The Lifestyle of Simplicity in Food and Human Nature

By August 7, 2015 November 9th, 2015 Blog
Lifestyle of Simplicity in Food and Human Nature

This is an introduction to a series of bog posts I have been planning. I’m calling it: What We Have Forgotten: The Lifestyle of Simplicity in Food and Human Nature

In today’s world, with our thirst for entertainment, and a desire to while away the time, we depend on popular culture  and consumerism, which leaves us restless and longing for something better and more meaningful in our lives.

We are in a hurry, and few of us live in the moment. We are not happy. Therefore the pace of our lives depends on the future, and not the present. Consumerism has fed that hunger, and the happiness it provides is fleeting, gone within hours, after being enveloped yet again with more wants.

But long ago, things were different. We lived a simple life. The simple life that those of us who always find themselves in jumble and confusion, yearn for most of all.

We lived fully in the moment. Only when we were desperate did we want more, and savoring the tastes of life was what we lived for.

Then, it ended. The peak of simple happiness began to rapidly decline. We don’t know exactly when it ended; probably around the Industrial Revolution.  

And with the Industrial Revolution we have lost what kept our simple in-the-moment lives at a stable pace. Seasons. The awareness that soon, the apples would be ripening. That the mulberries and blackberries were ready to pick and preserve, and that your fingers were stained red and purple.

The Industrial Revolution brought factory life. As people were forced into poor working conditions, inside large rooms with no windows, they lost track of the outside world around them.

Better transportation and refrigeration led to the shipping of produce from different hemispheres. The apples that we had once waited for through July and into August became available in February.

We didn’t get the anticipation of the crispy fruits when we could get them any time. They lost their appeal, as the shipped apples had only half as much delectability.

August and September became any normal month, in that now any month you could eat apples.

With the Industrial Revolution consumerism began to take over. We fed on want for this, and want for that, and nothing has changed since then. In the factories, everything can be mass produced. For example, a factory is mass producing and making tons of money, and a child wants a doll from that company. Another child will have the doll, and so it is wanted more. The child can now get the same exact doll, and the doll that was made for her by her mother has lost its value–the doll that her mother sewed in the heart of winter when the canning was over. Consumerism is what takes over. We no longer feel the belonging to Earth as an animal. We don’t notice the fresh smell of a sunny winter morning.

The seasons are something that we forgot in the past century or so. The week in which the figs are the ripest is no longer known to us, and it is like a disappearing language that is slowly fading.

I would like to introduce you to a four-part series on this loss, taking us through all four seasons, and finding a new way to remember what we have lost, and bring back the vibe of the simple country life that we have forgotten.

For each season I will explore the ways of living, and bring a taste of them back to life.

Let’s relive and savor the meaning of a healthy lifestyle, and a fork with a good place to go.

Lillian Black is a writer and political blogger, and helps on her family’s farm in Petaluma. She raises her own flock of chickens, and writes about them too. She loves cats and is being homeschooled.

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