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Every walk starts with the first step, Every great journey is completed one step at a time. Right? Only today's walk isn't the greatest of journeys it is essentially my walk to work, with the section I usually drive added on for good measure. And as I only committed to the Camino way yesterday, it's the best I could do at short notice. So, here I am... the after decision day, with a very rare day all to myself. My other half (OH) and the boys are on a coach heading to Southampton to watch Coventry City play in the FA cup third round, and I've got lunch planned with my friend from work, followed by a Hot Yoga trial session in the town centre. But the voice in my head-my chatterbox- won't stop yabbering on about the fact that I am walking 116km's, in six days, in four months time, so I NEED TO GET WALKING. "At least a million miles a day" it yells. "And if you don't walk a million miles a day, you will get blisters and the walk will be over, you will never make iiiiiiiit!" *Yes, my voice is incredibly dramatic and is prone to catastrophising EVERY SINGLE SITUATION- but that's another post, when you know me a little better and don't think I'm odd for naming said voice, Felicity!) Anyway, I digress. I'm not quite as alarmed by my chatterbox as you may be (or may not be, you might have one of your own) as we go back a long way and we are friends now- sort of, it's more of an uneasy truce- but, I decide that walking into town is the best solution. By my reckoning, it's about a three mile straight walk there and back, so it's a pretty good start to my walking world and I can still get to do all the other stuff that makes me happy. Yay! But as I've got ALL Day to myself, and its all about doing things for me today, I take a detour (in the oppposite direction) to the out of town shopping centre to have a mooch around thr charity shops. An hour later, my purse is groaning under the weight of receipts, my arms are aching carrying two bags of loot home, but my walking app tells me that I've walked two miles. I drop of my excellent haul from the second hand shops, and collect my yoga mat and my backpack, and with some bonus miles under my belt, I head off on the road to town. Now, the road to town is just that... a three mile, almost straight road that leads directly to Coventry City Centre, and so in 'walking to work mode' I stick in my ear plugs and scroll through my list of poscasts... (Love Sober, How to fail, By Elizabeth Day, in case your interested) and just as I'm about to connect to the 'joys of being sober' I realise that I'm disconnecting from the world around me. And whilst this might work for the walk to work three times a week, it is not right for now. The purpose behind commintting to walking the Camino Path was about connecting to something bigger than me, connecting with a community of people who have walked this path for hundreds of years, connecting with myself, and connecting with nature and the beauty of the natural world. And we might be dismissive of the idea of finding nature and beauty in the concrete of the cities, but this is the thing about nature- it always finds its way. It peeks through the paving slabs, in twitters in the trees at the side of the road, it shines off the windows, it caresses your cheeks as you pound the streets. Right here, right now- alongside the number 13 bus stop, I make the decision to stop muti-tasking. As a woman, a mum, a working-mum, or whatever hat I wear on a daily basis, I am an obsessive multi-tasker- I clean the bathroom, whilst I'm cleaning my teeth, I fold washing, whilst the pasta boils, I .... you know the drill. And as I'm not sure I do any of these adulting tasks hugely well, I don't want walking to be just another thing I do, I fit in, I multi-task on. So, walking from here on in is a mono-task. It has my full attention, my fullest commitment and my even fuller focus... right after, I've just spoken to my sister. But you know, walking without disconnecting is a skill in itself, and giving that I've just had somewhat of an epiphany, it will take time to process and practice. I tune into what I can hear, what I can see and the feel of my footsteps on the ground, but I tune out quite a lot. And Felicity (you remember her from earlier, right?) well she is one loud and persistent piece of work and very distracting. I know changing habits takes time, building new habits takes time and practice. But I am... I can... One step at a time! One walk at a time! Footnote: I've bought a notebook to write about stuff as it happens. Today's mile count was six miles and an hour of hot yoga, where I sweat more than I've ever sweat in my life (and I am one of life's sweaty bettys). But in training terms, I doubt (hope) even in the hottest of weather and the hilliest of walks in Spain, I will never sweat a river like I did today. But if I do, it'll be a walk in the park after Hot Yoga.