Walking My Way Back in Colour

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When grief first hit me, I laboured to move.

Even the simplest act, putting one foot in front of the other, felt heavy, resisted, almost

unnatural. And that, in itself, felt like a second layer of loss. Because movement, especially

walking, has always been how I process my deepest emotions. It is where I think, where I

release, where I find some form of peace.

So to find myself in a moment of profound grief, with so much to feel and process, and yet

unable to access the very activity that helps me do that felt like a double dose of tragedy.

And that’s what led me to become acutely aware of the colours on my walking app. You see,

my walking app speaks to me in three colours: Red when I don’t come anywhere close to my

daily step target; orange when I manage at least half and green when I meet or exceed it.

At first glance, it’s a simple system. Clean. Measurable. Objective. Over the past months

these colours have come to mean far more than movement. They have become a quiet

language of healing.

After Mama died, I found myself walking again, not because I felt ready, but because I had

committed to a pilgrimage. It was a very, very difficult walk. Every day, the app showed

green. Every day, I met the target. On the outside, it looked like strength, discipline, success.

But inside, I was hurting in ways no app could measure.

That experience shifted something in me. It made me realise that green does not always mean

well. Since then, I’ve been watching the colours more closely – not just as data, but as signals.

There have been many red days. Days when walking felt impossible. Days when the weight

of loss sat too heavily in my body. Days when rest, stillness, or simply getting through was all

I could manage.

There have been some orange days. Days when I could move a little. Not fully, not freely, but

enough. Enough to step outside, enough to breathe, enough to remember that I am still here.

And then, there have been green days again. Fewer at first. But they are returning. And this is

what I’ve come to see:

The colours are changing, not perfectly, not quickly, but directionally.

There is more green now.

There is more orange.

There is less red.

Not because the grief is gone. It isn’t. The void left by my mother’s absence is not something

that disappears. It is something I am learning to live with, to carry, to make space for. But

something in me is healing.

Walking has always been my way of processing life. It is where I think things through, where

I find peace, where I release what I’ve been holding. When I couldn’t walk, I wasn’t just

losing a habit, I was losing a pathway back to myself.

So each step back into walking is more than physical movement. It is a quiet return. A

rebuilding. A reclaiming. I’ve also had to gently redefine what the colours mean.

Red is no longer failure.

It is a signal: today, I need rest.

Orange is no longer “not enough.”

It is a bridge: I have some capacity, and that is enough for today.

Green is no longer the only measure of success.

It is a gift: today, I have access to strength and movement again.

Healing, I am learning, is not colourless. It does not move in straight lines or neat

progressions. It shows up in gradients, in shifts, in subtle changes over time.

And sometimes, healing looks like this:

A few more green days.

A few more orange days.

A quiet reduction in red.

Not perfect. Not complete. But real. And for now, that is enough.

By Coach Jaki