Something that has been on my mind tonight...

Our lives are different from what they were before. And we should really turn off the lights. Right?

Today was a very rainy day. I got home from work at 5pm, and the first thing I did was turn on the lights and run to the kitchen to find something to eat. After devouring my three egg omelette with jalapenos (I love breakfast for dinner), I made my way up to my room and listened to some music while studying for a new job i'm looking to get. A really catchy song came on spotify, and I decided to break out the guitar and improvise along with the song. It was now 7 45PM and the lights were still on, as they always are. My fingers hurt. I put the guitar down and felt like I needed to catch some fresh air, so I stumbled out the front door and into the world.

I could already see some stars, and there weren't very many clouds, so I grabbed my reclining lawn chair from my honda civics trunk, and headed to a field by my house. I get lost in the night sky very easily. Deep thoughts enter my mind as I realize it has been a very long time since I actually took in the size of this thing that has always been right above my forehead. Im starting to get annoyed by the lights on the street nearby, and the cars passing by. I think to myself "Am I the only one that sees this huge THING above us?!, its crazy how distracted we get by our own lives. We hardly make time to look up at the other half of our world."

I realize that most people ARE just sitting at home, watching TV, and eating dinner with the lights on. It's wild how our daily lives are spent mostly indoors one way or another. Start in the house, 15 seconds outside to get in car, 30 seconds outside to head from car to the office to spend the next 8 hours, 30 seconds outside from the office to the car, 15 seconds from the car to the house, then last but not least, 5 WHOLE MINUTES outside to walk the dog.

I wander back inside and, again, turn on the lights. It didn't feel right. I turned them back off. All of them. Everything with electricity and sat in silence.... its now 9:45, and I just had to write this. There is no more gradual "dimming of the lights" anymore, its just, keep the lights on until 1am, then realize you should seriously go to bed, then *click* immediate blackness. That cant be right, can it?

It just doesn't make much sense that for thousands of years, humans have "pretty much" been doing the same thing (wake up in a tent/cave/non AC controlled environment, hunt/pick food, hang with friends/tribe members lol, then go to bed when the SUN GOES DOWN), and now we have quickly filled the boring moments of our lives with sensory input, entertainment, internet porn, and anything to get that quick dose of dopamine..

But, it seems like we will continue this way for good, no going back now. Not saying its a bad thing...

This is the thought from which my questions arise.. DOES IT MAKE MORE SENSE TO LIVE YOUR LIFE LIKE HUMANS BEFORE OUR TIME (Awake and go to sleep based on the natural light outside, eat our own meat, grow our own food, sleep on the floor, run or walk most places, shower in COLD water, drink tea and water only, etc.) OR, TO LIVE FOR THE FUTURE, AND ATTEMPT TO KEEP UP WITH THE NEW LIFESTYLES OF TODAY'S HUMANS?

• IF YOU CHOSE NOT ADJUST TO THE NEW LIFESTYLE, WOULD IT NOT EFFECT YOUR CHILDREN IF THEY GREW UP WITH A RADICALLY DIFFERENT WAY OF LIVING THAN MOST OF SOCIETY?

Lastly, • IS THERE REALLY NO TURNING BACK TO HOW WE LIVED BEFORE?

Im excited to see what you all think. Personally, I feel like there is no stopping this new type of lifestyle, and its just going to get more and more and more intense, I'm just not sure if we are capable of evolving to accommodate quick enough..

First to answer your questions: It makes more sense to live the way humans used to if YOU think it makes sense. I can't comment on whether or how much your lifestyle would affect your children as I don't have children but of course your lifestyle will not only effect your children but it will also affect everyone else in the world in some way. Lastly, of course there is the option to "turn back" in the sense you are saying it. If you have the option to "turn back" (and you clearly do since you are considering it) then everyone else has the ability to do the same.

My way of looking at things is that we have gotten ahead of ourselves as a species in the external world and we have to catch up our internal worlds before we will be able to utilize what we have created externally in a positive and useful manner.

We came from a state of not knowing how to gather food and take care of ourselves and evolved into what we are today. Now we need to realize we have all we need and we can relax. It's like we had such trouble surviving in early evolution that we have forgotten that we are allowed to just relax and be. The analogy I like to use is our species having inhabited this planet is like a few people finding a disordered and dirty cluttered house and cleaning and cleaning it for so long to the point they are just being neurotic and don't realize the house is clean and have forgotten they are even cleaning in the first place. They think it's the only way to be. This is like how our species has been thinking and thinking about the external world for so long that they've become neurotic and can't relax.

I've taken showers with hot water, showers without hot water, baths with and without hot water, I've washed myself in rivers, lakes and oceans.

You really don't want to give up your hot showers/baths Especially if you don't live in a really warm climate. You get used to it, but let me put it this way: a hot shower/bath after going without one for months or years is better than sex. At least it was for me.

Cavemen would have taken hot showers if they could have. Wild foxes would sleep in beds if they could. Comfort is not a bad thing, but you're on to something: too much comfort can be.

There is so much value in spending a lot of time outside, picking and gathering your own food. It helps keep you connected to the world around you, the life around you.

You can go forward without going backwards. Cavemen didn't know about electricity or supermarkets. You know and want to mindfully give up some of those things. That's different from going back to being a caveman, that's going forward!

Try not to worry about what other people might/could do. This is your path, follow it if it feels right

One more thing: I stopped eating processed food (except for soy milk and sweetener for my coffee, eventually I think I'll switch to raw sugar or something) and modern grains just recently but I already feel so much better. Diet is an incredibly huge part of your well-being. Change your diet to fit your current thoughts and see what happens.

I also stopped eating meat. I wasn't eating much meat to begin with, maybe once a month, eggs I sometimes ate a couple of times a month, so that wasn't really a huge change. I just personally feel better now, not eating animal products. Might not work for everyone.

I'll entertain your last question. Yes, people will stop experiencing outdoors/nature more and more. Eventually there will be domes around cities with no naturally occurring animals or trees inside. Even later, it's likely this planet will be surrounded by an array of microsatellites armed with various energy weapons to scan and, when needed, destroy any particle, organic or inorganic, making this planet a closed system (a gated community, if you prefer). At that point, the amount and type of life on this planet could entirely be decided by humans from creating new species to eradicating every last one of existing ones and eating nothing but 3d printed artificial food.

Scary thought? That brings me back to my suggestion: Try not to worry about what other people might/could do. This is your path, follow it if it feels right

Wonderful thread, I hear all of you, clearly.

Diet is definitely the freeway to contentment: crap is everywhere, whether food, or media, and swerving the worst parts brings immediate benefits, IME.

I don't tend to bother much any more, but back when I was still 'gadget-curious'...disappointment/frustration/feeling-ripped-off tended to arise far more often than 'Oh, wow, now my life is complete!'

Resonance!

As Nikolai Tesla said, if you want to understand the secrets of the universe, you have to think in terms of energy, frequency, and vibration. By choosing to align with a natural rhythm/frequency, such as the daylight-period, well, you're listening to very deep music, and that's always a good idea

And as Gautama Buddha said, neither the high nor the low path, but the middle one...

Candles FTW!