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Micromovies - noticing the elm
Earth Day message
is this site Buddhist?

using your own two feet 

Not so Fast
from the WSJ

Essays

appreciating time

voluntary restraint

the real
No Impact Man

you are as you drive

TV: the unhappiness machine

start with silence

diminishing returns

bicycle

 

Instead of taking a car, take a cart. By walking you observe one of the rules of life at 12 miles an hour: to voluntarily reduce convenience and increase effort. Of course, you save money and improve your health and enjoy the walk at the same time. It's proof that you can improve your life by making it "harder".

Notice the wooden dowel rod handle extension, a homemade improvement that can't be bought and required time to make. Building it slowed me down, a good thing in itself, and gave me a sense of accomplishment, simple though the task might be.

 

 

If you live in a northern climate, why stop riding a bicycle in winter? The plows are out in most places so you have clear pavement shortly after a storm. Too cold? With all of the warm down jackets that are available modern man is better insulated from the cold than any Inuit above the arctic circle. If anything you will be too hot. Since everyone already has warm clothing just to rush from the front door to the car, why not put it to good use?

Again, it takes more effort and it takes more time but that's the idea.

(the sign says: Man is born free, but everywhere he is in cars)


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  last site update: September 7, 2009