Home » Posts tagged 'conveniences'

Tag Archives: conveniences

Olduvai
Click on image to purchase

Olduvai III: Catacylsm
Click on image to purchase

Post categories

Post Archives by Category

This and That Vol. 4–Mid Winter Musings

THIS AND THAT VOL 4 – MID WINTER MUSINGS

Probably the one topic Mrs. Cog and I return to more often than any other is our amazement how so many people who profess awareness and understanding of the coming chaos and hard times remain firmly rooted in their present situation. Despite acknowledging the runaway train barreling down the tracks directly towards them, they do little to nothing to get out of the way.

They know they are dependent upon a failing state for most, if not all, of their needs. Whether it is food, water, sewer, electricity, security, employment, whatever area we wish to examine, they remain tragically dependent upon a failing state to ‘not fail’ in order to continue to provide what the failing state soon will be unable to supply.

The thing is, there is no particular reason we can point towards as the reason for remaining shipwrecked and locked in the winter ice, slowly crushed by the ever thickening, shifting, grinding mass surrounding us.

This is not to say one can escape in totality from the insanity. There remains no ‘new world’ to travel to for a fresh start. Or at least none that is conveniently located within two miles of a grocery store, mall, movie theater, schools, Home Depot and Starbucks.

And therein is the rub and possible the central reason why people simply won’t get off the tracks. The railway we lay upon leads directly to all the conveniences so many of us take for granted that they are no longer wants, but bleeding needs.

We are so thoroughly entangled by and dependent upon our consumer culture that it is unthinkable to voluntarily withdraw from what we believe nurtures and sustain us. We are main-lining our own poison in every way imaginable and it’s killing us softly.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

How Modern Life Destroys Survival Instinct

How Modern Life Destroys Survival Instinct

Our world today would seem magical to our ancestors. Our needs are met almost immediately, we have clean water at the turn of a knob, heat at the push of a button, and light with the flip of a switch.  Food is purchased in a box, ready to heat, and a person can prepare a meal in under 6 minutes using the microwave oven that’s a fixture in most modern kitchens.

Our world is clean, convenient, and loaded with abundant resources, things that took significant time and effort to produce in days gone by.

But all of this convenience comes at a high price, one we don’t even realize exists until a situation arises in which the ready answers aren’t there, the food is not available, and the dial on the thermostat no longer has any effect at all.

Modern life destroys survival instinct. Most folks just buy the answers to all of their problems and they have lost the ability to think. Self-reliance is an act of epic rebellion against the status quo.

Quick solutions reduce problem-solving ability

Yesterday, I discovered I was out of oregano.

Normally, I’d hop in the car and go to the grocery store. I’d buy some oregano, some other interesting things that caught my eye, and grab a coffee on the way home to fight that mid-afternoon crash.

But, since I’m participating in the Once-a-Month Shopping Challenge, running to the store was not an option, and wouldn’t be for 3 more weeks.  Since the tomatoes I was processing wouldn’t last that long, I had to think about solutions – real solutions that did not involve running to the store.  (I substituted thyme and basil, by the way.)

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Tyranny of Convenience

The Tyranny of Convenience

Our lives are ridiculously convenient in this day and age, and much of the consumer economy seems to be directed at making life ‘easier’ still. It seems that the more convenient life becomes, the more need there is for more convenience. Anything is possible in this technological age and if it can’t be afforded, then convenient credit can make it happen. There is no reason to wait for anything.

Just like an addict, the modern convenience seeker is rarely aware of the damage that the need to feed the need is causing.

The pursuit of convenience is big business and over the last 60-75 years we have experienced a profound cultural shift towards disposable consumerism. We’ve been sold the idea that life must be easy, and that the mundane things in life are to be rushed or delegated so that more time is available for enjoying ourselves. For several generations now our culture has been programmed to place an overly high value on convenience, and the flip side of this is that we have grown to loathe inconvenience to such a degree that we now perceive even slight delays in the delivery of convenience as inconveniences.

Who has time for anything to go wrong in our world today?

Our addiction to this complex lifestyle, requiring ever-compounded convenience, is one of the subtlest and most addictive tyrannies of the modern age.

 

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Olduvai IV: Courage
Click on image to read excerpts

Olduvai II: Exodus
Click on image to purchase

Click on image to purchase @ FriesenPress