I’ve never known a Leo to be a naturally fast walker, have you?
I’ve always thought they like to set a stately pace because it helps them embody an ideal of unhurried patrician splendor. You know how royalty seems leisured because there are literally never any errands to take care of, only one’s noblessse oblige.
Yet there are other advantages: A slow motion glide allows for creative visualizations – the catwalk, a red carpet, one’s retinue, flashbulbs, awe etc – even if the Leo is, in fact, en route to the post office after some terse texting with bots.
It also aids any dazzling entrance. After all if you’re not seen to have arrived, are you even there?
And how else is the Leo to spontaneously catch a glimpse of their reflection in a shop window or placid pond?
But it’s also a vibe lift. The American photographer Peter Hujar – a Libra but with Mars in Leo – advised friends and photographic subjects who were feeling unattractive or down to slow their pace and “as you’re walking along, say to yourself: ‘I’m me.‘”
Marina Abramovic (Saturn-Pluto in Leo and a loaded 5th house) has turned her ‘Slow Motion Walking’ practice into both a meditation and performance art.
And the Leo Rising Honore de Balzac said that the ideal gait was smooth. “Slow movement is essentially majestic. Economy of movement is the means to render a noble and gracious movement.”
So this is not the laborious shuffle of the unconfident or a stride shortened by tight Achilles tendons – the slo-mo Leo gait is deliberate, like choreography.
Some have figured out that they can fix physical imbalances and misalignments via correct gait, others are thinking ‘big cat’ – lions and panthers have the most measured pace when they’re on the verge of a sudden speed-up and pounce.
You could also think promenade. In Wanderlust – A History Of Walking ( I love this book), Rebecca Solnit (Cancerian, Mars in Leo) writes that “The promenade is a special subset of walking with an emphasis on slow stately movement, socializing, and display. It is not a way of getting anywhere, but a way of being somewhere, and its movements are essentially circular…”
So if you’re a Leo who’s over being harangued to hurry up – most likely by antsy Cardinal signs- take heart! Your pace is your grace.
Thoughts?
Images:
Stephanie Seymour – Versace 1991
Charlize Theron – Demonstrating her “Queen Ravenna” walk.
Slow?? I’m a Leo and I’ve never done anything slow. Neither has any other Leo I have known. I am a red head though, not sure if that makes any difference. At work I once had a colleague tell me to slow down and that he worked slowly so they didn’t assign more work. I explained I wasn’t trying to go slow or fast, I was just working at the pace I always work.
Slow walking Taurus – this is normal, I can go slower
Slow walking Cancerian – slow if walking away from home, fast on return
Slow walking Leo – gives you more time to gaze upon me
Slow walking Scorpio – not walking, thinking
Slow walking Saggo’ – never happens, unless in moon boot from skiiing accident
Wow! I thought slow walking was just me
Guess that’s Leo too. An ex would have included my walk in the Ten Things I Hate About You, along with the mane and refusal to eat fast food. I love this post. Thanks!
Love the “The promenade… is not a way of getting anywhere, but a way of being somewhere.” Yes at its best walking is being somewhere, seeing and being seen. The Efficient Walk is for signs with more Internalized Capitalism, like Arieses and Capricorns. If I need to speed walk (like walking with my 35 kg Bracco Italiano), I make it look like I just swish my Sag rising legs a bit more while maintaining that regally nonchalant air (I wish) 😂
The Bracco Italiano walks you non 🙂 It’s pulling weight is 3 times it’s actual weight so you have my total admiration to speed walk along side it…methinks you would HAVE to!
Yes, I am slow walking..now. My hypermobile hips slink lazily down the footpaths of my suburb, when passing physios see me disjointed, posture like a drugged lynx half way belly to floor playing predator, they shriek in horror.
In my goaty youth I parkour-ed my way over seats and embankments like Avril Lavigne sans skateboard.
But now, I slink.
I have 5 Leo placements— sun, mercury, mars, south node, venus — notably though, also an Aries moon — and I walk FAST
Same for my sister, a Leo moon
*typically —
I do enjoy slow movement exercises…and maybe I could do for more “slow walk” experimenting
I’m with you Hermeswitch, always a step ahead of the pack and oh so impatient with these strolling types. Am now going to channel Mystic’s insights and slowwwww it down just to feel the difference. “Your pace is your grace”. Who knew indeed, it might just be a new thing for us.
Despite your suggestion, its not deliberate. I’m striding it out thinking I’m zooming along and then a Gemini grandmother whizzes past me. We’re not scheming to be regal, it happens despite all our thoughts that we’re ordinary folk.
Thankyou for sending this, MM, but I couldn’t possibly read it since my Leo niece has eaten up all my psychic space on social media with her upcoming birthday in a feed that has not stopped, even though the birthday has since passed. Sorry, but I just can’t …
Gone-to-god Leo bestie of forever years used to say to me ‘you have such an efficient fast walk’. Guess so that’s a Saggo thing compared to her stroll, indolence and art of lounging. Errands to do? Nooo everything was couriered and delivered. She really was the ‘hearth fire’ one circles and basks in the warmth.
Her generosity supreme…..lent her money for a solicitor to assist her inheritance claim (a lot) which she repaid in triple.
She also did the Chalice Thing. Ordered a banquet tat a restaurant then presided over it with expensive French wine without eating anything. It was for the setting and the ambience.
Jeez i miss her especially on 8/8 her B-day.
How magnificent and what a beautiful friendship. No wonder you miss her x
she sounds amazing! thanks for sharing your memories of your friend.
ah yes, I’m sagg mars and I do walking meditation, wandering whimsy or joyful, sometimes fast paced angry stride, but whatever the mood I need it like I need to breathe,
This year I had knee injury that lasted months & I couldn’t walk, it was tough & in retro I see I lost some of the angst.
These day I guess my leo sun gets to set the pace a bit more.
Driving is another matter, I’m always impatient even if there’s no reason to be, hmmm …perhaps apply a stately stroll approach to driving …
Understand these movements well both car and pedestrian 🙂
Leo rising to the Nth degree, but perhaps my Virgo moon (not my Sag sun) is responsible for my determined gait. It’s definitely not a leisurely stride. It works for me because of my innate confidence. People have told me that I always seem to know where I’m going, even when I do not 😅
Well, there you go. I never got the memo. Fast walking Leo here except at the beach when beachcombing. It’s nice and slow then but not because I have the figure to do it to get some attention. I’m going to try and slow it up and feel the difference. Who knew?
I love this so much! I grew up in San Diego and never felt rushed, but when I moved to NYC, everyone was so fast and I was still so slow but now I can save this and credit it to my Leo existence!
ok yes this is valuable advice for someone actively working on decrypting a lifelong Self-Limiting Leo condition via assorted psychonautical assays, but also, wise to never get caught behind a Leo on the footpath if you actually want to get to the train in time 💕
“in Leo land, train rushes for *you*”
I love this. Yesterday on my birthday I just wanted to be by the sea & walk in the sun.
I needed the sun. After too many gloomy days. It was brilliant. I was wearing one of my fav boots – my Mercury boots – I name many of my shoes – lace up, sage/olive to just below the knee, you glide in them almost on air. Perfect for a slow walk absorbing the blue hues of the ocean & all the birds (yes the feathered ones) out & about flirting with each other, as all the joggers run past endlessly.
Then after my coastal walk off to the AGNSW to go to these amazing magic art exhibitions. Slow walking to absorb these incredible artworks. Spellbound an amazing exhibition – magic on the walls, yes the artist Wendy Sharp painted art directly on the walls as well as hanging her art on the walls. It was so powerful my phone kept glitching as I tried to take photos.
The Grotto is about the occult & esoteric in Sydney. A tiny room about walking around Sydney discovering the psychic, mystical places that exist around us. A re-enchantment of Sydney. A Sydney that exists “a step to the left”. Or a stumble & a portal realigns & some object appears or disappears.
I circled this room multiple times, I did not want to leave. And the marionettes she made of famous occult figures of Sydney. Sitting. Waiting. I’m sure at night they get up & walk around slowly.
Gliding by absorbing everything in my Mercury boots.
There’s an awareness of how I walk, a feline nonchalance, but also an almost predatory aspect esp when I’m in the moment.
(As opposed to when I’m in the supermarket which is more akin to I’m hungry & hunting & my cubs are waiting so get out of my way)
Sun, northnode, Bastet, Vesta, Juno Mercury,Anubis, & Uranus in Leo.
Mars conjunct Hekate in 5th house. (I have quite a few red Mars shoes/suede boots too)
Neptune conjunct moon in Scorpio. (black thigh hi boots – or as the retired director of the gallery referred to them as the FMH&FM boots)
‘Puss in Boots’ 🙂
Thanx for that delightful reminder of life in Sidders.
Even you writing has a fluid flowing pace, delightful
*your (my charging Bull typing allows random errors or Mercury glitching my device?)
sounds like a trip to sydney to see this exhibition–you describe it sublimely
now that I’m semi retired I can spend hours walking wandering moseying and observing–i’ve always been a flaneur but now I have more leisure time
The Charlize Theron graphic is my September vision board.
ha! It’s going on my forever vision board!
Leo Venus conj. NN. Notorious catwalker.
My fav compliment ever: « Tu marches comme une impératrice! » (You walk like an empress!)
Will now walk even slower (‘your pace is your grace’, ooolala I feel like a panther 🐆) – and catch that Rebecca Solnit book!