When was the last time you specifically noticed something red on your walk to work? Do you know how many trees you pass from your home to the street corner? What does that piece of graffiti art next to your favorite restaurant really look like?
Our senses are overloaded every single day as we move through the world — yet we rarely take the time to actually notice what surrounds us. If we took the time to slow down, what would we see? More importantly, what would we learn?
Street Wisdom, a global social enterprise, encourages people to slow down, tune in, and find inspiration on the urban streets around them — a concept deeply entrenched in the programming at this year’s Summit. It’s also an experience several delegates will participate in on Montecatini Terme’s streets during the week.
Anja Mutic, a media delegate and Street Wizard, will lead two groups (one each on Tuesday and Wednesday) on a Street Wisdom search for answers. To get the most out of the experience, she recommends confirmed delegates arrive with both an open mind and a specific question they’d like answered. “Make it as applicable as possible to your current situation in the adventure travel sphere,” she advised. “We all have many questions, but if you pick the one that's really plaguing you and bring it to Street Wisdom, the street will give you answers. It may be ‘the’ answer or it may be a piece of a bigger puzzle, but it will certainly open your mind to a different way of thinking and problem solving.”
Not only does the experience offer up potential answers, it also polishes a few skills any successful professional can use, such as learning how to pay attention, sharpening the senses, and being open to the street freely giving out clues.
The Summit’s Street Wisdom sessions are already booked to max capacity, but for those unable to participate in Street Wisdom this week, there’s still a way to participate: Street Wisdom offers organized events all around the world. Don’t see an event near you? The organization also has a self-guided audio file for those seeking insight and inspiration. And regardless of whether you take to Tuscany’s urban thoroughfares or roads in your hometown, Mutic said the streets provide answers — if you listen. “You can take those tools and apply them to any situation and any urban setting — and you'll enter a dialogue with the street, so to speak,” she said. “But you have to be able to go inside as well and quiet down; the street doesn't shout, it whispers.”