Golly gosh, if you love the City life then that's great. I can assure you, i am not a boring person, and have not lived a boring life. I also enjoyed City life. But now as i get older and wiser and see it for what it is, i now realise that it is wrong for humans to live like this. Sure it's too late to start all over again, and some of us have no choice. But to me living in concrete skyscrapers, being "entertained" by television presenters,etc..it aint normal.

-I guess you guys may be young and new to this world, but trust me , sooner or later the media, the fashion, latest haircut, latest remix, movie,Celebrity,etc, it all becomes a pathetic crap way of trying to stimulate a need, and falls very much short of fulfilling that gap. Nature "boring" as it might seem to you city folk is on the otherhand calming and extremely stimulating on a great many levels in tune with your true natural beings, IMO.



-Again, why do you think this is so??...Cultural events, being close to everything, arts??...Well permit me to answer that please: Sure there is a lot of this in a city, because it's city folk trying to put the vibes of nature into the city to cancel out the concrete vibes. When you live in the nature, you don't need "cultural events", you are the culture, like any naturally living race is. Your arts would be constructing your accomodation, or artisan work, etc. In fact living in the nature is an expression of art. If you guys cannot see this then i guess you are far too into the city life to realise this simple truth. No offence meant. Close to everything??...you don't get closer to where you need to be in the nature. You are home, and all you need is there. Don't believe me??, think you need cars and trucks to get services??..then go study, and know that man has lived happily in small communities in the nature without these technologies for millenia.You do not NEED the city, in fact it needs YOU, the government want your taxes!



-But you are entitled to your opinions. But let's just say although i don't mind the city, and even find it fun, i know that it's really crap.

I get this feeling a lot. It makes me want to leave civilization altogether. Live off the land like my Native ancestors did. Every time I go hiking, hunting or fishing I dream of someday everyone living in the wild permanently. No material longing or possessions to worry about. No debt to get into. I often feel resentment towards the fact that as people in society we are enslaved to our jobs and money. I hate that If you don't have a bunch of material junk lying around making you happy or an expensive house with matching expensive car in the driveway to come home to, you are considered poor or unfortunate even if you choose that lifestyle. I feel like I was born 200 years too late, almost like I missed out on the good old days, before corporate greed and modernization.

No point in lamenting anything. Change stuff.


FYI haves have always abused have nots ever since society existed.

I believe this to be absolutely true! Humans are no less natural than any other living organism.

We are natural inhabitants of mother earth and, like it or not, our societies and our cities is how we inhabit earth.

Birds build nests, Bees build hives, humans build houses and buildings and groups of these form cities. The natural result of these groupings of human dwellings is natually occuring human culture and unfortunately that culture consists of mass over consumption and all the crazyness that goes with that.

What is not natural about it? Thats how we humans have evolved like it or not.

Thats life.

Mooshy, IMO, you are correct.

Answer: EVERYTHING!

-Birds build nests using natural materials, bees likewise. They do not build skyscrapers, or watch reality television , or watch lady gaga to be entertained. Their natural life has all the joys and stimulae they require. They do not work 40 hours a week simply out of habit, they simply do things as required. They might live in hives, or nests, but you won't find cities of hives or nests. No. Animals and creatures are not greedy, and don't live crazily like humans do.

-No, you won't find me living in New York!

Animals' lives are, almost to a creature, nasty, brutish and short. They achieve nothing but the temporary satiation of their basest programmed desires, mindlessly procreate if they are lucky, and then perish, often violently, having bettered the world not one iota for the generation to come.

Wherever do you live that you can so blithely dismiss the social contract? I should like to steer clear of it if possible.

Honnestly, if you can't live in a city and NOT watch TV, the problem comes from you, not from your habitat.

Maybe you don't have the chance to know the interesting people that often lives in cities? Because honnestly, I have a lot of friends in this city, with none of them liking Lady Gaga and the majority of them not even owning a TV. I think you are grossly generalizing people's lifestyle.

-Really??..Is this how low you percieve nature??..You believe that humans better the world, and animals don't?. So you think humans are doing good for the environment and planet?..how wrong you are, look at deforestation, Nuclear warfare, Germ warfare, the damage to the ozone layer, melting ice cap, pollution of air and seas by oil and dumped trash..I think you are VERY wrong to think that humans are bettering their future, or the world just on this evidence alone-need i add to this?. And i put to you that animals do not damage the world like humans do. That the future of the world is at risk, thanks to the daft actions of needy humans, "contributing to society", and in the process causing irrepairable damage simply for fulfilling artificially created "needs" as dictated by idiotic governments and the media. I'm on the side of these "non bettering" creatures, Shrewsberry-i'm afraid. Because i think that they are our future and not humans, or their "better" cities, as i'm sure you think!!

-Man created the city, as a platform above nature. As an act of defiance and disgust over nature. When man made the city, he was basically saying we don't need you nature, we control the world, not you. Then came the City life drugs epidemics, larva flow, the hurricane, the tsunami, etc... How wrong was man to let his ego dictate his superiority over nature!!




-Let's just say that living in a City in scyscrapers is a rather sad state of affairs, IMO. If you think it's ok, then perhaps you and your friends are too "citified", and "normalised" to know different.

-Sure nature can be brutal, but so is the city- in indirect, lied to you ways. But humans unlike Animals can choose to live in the Nature and make it as beautiful a life as they choose. This is almost impossible in a concrete city full of skyscrapers, polluting cars, billboards, "supermarkets" selling junk, and unnatural noise pollution, and media nonsense.

--Again, City lovers, i'm not trying to convert you. If you love the city then that's fine. But you can't get any better than nature. You came from it, and you're going back there. City or not!.. Do not be afraid of the truth.

-The city life and all it's "entertainments" and other delusions isn't better than nature, i'm afraid...Unless you become a Tsunami fighter, or larva stopper, or hurricane steer'er, i guess.

Skyscrapers? Do you live in one? Strangely, I know no one living in a skycraper and I live in a city.

...

That's the part where I don't agree with you: liking city life doesn't make you "normalized". That's just plain insulting. You sound like you're having a late adolescent crisis.

I've hitchicked from one side of the american continent to the other just to go on the other side of the country and live away from the city for a while, picked fruits for a living, often lived in a tent in the woods... don't tell me I'm addicted to cities. I like the wild just as much as the other. But if you can't see the beauty in human society, I think you are being alienated.

It's ALL Nature. Cities as much as the wild. I notice that you haven't answered: what makes buildings or concrete less natural than animal's constructions? It all comes from the earth, it's all energy and matter.
Cities are not inherently evil. The is a very special energy that comes from them if you can focus and direct your attention to the right places and people.

I'm sorry you haven't found your place there. But I'm curious, what are you waiting for if living in the wild is so much better?

-Man causes untold destruction to the earth simply making his concrete buildings. He uses oil polluting machinery etc and all sorts of earth materials, destroying the natural environment in the process. You've heard of deforestation, right??- for these constructions. He actually kills the earth, and animals, to build his fashionable creations, that he then knocks it down cos it wasn't his dream pad. It's not natural to work against nature, it's evil. And we are paying the price of "progress".

- You ask about me, currently living in a small town near the sea: I'm happy living in my simple rented abode. I live as simply as possible. I have no need for a life of "lies".

-Adolescent crisis, Chaotic??, you'd better wake up son and smell the coffee, and realise that your country isn't just damaging it's own land either!!

Does the beaver "work against nature" when he takes down living threes to build his home, and ends up modifying the configuration of the surrounding waterflow?

Does the eagle "work against nature" when it kills it's prey for food?

There is most often than not some destruction involved in the process of creation. I agree with you that we should try to minimize the environmental cost of our living. But instead of rejecting the technological and technical progress, maybe we should try and push it in the good direction?

We are all using the products of our era. Aren't you using a computer right now? So instead of being ashamed (wish isn't productive at all if you want to transform society), maybe we should focus on how we can change our production methods that are overly destructive, and our over-consumption.

I'm pretty sure renting an appartment in a city and living as simply as possible isn't overly destructive in itself.

I lived in a city for 6 months. A cool city too, as far as american cities go. Portland Oregon. It still bothered me a bit. Mankind alters the environment he lives in to a much more signifigant extent than a beaver.

I'm really into things built with natural materials.


VOC's, co2 emmssions and just plain ugliness is what you get when you build with manufactured products.

Harmony with the surroundings, clean air and clean water and aesthetiuc beauty are what you get when you build with adobe, rustic logs, natural stone, ect.


This stuff permeates our lives and effects us on subtle levels. A book shelf made by hand from branches and logs collected in the forest will add warmth and peacefullness to your living room in a way that ikea cannot.

Sure, it is natural for humans to build stuff. I know this because I am a human and also a builder. I once built with typical bullshit. That's what everyone else was doing, that's the world I found myself in, I had bills to pay so I just went to work.

Being a free man and a thinking, feeling person...I couldn't help but notice: adobe looks and feels right. Houses buiult from "ticky tacky" feel wrong. Same with furniture, same with everything. I no longer build with manufactured garbage. No polymers, no acrylics, no pressure treated this, no vinyl that, no VOC-laden paint--no cheap mass produced petroleum derived disposable nonsense. Petrol came around and made everything quicker and easier (or so it seemed at first). Look around you. Quicker is not better. Quicker is cheaper. Easier in the short run.


Answering the original question: The way I deal is By doing what I can to make things better. As I said, I make stuff out of natural stuff. My advice to you is to get some house plants, maybe build or buy something earthy and hand made. Put a better vibe into your personal living space. Also find a way to improove the problem which your percieve in the world. Perhaps you already have...in that case, keep at it and be of good heart.

-It sure ain't Destructive, Chaotic, and if that's how you are living then that's ok in my book



-Some good point's Bedazzle, and thanks for the positive tips, although i don't feel i need them, thanks anyhow.

The band-aid suggestion: get some plants! This usually helps me, if I'm living somewhere without them and start feeling hemmed in by the man-made world. I also get very claustrophobic sometimes, I know exactly what you're talking about.

Now, think you can help change the place you live into a better one? I bet you can. I bet you can get out there and make some of those little changes that start the whole process, talk to a few people, and watch it all unfold. Try getting out into your environment, but on your own terms, and changing it into something you want it to be!

Not to jump into this debate, or even take sides overly as I do find humans and our cities natural... just not very healthy or pristine for the most part. After all, pools of sulphuric acid and poison gas jets are natural for some locations... you just wouldn't want to try and live on top of them.

I feel best in places of immense natural beauty, but I certainly don't want all the 7 billion people in the world trying to join me in them.

However, your comments above, Laban, need a bit of addressing IMO.

Everything you have said in the quote there is opinion... or a willful twisting of facts. No offense, but a statement like this needs a disclaimer. The Nexus frowns upon the stating of opinions and uprovable conjecture as fact. Try phrasing this as "in my opinion," perhaps.

I will explain what I mean.

Compared to their basic lifespans, plenty of animals live rather long lives. A human, capable of at least 120 years, living into their 60s is not any better than the similar statistics for most animals. There are countries with life expectancies as low as 40... and city dwellers are not at the top of any life expectancy list. Even fruit flies tend to live out a fairly significant portion of their biological lifespans.

Nasty and brutish are subjective judgments, and they could go equally well against humans. After all, no animal is more perverse and cruel... if only because other animals don't have such concepts, and can therefore not be sadistic.

How can you say for sure that their desires are programmed? If you had any number of pets growing up you would probably know that animals are individuals and very unique in their likes and dislikes even within a single species, subspecies, or breed.

The idea that 'animals achieve nothing and do not better the world' is another extremely subjective idea with no empirical evidence to support it. On the contrary, even from your anthropocentric viewpoint, we must recognize our extreme dependence upon animals. Without bees, bats, butterflies, and hummingbirds... we would all starve to death. Also, who can put a value on the aesthetic beauty of a soaring hawk or a deer in the woods? Since this post is about nature in general, we must also take into account the plants... without which we would perish instantly.

The plants and animals not only have enabled everything we as humans have ever accomplished or ever will accomplish... but they have created (and continue to co-create) the most marvelous and magnificent thing we humans know of... something we can not replicate or come close to creating without them... our precious, bio-diverse Earth.

They also have often inspired humanity to create the things you seem to value. Perhaps, if you went and spent a few days somewhere like Yosemite or Yellowstone... you might be inspired to pen an ode, or compose a sonnet, and, thus, join the ranks of the multitude of people who nature has inspired to further human achievement.

We are not separate from nature. You mention the social contract... well, the natural one supersedes it in every way.

IMHO, anyway.

-Thank you Hyperspace, for "enlightening" the poor chap!



-I do get Plants, thanks, foreskin. And i also enjoy eating them! . When i can i get out and about into the nature, i am lucky to live in a mostly natural environment out of town. It doesn't need changing it's fine as it already is. Thanks for the tips.

Beautifully said hyperspace fool.

I have grown up in the city all the way up till 15 years of age and then me and my family moved to the middle of nowhere (population 5,000) I wasn't happy about moving I didn't have too many friends and I stayed inside quite often but I was very upset that I wouldn't see the few close ones I did have none-the less. I lived in the middle of nowhere surrounded by tress the closest city is 1 hour and 1/2 drive, I thought to my self it wasn't a big deal since I like the inside more. 5 years later I find money and a way to move out of this middle of no where "I'm sick of the forest I said", "There is nothing here but water, and trees, its all nice and dandy to get away from it all but really every day...its the same thing".

Anyways I move to the city for a whole year(I am around 18 or 19 years old), I was really excited to finally to get to go and do shit go talk to people again find some friends I could relate to it involved a lot of good and bad personal experiences, generally the day consisted of superficial nonsensical drama, an almost infinite rainbow of social cues that concluded with more drama from lack of communication from all groups of personality types(he-said she-said domino effect..) and there was some fun times were I learned a lot of the reasoning behind all this and some other good times that aren't appropriate for inter webs(A gentlemen never tells ).

I can see that a majority of the people that live in the city are pretty content with how they are living and that makes it natural for them, but getting a personal taste of how humans have lived before building non-biodegradable living quarters and synthetics of just about everything, I feel as though the human race has jumped too far with out allowing the body to integrate with everything. I guess what I mean is we went from living in tee-pees to all of a sudden living in synthetics in just ~100 years. My 5 cents on the matter

Oh yeah and now i live in the forest again and I just smirk when others are just dying to get out of there "more forest for me!"

Each to their own. But i do think that the hours that some people spend commuting to work and back simply to "earn a living" are questionable , as are stressful jobs with no satisfaction or meaning. Sometimes city people must wonder why they are stressing about trivial issues that are meaningless when surrounded by nature. In fact city stress is in the city, it doesn't exist in nature.

Consumerism, celebrities, propoganda , all junk that feeds the stress filled lives of city people. Who needs celebrities and all that crap in nature... give me an apple and a blue sky anyday.

This modern world makes me very anxious and fearful , I long to live a simple life more in touch with nature but as you have said I am spoiled and adapting to such a change would be quite a challenge albeit a worthwhile one I think because I can confidently say that I am not a happy person living the lifestyle I live now and being in the enviroment I am in.