Can walking beat stress?

Walking daily has the power to change your mood, enhance your self-esteem, and overcome depression, writes Vishal Gondal

Stress is an inevitable part of our lives. Unfortunately, it can consume us completely. If not dealt with in time, it can lead to depression too. There are several ways of tackling stress. But, the best and easiest among all is walking. Most people believe walking only helps in weight loss or getting into shape but it can help overcome stress as well. When you walk, you’re boosting your feel-good hormones which curb stress levels. In fact, if you take up any kind of fitness exercise and calculate it against more than two minutes of walking, both would give you the same results when it comes to acting as a stress buster! So, why not try to incorporate walking in to your daily fitness regime? After all, it’s the most simple, convenient and inexpensive form of exercise that’s fully in your control. Walking daily has the power to change your mood, enhance your self-esteem, and overcome depression. That’s not all! Here are a few other benefits it has:

Pumps up your endorphins

Whenever you perform any kind of aerobic activity, you release endorphins (feel-good hormones). The higher your level of endorphins, the greater is your sense of calm and well-being.

Meditate in motion

If you haven’t noticed yet, after a good football match or after completing a few laps in the pool, you feel relieved of irritations. For that brief moment, you tend to forget your tensions and worries of the day. As you begin to regularly shed your daily tensions through movement and physical activity, you will find this resulting in energy and optimism. A walk can help you remain calm and clear your mind in everything you wish to do.

Improves your mood

Walking regularly can help increase your self-confidence. As it relaxes you, it can lower the symptoms associated with mild depression, stress and anxiety. Walking improves your sleep, which is often affected by stress, depression and anxiety.

Lowers blood pressure

Stress can play a key role in high blood pressure problems. Taking a walk regularly can help you maintain your blood pressure, which in turn curbs mental stress.

Reconnects with the body

Taking a walk simply helps you reconnect with your physical body. And if you add some breathing techniques and work on your walking form, you can completely change your mood which will reduce your stress significantly.

Reduce depression

Research on depression, anxiety and exercise shows that the psychological and physical benefits of exercise can also help improve mood and reduce anxiety. Depression is another disease whose symptoms can be alleviated by walking.

If you walk regularly, you can even concentrate on relaxing your muscles. To do this, you can simply focus on a particular muscle or muscle group, such as your shoulders, neck or jaw. Tense the muscles for a few steps as you walk, then slowly release the tension and as you do this, you’ll feel the stiffness slipping away.

These are some of the few amazing benefits that walking offers. It can ease stress and help you have more command over your body and your life. Whenever you feel stressed or depressed, just go for a walk and come back feeling good and stress-free.

(The author is founder, CEO, GOQii)