Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    The Art of Flaneuring: How to Wander with Intention and Discover a Better Life
    The Art of Flaneuring: How to Wander with Intention and Discover a Better Life
    The Art of Flaneuring: How to Wander with Intention and Discover a Better Life
    Ebook115 pages1 hour

    The Art of Flaneuring: How to Wander with Intention and Discover a Better Life

    By Erika Owen

    3/5

    ()

    Switch to audiobook
    Read preview

    About this ebook

    A fun and practical guide to cultivating a more mindful and fulfilling everyday life by tapping into your inner flaneur—perfect for fans of Marie Kondo and The Little Book of Hygge.

    Have you ever been walking home from work and unexpectedly took a different path just to learn more about your neighborhood? Or have you been on a vacation and walked around a new city just to take it all in? Then chances are, you’re a flaneur and you didn’t even know it! Originally used to describe well-to-do French men who would stroll city streets in the nineteenth century, flaneur has evolved to generally mean someone who wanders with intention. Even if you’ve already embraced being a flaneur, did you know that flaneuring has benefits beyond satisfying your craving for wanderlust?

    In The Art of Flaneuring, discover the many ways flaneuring can spark creativity, support a more mindful mentality, and improve your overall well-being, including:

    -How flaneuring your mundane daily routine can boost your mental health
    -Why flaneuring isn’t just for jet-setters—you can flaneur anywhere!
    -How to manage your stress at the office by doing fun flaneur-inspired activities
    -How to use flaneuring to connect on a deeper level with your friends and partner
    -And so much more!

    With this practical and engaging guide, you can learn how to channel your inner flaneur and cultivate a more creative, fulfilling, and mindful everyday life.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster
    Release dateOct 22, 2019
    ISBN9781982133528
    Author

    Erika Owen

    Erika Owen is a Brooklyn-based travel writer, editor, and content strategist. Her work has previously been published in Travel + Leisure, Departures, and Vogue. You can also find her work online at GQ, Martha Stewart Living, Bustle, Rachael Ray Magazine, and more.

    Related to The Art of Flaneuring

    Related ebooks

    Personal Growth For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      A Quiet Path Out of the Coronavirus Shadow

      Mar 31, 2021

      Eleven years ago, I sat down across from a man named Edward Espe Brown. I had returned home to Texas from a four-month stay at the Tassajara Zen Mountain Center in California, endured a breakup, and was feeling adrift. I told Ed that I was struggling

      9 min read

    • Article

      Hygge? Lykke? Lagom? Huh? The Language of Life Advice

      Jan 29, 2018

      IF YOU HAVEN’T YET LEARNED THE DEFINITION OF HYGGE, don’t sweat—the world will have moved on twice before you do. Thanks to concepts like hygge, lykke and lagom, bookstore browsing has become an exercise in translation, with more and more covers boas

      5 min read

    • Article

      Three Anchors For Your Attention

      Dec 28, 2021

      1. LISTEN Let yourself be the center of a living soundscape. Without trying to figure out what you’re hearing, can you allow yourself to just listen and be curious as you follow sounds in the room, your body, and the world around you? When you’re bri

      1 min read

    • Article

      Living Your Values

      Mar 16, 2022

      Living Your Values
      7 min read

    • Article

      Nordic Wellbeing

      Nov 3, 2021

      Nordic Wellbeing
      3 min read

    • Article

      Activités

      Mar 4, 2021

      Activités
      1 min read

    • Article

      It’s In The Doing

      Mar 16, 2022

      For as long as I can remember, I have suffered from social anxiety. Feelings of not-enough plagued me during work meetings, family dinners and even with friends. After a breakup just before lockdown in Sydney, I was living alone. I’m 34 years old and

      2 min read

    • Article

      Making Monsters!

      Mar 4, 2021

      Making Monsters!
      6 min read

    • Article

      If You Only Do One Thing

      Dec 17, 2020

      If You Only Do One Thing
      1 min read

    • Article

      Viewpoint

      Nov 23, 2021

      It did me a power of good to read ‘Time to let go?’ (December edition). You see, I felt happy most of the time… but then I would let my mind wander and think of all the things that troubled me: people I have wronged and those that have wronged me. I

      2 min read

    • Article

      Sumac

      May 5, 2021

      Sumac
      3 min read

    • Article

      Kindness Rocks!

      Mar 4, 2021

      Kindness Rocks!
      4 min read

    • Article

      HOW TO Practice Curiosity

      Dec 28, 2021

      First, find a quiet, comfortable place where you won’t be distracted. You can be sitting, lying down, or even standing up. Recall your most recent run-in with a habitual pattern. See if you can remember the scene and focus in on the habitual behavior

      1 min read

    • Article

      Goodbye Things, Hello Life

      May 19, 2020

      Goodbye Things, Hello Life
      7 min read

    • Article

      Cheat yourself HAPPIER

      Nov 16, 2021

      Cheat yourself HAPPIER
      3 min read

    • Article

      Four Ways To Explore Gratitude

      Oct 26, 2021

      How do your physical senses recognize and experience beauty? Explore how you notice something lovely today. What part of that process sparks gratitude? Write or draw about that beauty. Notice the good ideas you have today, in any area of your life—a

      1 min read

    • Article

      The Little Rituals We Love

      Nov 23, 2021

      The Little Rituals We Love
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Self-Development BOOK CLUB

      May 4, 2022

      Recharge Your Life Using Your Body’s Own Restorative Systems. Sara C. Mednick. Hay House £12.99 The 21st Century might be all-go, but what impact does our 24/7 lifestyle have on our mind and body? In the age of burnout and stress, Professor of Psycho

      2 min read

    • Article

      Give It A Rest

      May 24, 2023

      Give It A Rest
      4 min read

    • Article

      DUTCH COURAGE TO DO nothing

      Dec 11, 2019

      DUTCH COURAGE TO DO nothing
      4 min read

    • Article

      Project Happiness!

      Dec 17, 2018

      Project Happiness!
      6 min read

    • Article

      The Courage To Do Nothing

      Apr 20, 2020

      The Courage To Do Nothing
      4 min read

    • Article

      What Is Nagomi?

      May 10, 2022

      Nagomi enables you to achieve the following five pillars in your life: 1 Maintaining happy relationships with your loved ones, even if you disagree with them. 2 Learning new things, while always staying true to yourself . 3 Finding a sense o

      1 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for The Art of Flaneuring

    3/5

    10 ratings1 review

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 2/5
      Although the title was intriguing, The Art of Flaneuring is a disappointing fluff piece with no substance. It might have made a good one page article for Cosmo. It’s full of tiresome, trite truisms. A better choice would be Wanderlust: A History of Walking or The Art of Pilgrimage.

      2 people found this helpful

    Book preview

    The Art of Flaneuring - Erika Owen

    Introduction

    What on Earth Is Flaneuring?

    You know those feelings that often have a German word associated with them—words that you have no chance of pronouncing correctly? Take Fremdschämen, for example. This word defines a feeling we all have experienced: a deep shame for someone else in an uncomfortable situation, one that doesn’t exactly involve us. A stranger tripping and falling, spilling his entire coffee on the innocent bystander dressed in white in front of him. A server trying to explain to a vegetarian that her veggie burger is actually a real meat burger… after she’s already taken a bite. Your manager berating one of your coworkers about something that wasn’t his fault. Flâneur isn’t a German word—it’s French—but it falls into the same bucket of expressions. It describes an action and a way of being that you may never have realized there was a word for.

    In the nineteenth century, the word flâneur referred to a well-to-do, dandy type of white man—and usually a Parisian—who would idly stroll through the streets of a city, carefully observing his everyday surroundings and finding the beauty in what many would consider the mundane. The kind of strolling these early flaneurs did was always done with a romantic mind-set—or a greater focus on finding meaning in the cracks in the street than getting somewhere specific—and more often than not it was also done while slightly drunk.

    But much like the beloved Danish concept of hygge, which emphasizes the value in being comfy and cozy, behaving like a flaneur—something the French originally called flânerie and many have since colloquially starting calling flaneuring, without the diacritic over the a—can also be a lifestyle. Over the years, and as more and more people have discovered flaneuring’s many benefits, to flaneur has evolved to more generally mean to wander with intention—or, in other words, to be intentionally aimless. Flaneuring, essentially, is taking a walk for the sake of taking a walk—not to stop by the bank, not to get some exercise, not to get directly from point A to point B. All these things can happen while you’re flaneuring, but the objective of a flaneur is to enjoy the journey for what it is—to look outward and let what you see influence your inward thoughts, to be a part of the scenery while also taking a moment to deeply appreciate the environment that surrounds you.

    Here are a few brief examples of ways you can easily incorporate some flaneuring into your everyday life:

    Killing Time Before Meeting Friends for Dinner

    We’ve all been there: arriving at a restaurant before our dining companions have shown up and needing a way to kill time. Instead of mindlessly scrolling through your phone (yet again), try taking a walk around the block. Read all of the storefront names as you walk by, making mental notes of ones that make you giggle, think, and scratch your head. If there isn’t a block to walk around, find a spot to perch and people-watch. Count the cars that drive by. Read their license plates and try to make out meanings for their letters as acronyms.

    Searching for the Perfect Picnic Spot

    Pick a park or a beach and start walking. A picnic can be anything you want it to be: a random selection of snacks, a bit of bread and cheese, a single beer, a full-on tapas-inspired spread. There are no rules when it comes to picnic foods, and anyone who tells you differently is certainly not a friend, in my opinion!

    Exploring a New Park

    Parks are the perfect places to practice your flaneuring. Not only do the preset boundaries create a safe space for exploring, but there are often a lot of different scenes to take in: dog runs, playgrounds, ponds, forested areas, bike paths. If you’re finding yourself fighting against the distraction of having a wide choice of scenery, focus on making a mental map of the park. The next time you visit, spend time acknowledging more of the details.

    Window-Shopping While on a Trip

    Window-shopping is another fantastic way to flaneur, so the next time you’re on a trip in a new location, head into a local store and take in the details. Are the signs and advertisements in English or the local dialect? That will tell you a lot about how many tourists an area sees. Are you seeing a local artist pop up more than the rest? What style of clothing or what kinds of items do you see being sold—and does it inspire you? Observe what all of the shopkeepers and employees are wearing. You can learn so much about a new place based on the items sold in its stores.

    Taking a Walk to Calm Your Mind

    If you’re working through something tough or anxiety inducing, pulling yourself out of a familiar environment can often give you the kick you need to come up with a solution, or something close to one. In this instance, don’t push yourself to calm down. Let your thoughts wander, and remember that your brain is still working hard on big problems even when you aren’t consciously thinking about them, and it might just take some fresh air to clear out all of the noise.

    Walking Your Dog

    What better way to flaneur than letting an excited pup on a leash guide you on a walk? If you don’t have a dog, chances are good that a friend who does have one will leap at the opportunity for a break as the designated walker.

    As I hope to have shown in these examples, flaneuring is relatively simple, but to truly appreciate its many benefits it’s worth learning about its origins as well as the many forms it can take. If flaneuring sounds like something you might like to do—and I’m assuming it is since you’re reading this book—but getting started is a bit intimidating, take solace that you’ve likely already flaneured at some point in your life. I’d even go as far as saying that babies, with their nerve-racking crawling and tendency to get into things they probably shouldn’t, are the ultimate early-life flaneurs. (Too bad most of us can’t remember what discovering a stairwell for the first time felt like.)

    Flaneuring can bring a lot of unexpected and beautiful moments into your day, and when you wander with intention, you’ll find your brain can do some pretty great work. Not only is flaneuring a good way to clear those daily nagging thoughts out of your mind and replace them with more positive and productive ideas, it can also be a great way to get some fresh air. Everyone could always use more fresh air.

    By reading this book, my hope is that you’ll ultimately come to better understand how embracing your inner flaneur can help you experience the world in a new way, spark creativity you never knew was in that brain of yours, switch up your daily routines, more effectively deal with stress, and so much more.

    Ready to begin? Let’s get started.

    A Brief History of the Flaneur

    At the most basic, a flaneur is someone who strolls. But in the late nineteenth century, to be called a flaneur was a much more exclusive description. It often meant that you were a middle- or upper-class white man who had achieved a level within society with the privilege of living a life of leisure—or at least enough time in your day to walk without a care in the world—and a level that arguably made you an interesting and intellectual person to talk to at parties.

    The French poet Charles Baudelaire was one of the first people to define a flaneur as such, by describing him in his essay The Painter of Modern Life as a gentleman stroller of city streets, or one who casually but thoughtfully observed and experienced modern-day urban life as

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1