I Walk Like I'm Late, So Tell Me to Slow Down
I probably should have led with this one. It's the most useful thing I know about myself as far as this group goes.
Left on my own, I walk like I'm late for something. Always have. I don't decide to; I just glance down half a mile in and I'm out ahead of everyone, arms going, like the loop owes me a finish time. It's an old habit from years of PT clinic days where every minute between patients mattered, and it never fully left me.
Melissa figured this out faster than anyone. She walked with the group exactly once, told me flat out that I set the pace like I'm late for something, and never came back. She wasn't wrong to leave over it. If I'd been new and gotten towed around a loop at that clip, I might not have come back either. I think about that more than she probably knows.
So here's the deal I've made with myself, and I want you in on it, because it only works if you are.
Tell me. Out loud. Every time.
I'm not going to notice I'm speeding up. That's the problem in a nutshell. My body thinks that pace is normal, so nothing flags it for me internally. The only fix is somebody else saying, out loud, "Reed, slow down." Not a look. Not a sigh. Words. I've asked for this so many times now that some of the regulars just say it automatically, like a checkpoint, and I mean that as a compliment to them.
If you're newer and it feels awkward to correct the guy running the group, get over that fast. It's not rude. It's the assignment. I'd genuinely rather you interrupt me mid-sentence than fall quiet and grit through a pace that doesn't work for you.
The test, if you don't want to say anything yet
I get it — some people need a warm-up lap before they're comfortable speaking up to the instructor. Fine. A few things to check on your own:
- Can you talk in full sentences, not just grunt out words between breaths? If not, we're going too fast.
- Are you having to half-jog to keep up on the flat stretches? That's the tell. Walking shouldn't have a jog in it, ever, on this loop.
- Is your attention on your breathing instead of on the conversation? That's backward. The conversation should be doing the work, not your lungs.
If any of those are true, that's your cue. Say something. Or just plant your feet and call out "hey," and I'll circle back — I don't mind.
My opinion here, stated plainly: slow is the entire reason this group exists. I built it that way on purpose. If you want a workout with a burn in it, there are treadmill classes and canyon hikes for that, and I'll point you toward them happily. This loop is for people to walk together at a pace where talking is still possible. If I'm accidentally turning it into cardio, I've failed at the one thing I said I'd deliver.
A smaller, dumber example of the same problem
I get fixated on things and then drop them completely, and it's the same impulse as the pace thing, just aimed somewhere else. Couple springs back I got hung up on one particular sagebrush along the trail, the one past the second bend where the path narrows. I decided I was going to sketch it properly, get the branching right — the way it forks low and then forks again at these odd angles that don't look like they should hold together but do.
I drew that thing eight or nine times. Different mornings, different light, sitting right there on a rock while people finished their loop without me. I was going to get it right. And then one week I just stopped caring. Lost the thread entirely. Those sketches are in a drawer somewhere at home, half-finished, and I couldn't tell you now what I was even chasing.
That's what my pace does to a walk if nobody stops me. I get locked onto finishing the loop the way I got locked onto finishing that sketch — head down, chasing something nobody asked me to chase, and the actual point of the exercise, which was the sagebrush itself, or in this case the person next to me, gets left behind.
What to actually do about it, starting this week
If you're walking with us and you notice yourself breathing hard or losing the thread of a conversation, that's not a personal failing, it's data. Slow your own steps first. Then, if the group as a whole is moving too fast, say so. I promise I'd rather hear it than find out later somebody quit over it.
I still won't catch it every time myself. That's the honest truth. I've been working on this for years and I still drift back up to speed when my head gets busy. So consider this me handing you the job permanently: you're allowed to slow me down, any week, no explanation required.
Before next time: try the full-sentence test on your own walk this week, even a solo one, and notice where your pace tips over from walking into something closer to a jog.