a large oak tree, to avoid an out-of-control oncoming truck. The young lady emerged without a scratch on her body; he fractured his neck, with a complete severing of the spinal cord. He would never be able to walk again (similar to the 1995 injury to the famed actor, Christopher Reeve of Wonderman fame.)
The reason for the consultation was the severe shock suffered by his fiancée on learning of the tragic prognosis. She was the patient and hysterical. Why? What to do? What could I say? Just listened and held the pain of shattered dreams.
I left the consultation with tears flowing down my cheeks. How cruel the fate of life. I wander how this tragic story unfolded over the past two decades. Walking must never be taken for granted.
2). My medical files are filled with psychologically distressed patients who could not walk again, even though they could learn to shuffle along with crutches or get from A to B in a wheelchair: Strokes, Guillain-Barre Syndrome, cerebral palsy due to birth complications, Multiple Sclerosis, tumours, or amputation due to uncontrolled diabetes. Walking is restricted by medical illnesses as it destroys muscle, bone, nerves and/or blood vessels.
3). Physiotherapists are great believers in neuro-plasticity (the ability of the brain to change structure and function due to deliberate, repetitive experience). Their profession trains patients to walk again. We need to salute their contributions. I think we only appreciate what we have, when we don’t have it. Walking, sometimes, can be relearnt with intensive practice.
4). Complexity of walking.
Try recreating walking, artificially. Robots, presently, have great difficulty in performing all the functions of walking - upstairs or downstairs. But they can womble somewhat.
Walking is a multi-sensory experience - finely tuned by what we feel, what we hear and see, and knowing the position of where our limbs are right now (propioception). We should bless and care for our feet, everyday. Walking is a very complex cognitive neuromuscular phenomenon.
5). Interesting that humans evolve by needing a year to learn to walk from birth; and a couple more to run and be agile. Comparatively, most mammals walk and run within minutes of birth. As a grandparent I watch how my youngest grandchild crawls, sits tries to stand, but not yet walking. He just has to learn do it himself. And deal with all the frustration of falling, again, and starting all over. Good metaphor for life.
My youngest granddaughter is walking, toddling to be precise, and can explore so much more. My eldest at 3 years plus, skippity hops most of the time. Walking is adaptive, and we can walk the world, literally. A few, daring people have done it. Expect lots of adventure, build in a few years of free time into your schedule, and take many pairs of shoes. Walking expands our experience, our possible journeys of the physical world; even a small garden.
6). During my medical science studies in the late 1970s, The Department of Anatomy at Wits was a world class center for the study of paleoanthropology. Prof Phillip Tobias steered an excellent ship of teachers and research workers seeking out anatomical clues of our earliest humanoid origins.
I remember a number of symposia sharply debating the theories of the hominid skeleton evolving into a more upright stance, freeing the hands whilst walking, and developing rudimentary tools to hunt and harvest.
Known as bipedalism, the range of walking extended the opportunities to carry babies far distances, and more, allowing our ancestors to leave North East Africa (the current Ethiopia) and move south or north or west to populate the world. It was a gradual process of course. A few million years to be more precise.
The physiological and anatomical adaptation to walking far distances is a key feature of evolution. (BTW. The biblical book of Genesis records Adam walking about in the Garden of Eden, alone!)
7). My expansive review of scientific research into brain health centralises regular daily walking as the choice of lifestyle to maintain neuronal integrity. No question! Walking builds brain elasticity and resilience.
8). Brisk walking of 150 minutes per week is the recommended quantity and quality to keep fit, and enjoy the health benefits of exercise. Walking builds heart health.
9). A few physicians now prescribe walking as the first medicine of choice to reduce anxiety and depressive symptoms. It works, especially when performed with another human being(s) or dog(s). And it is free. Walking with others is a wonderful social lubricant.
10). Many of the greatest writers of all time agree that walking - getting the body moving, legs pumping, arms swinging - generates cortical activity in creative thinking, nuance and imagery. Charles Dickens, for example, treated his chronic insomnia by walking the streets of London late into the night. His observations, on reflection, served as his profound research findings of the despicable slums and factories and child labour, that then wove its thread through all his later novels: Oliver Twist, A Tale of Two Cities, A Christmas Carol….
Other influential novelists and philosophers all write about the utility of their daily walks - Virginia Woolf, Soren Kierkegaard, Immanuel Kant, Mark Twain, Freidrich Nietzsche, William Wordsworth, William Blake … Walking sparks the creative juices: physical motion turns on the cognitive machine.
And finally.
11). As an incorrigible life time walker, I resonate with all these quotes on walking:
I have two doctors, my left leg and my right. (George Trevelyan).
All truly great thoughts are conceived by walking. (Frederick Nietzsche)
You don’t have to do anything to teach a child to walk. (Dr Benjamin Spock)
Come walk with me - come, walk with me. (Emily Bronte)
There will be many footsteps in Utopia. (H.G. Wells)
If I couldn’t walk fast and far, I should just explode and perish.(Charles Dickens)
Further reading from my library:
1). The Lost Art of Walking. (Geoff Nicholson)
2). Beneath My Feet. (Writers on Walking)
3). A Philosophy of Walking. (Frederic Gros)
4). The Joy of Walking. (David Bathurst)
5). Rebecca Solnit. (Wanderlust)
Johnny, Keep on Walking!
(c). Dr Jonathan D Moch
Psychiatrist, writer.
Website
www.jdmoch.com
Core Professional Interest
Cognitive-Behavior Therapy“Yes, You Can!”
Subscribe to free daily newsletter
Overall Vision
Uplifting (ExtraOrdinary) People To Achieve The Impossible.
Links
1). Shane O’Mara
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shane_O'Mara_(neuroscientist)
2). Christopher Reeve Injury
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-06-02-mn-8630-story.html
"I have two doctors, my left leg and my right leg." I love that. My brother says - G-d gave me two feet, one for the clutch, one for the accelerator :) Walking is a wonderful activity and one that most people can enjoy with very little effort. I find the rhythm of it meditative. When the body moves the mind stills, I find, and when the body is still the mind is too active, which is why I've always had difficulty meditating while sitting.
Good morning Dr Moch.
Indeed the blessing of being able to walk on one’s own two feet.