We talk to REDer Ian Sansbury, from our friends at Mind Over Mountains, about the positive impacts of walking and talking with his family and friends...
Walk and talk! That’s my advice for anyone and everyone, always and at all times – but particularly for parents with their children. However old or young, I believe passionately, and through personal experience, that children and young people open up more to their parents on a walk than in any other situations. (I suspect that parents also open up more to their children when walking – so parents, be prepared to be honest and authentic with your kids too!). Walking side-by-side, shoulder to shoulder, brings a greater openness and candour to conversations than other settings (although, for some similar reasons, car journeys do seem to achieve some of the same effects).
Being shoulder to shoulder removes any sense of that face-to-face confrontation, it creates companionship, a shared sense of journeying together. And the act of walking itself creates a rhythm where occasional silences are natural and even welcome, rather than an embarrassing void waiting to be filled. We know the act of walking is good for cognition – conversation seems to be enhanced and uplifted when we’re out and about in nature. But it’s that sense of increased openness from which I think families can most benefit. There are no topics, however difficult, that can’t be tackled on a walk.
As a family, we have always walked. We were lucky, until Adam and Emma were 12 and 10, to live deep in the countryside of the Chilterns, and walks on the weekends and summer evenings were simply a way of life. We now live next to a canal, the penultimate house in our town before open countryside, and walking remains a family joy – whether a long trek or a quick twenty minutes up and down the towpath.
We talk about anything and everything: school, friends, work, relationships, politics, history, music – and of course simply how we’re feeling, our mental health. It’s hard at the best of times to get people to open up about their mental health – and it can seem harder than ever to talk to our kids about it. If you ever want more than the answer, “Fine”, when you ask your kids how they’re doing, ask it on a walk. And perhaps, learning from our friends at the amazing charity Talk Club, ask them how they’re doing out of ten while you’re walking. And then ask them why they chose that number. It’s an absolute game changer.
And just to prove that this isn’t just the opinion of a deluded dad, here are a few words from my amazing daughter Emma. And no, I haven’t had to bribe her to write this…
“I’d definitely agree that I open up most when walking and talking. Most of my life planning happens on walks, whether that's conversations about careers, university choices or job interviews. At the moment I spend a fair amount of time revising or watching films with my bedroom door firmly shut, so it's far easier to check up on how I’m doing or have an important conversation when out on a walk. Generally, there’s just far more time when walking to chat, without the distractions of screens or the many things on our to-do lists. It feels much more natural.”
Two REDers walking and talking on a Mind Over Mountains retreat in the Peak District.
All that said, I’m conscious that all this isn’t very helpful, and perhaps even seems at least a little smug, for families for whom walking and talking is yet to be a habit. How do you extract your teenager from their bedroom or off their PlayStation to go for a walk? I asked a friend who’s recently successfully created a habit of walking and talking with his teenage son how he went about it. And here is his very sage advice:
- At the beginning it can be hard to persuade a teenager to go for a walk – that goes without saying. Fairly obviously, don’t launch straight into long walks but start with something short and simple.
- Choose your weather carefully – its so much easier (for any of us) to get out there in t-shirt, shorts and shades, or at the very least not in full wet weather gear.
- Build in some sort of a reward – a stop off at a coffee shop on the way back can be a very suitable incentive.
- Look to create a bit of a routine – perhaps it’s a Saturday morning thing, or one evening a week. You can build from there.
- Give some notice about a walk – don’t spring it on your unsuspecting teenager without warning!
- When you start walking together, don’t launch into a deep discussion about mental health in the first five minutes. Your child will smell a rat and probably never walk with you again!
- And perhaps most important of all, be prepared to share how you feel – to be honest and authentic. Good trusting conversations are a two-way street.
You’ll be surprised where it can all lead. This particular friend’s son is neurodiverse, suffers with anxiety, and has really struggled with school. They never walked together until recently. But gradually he has come to recognise the benefit on both his physical and mental health of getting out, walking and talking in nature with his mum and his dad. It has become a habit, the benefit of which they all recognise and appreciate.
Walking and talking with your kids is hugely beneficial. There is little doubt in my mind about that. It’s never too late to start to build that habit of walking and talking with your children – a way of supporting their mental health, and yours!
