[Walking] is the perfect way of moving if you want to see into the life of things. It is the one way of freedom. If you go to a place on anything but your own feet you are taken there too fast, and miss a thousand delicate joys that were waiting for you by the wayside.
Interpretation
Walking allows you to observe and appreciate the beauty of life more fully than any other form of transport.
In this quote, Elizabeth Von Arnim expresses the idea that walking provides a unique opportunity to engage with the world around us. Unlike faster modes of transportation, walking allows us to slow down and notice the small, often overlooked details of life, leading to a deeper appreciation of our surroundings and a sense of freedom.
In practice
This quote is perfect for inspiring a nature walk event in a community newsletter.
On wet days I will go into the thickest parts of the forest, where the pine needles are everlastingly dry, and when the sun shines I'll lie on the heath and see how the broom flares against the clouds. I shall be perpetually happy, because there will be no one to worry me.
I want to be as idle as I can, so that my soul may have time to grow.
If one believed in angels one would feel that they must love us best when we are asleep and cannot hurt each other; and what a mercy it is that once in every twenty-four hours we are too utterly weary to go on being unkind.
An early-morning walk is a blessing for the whole day.
We are now heading down a centuries-long path toward increasing the productivity of our natural capital - the resource systems upon which we depend to live - instead of our human capital.
In nature we never see anything isolated, but everything in connection with something else which is before it, beside it, under it and over it.
It is the marriage of the soul with nature that makes the intellect fruitful, and gives birth to imagination
"The earth is so beautiful. We are beautiful also. We can allow ourselves to walk mindfully, touching the earth, our wonderful mother, with each step. We don't need to wish our friends, 'Peace be with you.' Peace is already with them. We only need to help them cultivate the habit of touching peace in each moment."-
The lakes are something which you are unprepared for; they lie up so high, exposed to the light, and the forest is diminished to a fine fringe on their edges, with here and there a blue mountain, like amethyst jewels set around some jewel of the first water, - so anterior, so superior, to all the changes that are to take place on their shores, even now civil and refined, and fair as they can ever be.
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