Falling in Love With Boredom

How walking 10,000 steps every day can boost your productivity.

My right shoulder was killing me.

Like many of you, I spent the past year mindlessly scrolling Instagram since COVID-19 lockdowns began. It was Friday night, and I sat like soft pizza-dough. Bored and alone.

There was nothing to do in Toronto. We’d had 276 days of indoor-dining bans — the second-longest of any U.S. and Canadian city. I spent my days on the computer, and nights on my phone.

I lived life as a blob, and I hated it.

So I started walking.

I picked up the idea from The Happiness of Pursuit by Chris Guillebeau. Chris travelled to all 193 U.N. recognized countries as his personal quest. He wrote The Happiness of Pursuit to explore why people pursue quests and how we can apply those lessons to our lives.

Quests remind us that everyone dies, but not everyone truly lives.

Having a quest may be arbitrary, but it can bring fun and meaning into your life. The effort is the reward, and adventure is for everyone.

“We can’t always opt out of monotony, but we can choose which form it takes. Odysseus fought off sea monsters and escaped from an island prison, but he also endured a lot of boring days at sea.”

— The Happiness of Pursuit

How to Walk 10,000 Steps a Day Without Dying of Boredom

In the beginning, I was just excited to walk.

One positive about COVID-19 is that the streets are less congested. There’s so much space to exercise outdoors. I walked in a different direction every day and followed my feet. North on Monday, South on Tuesday… but there’s only so many directions I could go.

Now I try my best to enjoy the walk for its own sake. I think of walking as a form of moving meditation. It’s a time and space to think, to dream, to imagine.

I’ll often convince a friend to come with me. It’s a great way to catch up without technology, and nothing makes time pass by faster than good company.

When I’m walking, I marvel at the old things I see with fresh eyes. I notice small architectural details and Easter-egg art scattered throughout the city. Interesting street names, neighbourhood stores and cozy cafes…

My Google Maps is a mess, but every day still feels like I’m in Toronto for the first time. There’s a heartwarming pleasure in walking somewhere new or taking a different street. All I have to do is put one foot in front of the other, and life will do the rest.

Whether I walk or not, the time will pass anyway.

Walking Increases Productivity in Other Areas of Life

The biggest benefit is having something to “check off” every day.

Having systems in place allows you to win in the long-term.

Having goals allows you to win in the short-term.

Combine both, and you’ll win every day.

Before I started walking, I would finish each day dreading tomorrow. Now, I always fall asleep grateful for rest. There’s nothing better than feeling sore and being snuggly tucked in bed.

You know that feeling of content tiredness that you get on vacation?

You can experience it every day.

It’s nice to have a sense of accomplishment. Doubly so when the accomplishment doesn’t take much money or equipment.

The process is its own reward.

Whether it’s writing and publishing an article, making a podcast, completing a workout… Finding some way to “win” every day makes life more enjoyable.

Before walking, every day felt like a lifetime. Now, every week passes quickly because every day I’m hit with a daily dose of “accomplishment”.

A practical benefit of walking is exploring and connecting with your city.

During COVID-19, it’s easy to feel discombobulated. I didn’t feel human anymore. I’m was a flesh-robot living on the internet. But when you walk outside, smell the air, and feel the wind brush past… Life becomes real again.

I love walking in residential neighbourhoods, marvelling at how people reflect their personalities through their homes. I also love walking through city parks and nature trails — the best things in life are free!

Supporting small businesses is a secondary reward. Every day I discover new hidden gems I wouldn’t have known about otherwise. It’s a joy and privilege to support the dreams and hard work of small business owners. Especially when they contribute to making your city more vibrant and diverse.

Finally, I sleep like a dream. Seriously. Walk 10,000 steps every day, and if you don’t sleep better, I’ll refund you.

Key Takeaways

This is the secret that all successful people know:

Loving the grind and accepting both good days and bad days is how you persevere and live a life worth living.

Life is boring.

We hide from this by escaping into social media and consumption — but the real superpower lies in accepting the mundane, and thriving in it.

I noticed that the sheer boredom and consistency of the walking routine has had a positive spill-over into other areas of my life — it’s easier to podcast, write, and make YouTube videos now that I have a keystone “winning” habit to pursue on the daily.

Find your own small win every day.

For those of you interested in your own walking quest, you’re in good company. Here’s a random list of famous people who routinely walk for both physical and mental wellbeing:

• Søren Kierkegaard: Walking and writing.

“Above all, do not lose your desire to walk. Everyday, I walk myself into a state of well-being & walk away from every illness.

I have walked myself into my best thoughts, and I know of no thought so burdensome that one cannot walk away from it. But by sitting still, & the more one sits still, the closer one comes to feeling ill.

Thus if one just keeps on walking, everything will be all right.”

— Søren Kierkegaard

• Aristotle: Taught philosophy lectures while walking.
• William Wordsworth: Walked nearly 175,000 miles throughout his life. Saw walking as “indivisible” from the act of writing poetry.
• Nassim Taleb: Walks as the basis of embodying his “anti-fragile,” philosophy. Tweeted: “I wrote somewhere that writing was 95% walking, 5% sitting; mathematics was 95% sitting, 5% walking.”
• Ludwig Van Beethoven: Beethoven kept his creative promises by strategically using his time to incubate ideas. His favourite method of thinking things through? Long, solitary walks through the forested valleys of Vienna.

Happy trails.

“Solvitur ambulando.” It is solved by walking.

- Saint Augustine