Joined: Oct 15, 2004 Posts: 224 Location: Illinois, USA
Posted: Tue Oct 19, 2004 10:09 pm Post subject: Being happy and having fun without oil...
A lot of people here are so dull-damn-minded, that a major conscern among certain technophilic people who believe that society will collapse is that they think their fun and happiness have to go away with their high-energy lifestyles. Here's some rather surprising news for such people: Fun and happiness actually existed before electricity and television! Amazing!
I know this is hard to take in all at once, but one can actually be happy and have fun without owning lots of pretty things or using enough electricity to run a third world country. But how? Let's fill this thread with all kinds of ideas of how to be happy and have fun post-peak for our less-creative friends.
I'll start! Things which can bring happiness include:
--simple physical pleasures, like eating, drinking, sleeping, sex, etc.
--having fun (to be elaborated on)
--a good sense of self-worth, dignity, pride, etc.
--friendship and love; being held in high esteem by others
--fulfilling goals via Theodore Kaczynski's power process (I know discussing Kaczysnki--an anti-industrial terrorist--is something of a taboo; but he has good ideas, and this is one of them)
--improving oneself (by challenging oneself with exercise, learning, exploration, and experimentation; these are also fun, too!)
--being independent, and expressing one's own creative ideas
And, things which are fun include:
--playing games with friends
--challenging oneself with exercise, learning, exploration, and experimentation
--martial arts
--doing something risky (fighting, doing unfamiliar things, doing something unique or new, gambling (I personally don't like it, but it's something), etc.)
Notice that, regarding all the points I listed above, there are all kinds of ways to do them, both high-tech and low-tech. Many of them, however, can be easily fulfilled without massive energy consumption. Anybody else got good ideas?
Joined: Jul 07, 2004 Posts: 434 Location: Berkeley CA
Posted: Tue Oct 19, 2004 11:41 pm Post subject:
Well there is always chemical induced pleasure. Many traditional cultures in South America used Ayahuasca. Many other traditional cultures from many parts of the world use chemicals to induce changes in consciousness. _________________ my page:
www.myspace.com/peakoil
Joined: Oct 04, 2004 Posts: 5431 Location: Oklahoma
Posted: Tue Oct 19, 2004 11:43 pm Post subject:
This is why I am hanging on to the musical instruments we own, and acquiring a few new ones! We need to be able to have music in our lives. Music and the other arts will hopefully take on renewed significance if technology and the economy slow down.
Joined: Aug 18, 2004 Posts: 694 Location: SF Bay Area, Calif
Posted: Wed Oct 20, 2004 1:20 am Post subject: post-peak fun
We seem to be on the same wavelength, arocoun. The end of cheap oil doesn't mean the end of fun.
I predict that after peak oil, not only will the incidence of obesity and heart attacks go down, but people will gain about 15 IQ points as TV and movies occupy less of our time.
I love to read the biographies of the 18th and 19th century men of letters (women too). They make us look like ignorant pygmies. The philosopher Voltaire studied higher mathematics for fun in his old age. Marx took time off from his political activism and economics to read the plays of the ancient Greeks (in Greek of course) and the novels of Balzac (in French). He also knew English, Russian, and probably several other languages.
Rosa Luxemburg, besides writing and speaking several languages, learned to identify the local flowers. That inspired me to go on plant walks, buy ID books, and try eating wild edible plants.
Realizing that many of the people I admired knew several languages, I launched myself into a study of French, Spanish, and Italian. That was one of the most satisfying periods of my life ... getting to know the history and culture of other peoples. I got partway into Russian, Greek, and Latin before I ran out of steam. I'd love to go back to them someday.
A friend at work used to get lists of "the 100 best novels" and the list of Hugo Award winners (for science fiction), and then read his way through them, one after another.
My wife sometimes has trouble going to sleep, so I started reading to her at night. It became a routine we both looked forward to. The experience is so different from regular reading. You pay much more attention to the words and images, and find yourself deeply immersed in the world of the novel. We started out with short stories, moved on to a couple of Kurt Vonnegut novels, then hit our stride with the Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, and War and Peace.
If you are in a congenial group, it can be fun to read a play aloud, each person taking a role. Watching live theater is much more involving than watching a movie.
One can give oneself an education that's better than what most students get in graduate school by buying a few hundred dollars worth of used paperbacks. That plus the Internet, and you'll never be bored.
So many things are possible if one is not addicted to TV.
What things do other people do that don't require a trip to the shopping mall?
I dug up my old MSX computer a while back to play some of the games I used to play as a kid. They were not so nice anymore (except for rollerball). The games were slow and the graphics were horrible. Our sense of fun evolves and you can't turn back.
You talk about the 18th and 17th century. This was a great time indeed. But why was that? In my opinion it was because the church was loosing control. The church was a very conservative force blocking progress.
When the influence of the church was fading people found suddenly found themselves in a position where they could pursue their dreams and idea's. This was what was so great about this era. Thousands of people started experimenting. Some like Voltaire and Diderot experimented on paper. Others tried to build airplanes, steam engines etc. People started exploring the world, finding new races, new animals etc.
It is the amount of progress that was made in that period which made it so great. The coming period will be exactly the opposite. We will have to say goodbye to a lot of things.
If you want to compare the coming period to an era in history, you better take the middle ages. After the Roman empire collapsed many things were lost. Simple things like concrete, sewers, public baths, glass etc. Just like we are about to loose some aspects of our civilization.
And the middle ages were definitely less fun than the the Roman empire at its height. They don't call it the 'dark' middle ages for nothing. I don't want to live there, and you probably wouldn't either.
Joined: Oct 04, 2004 Posts: 243 Location: the Village
Posted: Wed Oct 20, 2004 5:52 am Post subject: don't need it ; will have it tho'
The future is mycelial tents in the deserts, solar powered arcades.......the shamans know it, the little guys knows it, God knows it, the Earth knows it, the future is nomadness, the future is knowing we never need to lose anything and death is nowhere near the end of anything anyway, so it's barking up the wrong tree thinking that even if there is a wipeout that somehow your soul won't exist anymore.
Plenty of people in the UK don't bother much with electricity at all now, and as is said above - the whole boredom factor just doesn't exist when drugs are not illegal or are availible ; the media is a mere substitute for psychedelics, always has been trying to mimic their effect. Mass comminication? telepathy, planetary mind. Bored? try psilocybin, break a communion wafer.
Joined: Jul 09, 2004 Posts: 71 Location: Sunny San Diego
Posted: Wed Oct 20, 2004 6:24 am Post subject:
Duff B. writes <<>> Let's fill this thread with all kinds of ideas of how to be happy and have fun post-peak for our less-creative friends. <<>>
I'll be able to see the stars at night. That ONE thing will make my heart sing with more joy than I can possibly express in this forum. I hope to pass along the arts of astronomy and astrology to the children. It will be called...astromonology. A post peak science
No TV, no worries. Unplugged the hypno box a few months ago. What a difference it makes.
Learning to cook from scratch. I'm collecting information on solar cooking and baking. Here in Ca, I hope to use corn as a staple. I hope to be able to grow enough corn to barter corn tortillas, bread, muffins (etc) with the neighbors.
Frankly, I think if the crash happens in my lifetime and it's not a catostrophic event, life will be FAR more fulfilling than it is now.
Joined: Oct 04, 2004 Posts: 5431 Location: Oklahoma
Posted: Wed Oct 20, 2004 10:55 am Post subject:
Wholeheartedly agree with TripleGemini about the stars. Our telescope is another thing we are trying to hang onto. Along with a bunch of astronomy, and other scientific, books.
Joined: Oct 19, 2004 Posts: 108 Location: Carlisle, PA
Posted: Wed Oct 20, 2004 1:59 pm Post subject:
We moved to the country a couple years ago and have yet to be bored, except maybe a bit in winter when we spend way too much time online.
Chickens are both more entertaining and stupider than television.
Seeing the stars at night is a biggie.
Having a bonfire. Hubby finds burning trash fun too, but I just like the bonfire thing.
One that surprises me is how much fun guns are. Target shooting is itself fun, but shooting up an old broken VCR that pissed you off is *really* fun.
Sitting on the porch with a drink and having long conversations with my husband is fun. His brain is a very cool toy.
Other things are fun with him too as his body is a neat toy too.
So much of our entertainment is wrapped up in "work" though. Work and recreation are no longer separate things. Trying a new recipe is both. Walking the nearby fields to scout for deer paths prior to hunting season is both. Building an outbuilding or other useful contraption out of scraps is both. Digging potatoes, while surrounded by bazillions of unidentifiable crawling things is fun too - you forget the "creepiness" pretty fast and it's a combination of an easter egg hunt and playing in mud. Pretty much all gardening is fun too.
I love the country... can't believe I wasted four decades of my life in the city.
You cannot post new topics in this forum You cannot reply to topics in this forum You cannot edit your posts in this forum You cannot delete your posts in this forum You cannot vote in polls in this forum
News
Discussions
Resources
Members
Forum FAQ
Search
Usergroups
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
