It is impossible to gather food for yourself. We don’t live in pre-civilization or even the wild west. Everything is owned by someone, regulated, etc.
How do you expect to feed yourself? Not like you can just gather all day and get lucky hunting.
It is objectively harder to ‘live on the land’ then it was centuries ago. Borderline impossible, especially if you want to… you know live and interact with people.
I have a wife and cat to look out for, hard to do that when I can’t pay rent.
Antibiotics
Indoor plumbing. Seriously. Go without for a couple of weeks and tell me how you feel about hot showers and flush toilets.
Also, people really underestimate how difficult it would be to just fuck off into the woods. You’d need a good amount of planning and knowledge to do it. What’s edible within what time range. Where the animals are at what time of year. And if you’re up north you always gotta be laying in firewood.
Also civilization has taken over most of the good hunter gatherer/ subsistence farming spots. River valleys, estuaries, anywhere with good fertile soil. Most of the places with good desolate wilderness to fuck off into was left desolate because it’s fucking desolate.
If you want to see what it’s like to live without modern conveniences, go to a really poor country and observe the lower-class civilians. Having been to Honduras where poor people live in the mountains (with amazing vistas) with dirt floor huts and no clean drinking water, I can tell you that it is a terrible existence. Half their children die before they make it to 10, because of parasites from the dirt which get in their feet, and contaminated water that they have to hike down and up the mountain for every day. I feel like everyone should see this at some point to reset their perspective.
I had enough with where this society is going and I no longer want to be part of it. But I like:
- fine spirits
- good food
- cooking nice steaks
- eating in restaurants
- drinking in bars
- traveling to places that are exotic or interesting to me
- traveling to places where it’s just nice to wind down
- swimming in tropical waters
- hiking snowy mountains
- driving
- listening to hi fi music
- reading books
- doing video calls with friends and family
- being able to follow my curiosity and learning new things
- playing video games
- being able to take my dog to the vet
- providing my kid with good education
- keeping my kid safe from injuries and diseases
- seeing a doctor when I get sick
- access to a dentist, a pediatrician, a barber, an ER when necessary
- taking a shower
- hot tubs
- having a washing machine, a dishwasher and a refrigerator in my house
- having heating and air conditioning
And probably a bunch more stuff because of which, while I truly enjoy being in nature, I keep choosing living in a city and going to work instead. The common thing with all these items that you need money for each. The only ethical way I know of for making money is working hard and building a career relentlessly for decades. if you’re lucky. There are no guarantees.
I’m not sure if it’s worth it, but I do know for sure I couldn’t give all of the above up, as long as I have a choice.
I nearly did, but didn’t for two main reasons:
-
Women. I’m not a monk, and it’s really hard to find a woman who wants to live in the woods, especially when you live in the woods.
-
Empathy for the rest of humanity. Can’t make the world a better place from the woods.
-
I’m in the woods right now, waiting for you to come help cut firewood and get next year’s garlic and potatoes in. December-Febuary I’m gonna go be homeless somewhere warmer though. For real, if you want a taste of woods life and are able to pitch in hmu. “Other people” are kinda the main thing missing from the equation atm
The only woods where I could do that in my country are part of the Amazon , and the uncontacted tribes living there are not exactly friendly
Mostly getting shit delivered. My current ideal spot is far enough outside town that I’m still able to get pizza delivered and have good internet… but not deal with JW’s.
Jehovah’s Witnesses?
Lack of survival skills
My guy. That was the precise thing most of our ancestors struggled their whole lives to get out of.
Chronic medical conditions that require medication.
I’ve done it, it’s okay. I’m back in the civilized world now. More than anything, it’s lonely out there.
…money
It’s not as easy as Stardew Valley makes it seem like.
