Wandering for answers on the streets of Bristol

“Answers are everywhere” goes the tagline for Street Wisdom, who devise free guided activity encouraging problem-solving through wandering in urban environments. The world around us is full of symbols and clues that we can tap into, they promise, and Bristol is no different.

Inspired by a friend involved in Street Wanders in Dublin, and as part of the second ever World Wide Wander taking place from September 14-16 2018, producer Hilary O’Shaughnessy from the Watershed’s Pervasive Media Studio has arranged Bristol’s first ever wander. “It’s a nice thing to get out of office and onto the street and have a wander,” she says.

At 9.30am on Friday, September 14, a bunch of seven slightly soggy individuals come in from the drizzle and gather in the foyer of the Watershed to gain fresh insight into ourselves and the city we spend time in.

Things start gently, with a short individual walk around the immediate area with the instruction “be drawn to what attracts you” front and centre in our minds. Everyone splits off and goes their separate ways, and it feels good to be giving something so normal, like strolling familiar streets in the city centre, full focus without an ulterior motive.

We reconvene and take a few moments to talk about the experience. One of the participants praises how “unpressured” the instruction was; another says she was drawn to a place where she’d once had a very good kiss, having forgotten it had happened until she got there.

The next instruction is to slow right down, and the group experiments with sitting still and watching the world pass, walking at as slow a pace as possible (which is foiled by well-meaning people holding doors open ahead) and slowing down thoughts, breathing and heart rate.

Next we look for patterns, and there are so many that it’s overwhelming, and finally we look for the beauty in everything, even the pigeon droppings and broken glass around the bins at the back of the Harbourside’s strip of restaurants.

Hunting for patterns amongst the city’s furniture

“By now you should have a somewhat altered sense of reality,” Hilary reads from the instruction sheet, and we titter but it feels true. The second part of the experience is to come up with our own question, something that has been weighing on us, and as we go around the group and reveal them they are all about deciding what we want from life and whether we are living our best lives now.

Using our heightened awareness, we are instructed to go on a quest for answers while we wander. “Teachers and answers are everywhere,” Hilary reads. There is a self-selecting subjectivity in the things you notice when you’re looking for signs, but also a pleasant mindfulness in walking the quiet, rain-slicked midmorning streets and noticing every sound and smell, listening in to conversations, taking back streets and removing the headphones that usually cocoon us.

When we reconvene as a group at Arnolfini after half an hour, there’s a new atmosphere of surprising discovery. Several of the group are emotional and cried during journeys that would otherwise have been routine; everyone has mulled over their question and sought answers from the universe or from people they met along the way, propelling them closer to an answer, or closer to the question they really wanted to ask. “The act of daydreaming is so important,” one participant says and there are sage nods.

Noticing the small details around us gives the mind space to mull over questions

“It was hard to know how much people would take it on board, and what the group dynamic would be, but it was a nice surprise that people went for it,” Hilary says once the wander is over, some three hours later. Several of the participants are also based at Watershed, and have continued to chat about the experience over a coffee.

“I think it’s important that people who work together find things to do together that aren’t after hours or based around drinking,” Hilary continues. “It’s always good to find more ways more ways to connect to each other as humans.”

Download Street Wisdom’s Wander Guide to take part whenever you want to at www.streetwisdom.org/shop/wanderguide