Guest Blog: Livin On ‘Island Time’

(Today’s post was written by my very own brother. Rock climber, Obama-lover, Zen master, extraordinaire.)

Anyone one who has traveled to a warm tropical destination for vacation knows the experience of dealing with the difference between the North American pace of life and well… theirs (Mexican, Caribbean, Spanish, or Thai.) They live their life for different reasons than ours.

We are driven to succeed, over-worked and over-caffeinated; and it takes us a few days to wind down to a pace of life dictated by: what SPF do I use? Is it safe to have ice cubes? Do I want to play tennis, or float in the pool like Dustin Hoffman from the Graduate?

Once we have acclimated to the altitude– no… attitude. We all wonder why it is we can’t bottle it, put it in our ‘carry-on’ bags, and take a swig whenever needed. Because when you actually think about it, that’s how humans are intended to live.

The Duck will tell you, being an Anthropology Master’s Graduate, 2 million years of evolution cannot be undone by an industrial revolution, the automobile, and Starbucks Ventis. The modern experience is the extreme outlier, not our vacation. Our vacation is a return to what ‘human’ actually should be, the bare essentials.

Human beings are not wired for 85 years of worry about our 401k, or EMFs 3 inches from our skulls from our new I-phone. We are wired to eat, sleep, be with our families, and worry about nothing more than the weather or infection. We’ve created so much more to our lives than we need. More, and more, and more. Visit a Wallmart in Houston and you know it. It is not natural. It is not human.

So how do we bottle it? Inject a little human experience every day?

The f*ck if I know. I’d sell it the Whole Food, if I did, and retire. Now.

A little reggae in the iTunes works for a few days. But throw in a little CNN, road rage, and dumb girls with little dogs and big sunglasses, and I am shot. Blood pressure up, and in need of some massage therapy. Don’t even get me started on douche bags like Bill O’Reilly or Sean Hannity. I’d never stop fuming.

I guess that’s why have our escapes. Some people it is drugs. Some alcohol. Some exercise. Some escapes are bad for us, some are good. But they are all a sort of psychological SPF to protect our soul from the blinding glare of insanity from our consumer-based economy. I,myself, am a rock climber. I am one of those lunatics hanging on by his fingers up-side-down from sheer cliffs, courting disaster.

“Why” do you ask?

Because the sheer effort, mental and physical, required leaves you with nothing left. Yes, the danger is subjective, ie. not real, but imagined, due to the ropes. But our lizard brain reacts to perceived threats in an irrational manner, raising alarm bells of impending doom. Our rational mind must override all those sirens saying “NO” to make progress. The force of will to suppress that natural response leaves us drained of energy. Stripped down & simplified.

Our interior monologue is similar to turning the TV to Channel 83, static white noise. Like a soul fresh back from vacation. Yoga works, too. Cycling. But they are all better than drugs and alcohol at achieving the same effect. Quiet.

I could go on about that, but some other time.

Gotta run. I am in need of some Reggae.

Oh one shameless plug!: “The Story of Stuff”. Amazing and explains it all.