Thoreau's rebellion

We define happiness in so many empty ways.  We see our success and self-worth in the goals we set for promotions, cars, homes, stuff.  Do we do this to fill the emptiness of our soul... to drown out the silence and the self we cannot stand?

A few months ago I was on the back of a motorbike in Thailand, wind whipping through my hair, my small chores accomplished for the day, not a care in the world and an odd feeling of immense pleasure and fulfillment washed over me for no particular reason.  And then back in the city its over and one wonders how to go back to bliss and being in love with life.  How can you be in love with something which is not human but feels just as good?

We ask the wrong questions.  We ask How can I get this?  How can I get that?  We can ask Why do I want this?  What do I want that?  Joseph Campbell said it's not the meaning of life we are looking for but an experience of being alive.

I would challenge anyone to throw their TV's away, spend time away from computers, smartphones, and go live in a developing country or the wilderness for a while.  Modern humans are inundated with hypnotic messages of clever marketers penetrating their minds and planting seeds of inadequacy, dependency, hopelessness.