Slow Living?
A new idea to help sort out today's challenges.
1. Stress is killing us
This was the conclusion of a long read from the Washington Post. It went into detail about the various stressors of modern life and the effect that has on our cortisol levels (not good) and what that leads to.
2. We are burned out and dying younger
That is some harsh medicine but this is how life for many Americans has evolved over the last however many years. We have evolved to stay inside, playing video games, eating poorly, not exercising, not getting enough sun while our stress has increased leading to our lifespans decreasing.
3. What to do about stress
The WaPo piece talked about things like stress from finances (no savings, living paycheck to paycheck) and other stressors that go with living hard lives as some people do. I was going to make a list about how to address stress, I've probably done that before but there are many people for whom "spend less than you make" simply will not work which was the tone of the WaPo article.
4. Solve our own problems
I am big on this point and while I realize the idea is totally foreign to a lot of people, we all have our own unique circumstances our own unique combination of stressors so who knows our circumstances better than us? That makes us the best resource to start, I say start, trying to solve our problems.
5. Something new
I read another article, more of a blog post, about slow living. Read the link below but my take on this is to do more things where you can be disconnected from the last 10 or 15 years. So not churning butter like Amish necessarily but things that allow you to disconnect from your phone and/or laptop and do simpler things.
6. Examples
For me this would include walking my dogs/hiking, shoveling or plowing snow, digging a fire line on an incident, weightlifting, something to do with firewood, doing yard work; simple tasks that might involve hard work but don't have to.
My wife makes her own tortillas, giving the dogs baths would fit the bill too I believe. Reading an actual book, you get the idea.
7. Mindful or Intentional Living
These words are included the above linked article. Candidly, I find them to empty words but that might be a me problem, if those words resonate then you could think of slow living in that context.
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