wandering woods
I struggle a lot with the difference between the way things were, the way things are, and the way things should be. A large part of my confusion is fueled by my own misunderstanding of humanity itself.
I often look back to our human past — to simpler times — and think, life was better then. There was a greater potential for more people to be more happy more of the time. And, as I’ve said before, the greatest measure of success is happiness. I read “The Continuum Concept” and, though it wasn’t the point of the book at all, I was ready to throw away everything I owned and move myself and my child in with some aboriginal tribe. Even if it meant a SHORTER life, if those short years were filled with greater happiness it would be worth it.
I began to believe that by taking myself as far away from complications as I could, and bringing myself back to the roots of existence, I’d be happier. I still believe this to be true. But, beyond that core belief, my conclusions were all wrong. What I didn’t see is that humans raised in different environments are really very different humans. While a biologist would probably disagree, I’d say they are even a different species. At some point in human evolution, technology (even in it’s simplest forms) became a contributing factor. Now, today, it defines our evolution and, because of that, defines our species. Plugging the people of today into a society of 200 years ago simply wouldn’t work. But that doesn’t mean there are some things from our past that we shouldn’t take with us.
Technology is what makes our particular variant of “human” what it is. And progress is what fuels that. Regressing to a simpler time is not the entire answer. I believe we’ve progressed unevenly and, in some places, too quickly. I think that, instead of considering a rewind into more simple times, the right response is to make simple what can be made simple, and to find what get left out along the way and put it back.
I think it’s important that we remember what we come from and to honor that daily. Our entire being is preprogrammed with instincts forged in previous generations. Our education was provided by those in a generation before us, who were educated by a generation before them. Everything that defines how we were brought into this world is of at least one generation before our own. And yet our technolofy is today’s technology. I can easily eat the exact same food and wear the exact same clothing every single day in any location within most of the civilized world. This wasn’t true for most of the previous generation. And wasn’t true for nearly all of the generation before that. In this way, and in so many others, our bodies expect something different. They expect cycles. They expect change. They expect work.
Technology has allowed our need for personal space has been allowed to run rampant. In earlier times shelter was difficult to come by. Tribes of people shared the same space only because it was the only one available. If a new space had to be created, there was much work involved and every member contributed. These days, houses and apartments grow up from the ground. You go online, pick one out, and it’s yours. Gaining access to personal space is simple. And because it was such a rare thing in our past, we are programmed to suck up as much of it as we can. Our cites sprawl outwards. Hermits and recluses are more and more common. People do fewer things with fewer and fewer people. Social activities aren’t the norm. They require planning and coordination. But our preprogrammed selves REQUIRE social interaction. And we aren’t getting enough.
Progress has changed the way we thing about food. Food doesn’t grow in the ground any more. Food comes in boxes and is served by restaurants. Maybe I’m exaggerating, but not by much. Even the unprocessed foods we buy are often enhanced in some way. Our vegetables are grown in fertilizers and pesticides. Finding fresh chicken that hasn’t been injected with “solution” is difficult. Cheddar cheese is most often dyed orange, simply because we expect it to be. There is, of course, nothing inherently wrong with bright orange cheese. But understanding where our food comes from brings a certain respect for it. Harvesting your own supper offsets some of the calories that consuming it will provide. Eating it unprocessed makes your body work a little harder to get everything out of it. It seems like a good idea to give our bodies the fats and the carbohydrates that would have been most nourishing to a human of earlier times. But, in these days, without the work to accompany it and the large spans of time without fat and carbohydrates to temper it, they only make us unhealthy.
Our bodies and our minds are suffering because technology has allowed us to have more than we need. And that excess has grown like weeds, smothering us and choking out other important things.
My current focus on life is to seek simplicity in all things without removing the advantages that technology provides us with. At the same time, I intend to recreate the circumstances and conditions that allow better balances among the things we have. I wish to honor nature’s cycles. I wish to feel the heat and cold instead of always taking refuge in climate control. I wish to work for my food, even if I can find it premade in a box, or served up hot at a restaurant. I wish to learn about birds and trees and animals, even if knowing about them doesn’t actually serve me any use in my role in society. I wish to spend time with other people even without occasion or special location.
The simplicity will free me. And honoring these things will bring comfort to unrest that lies far, far below the surface.