Posted on January 3, 2022

"Walking had an added benefit: it helped me to think. Nietzsche wrote, ‘All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking’."

—Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

Since I moved to Toronto, I’ve decided to take the bike as my preferred method of transportation. The benefits that I’ve found work for me are doing a fair share of cardio, getting to places fast, while it gives me the chance to listen to the current audiobook of choice or one of the podcasts I fancy. On the down side, given the rapidness that it entails, it’s also a very short time to make much progress on my listening affairs. Thus, I’ve been wondering if walking is a better alternative, or in other words, if the balance between time to get somewhere versus time to read/listen should be tilted towards the latter.

Now, whether I bike or walk, there is a different trade-off altogether: to listen or not to listen (a.k.a. think), that is the question. In the past few years, I’ve realized that when I’m in the middle of solving a problem or studying a hard concept, walking often helps me see things clearly—this usually comes in the form of pacing while bouncing a small red ball. When I’m not actively trying to solve something, however, I usually let my subconscious work on it for a while before I take up the active thinking about it again. Thus, when deciding what to do during idle time (e.g. commuting, cleaning), I tend towards listening instead of active thinking. Still, I’m favoring knowledge acquisition over knowledge production during those times. I think I will test Nietzsche’s hypothesis and try the opposite to see if it actually works for me. Knowing me, nonetheless, I’d predict an allocation of 80/20 of listening against active thinking would work (Pareto, is that you?).