I try to get outside every single day. To walk, to run, to move my body in some way, even when the weather is doing everything it can to convince me otherwise. Extreme heat, biting cold, wind that feels personal, humidity that is oppressive, it does not always make it easy, but I go anyway. Some days it is a long walk, some days it is shorter, and lately, if I am being honest, there is more walking than running as my body gently reminds me that I am not in my 50s anymore. And that is fine. I am still moving. I am still showing up.
People often ask why I am so consistent about it, and the answer is actually pretty simple. When I am outside, I am not distracted. Most days I do not listen to music, I am not on a call, and I am not catching up on a podcast or a book. I am just there, listening to the world. The birds, the cars passing by, kids playing somewhere in the distance, the ordinary sounds of a neighborhood going about its day. There is something grounding about it, something that pulls me out of my own head and places me back into the present.
Being outside forces me to look up. To look around. To notice.
And when I notice, I see things I might have otherwise missed. Small things, but meaningful ones. A flag fluttering in the wind. New buds coming up. The kind of details that are easy to overlook when life feels heavy or rushed. But when I slow down enough to see them, they feel like little reminders that there is still beauty here, still joy, still life happening all around me.
Yesterday, it was a hawk and a cardinal.
The hawk flew past me as I walked down the sidewalk, close enough to feel like a moment meant just for me. And then there was the cardinal. I could hear him for blocks before I ever saw him, that distinct call cutting through everything else. I knew he was there, so I kept looking, scanning the trees until I finally found him perched at the very top, like he had been waiting for me to notice.
The moment I did, and I took a picture, he stopped singing.
It felt almost intentional, like his job was simply to get my attention.
I kept walking for a few more blocks, and then I heard another one. Different tree, same song. Again, I looked up, found him, and again, as soon as I saw him, he stopped.
Coincidence, maybe. But it didn’t feel like one.
Because for me, the cardinal is not just a bird.
It is a constant reminder of my dad.
It is a reminder that he is still with me, that he is watching me, that somehow, in ways I cannot fully explain, he is still part of my life. And every time I hear that call before I see him, it feels like a gentle nudge. Like he is reminding me that if I slow down, if I listen, he will guide me.
I look for signs everywhere now. I move through my day asking the universe, sometimes quietly and sometimes not so quietly, to show me that my people are still with me. And I see them. In hearts that appear in unexpected places, in cardinals, in hawks, in flowers that seem a little too perfectly placed to be random. I choose to believe those moments are not accidents. I choose to believe they are connection.
But I also know this, I would miss all of it if I stayed inside.
Being outside clears something inside of me. With every inhale and exhale, something shifts. Something loosens. Something that has been sitting heavy inside my body finds a little more space to move and be removed.
Getting outside and moving my body during my divorce saved me. And that is not an exaggeration. It saved the fragile pieces of my mental health that were barely holding on at the time. It gave me somewhere to put the thoughts, the emotions, the questions that had nowhere else to go.
Over the past two years, while caring for my parents, it saved me again. In the middle of responsibility, stress, and anticipatory grief, those walks became a lifeline. A place where I could breathe, even if just for a little while. And now, in this new and different season of grief, I can feel it doing the same thing once more. It is helping me find my way back to myself, slowly, quietly, one step at a time.
There is something about being outside, about breathing in fresh air and feeling the elements against my skin, that makes me feel more alive than almost anything else. It reminds me that my body is still here, still capable, still moving forward even when my heart feels heavy.
It does not fix everything.
But it softens things.
And sometimes, that is enough.
Peace,
#tutulady
#forwardisapace
Kristine Binder 