This post is refusing to come through. I have made no less than three attempts to bring it into existence, yet it is resisting my every effort.
Perhaps its reflecting the blockage I feel in creativity when I put lots of my focus into work. It feels that way. My thoughts have been very occupied with work and not so free to consider this newsletter, it must be making an impact.
And it’s not like I don’t have plenty to say. So, I will go down this rabbit-hole that came to my awareness for the millionth time yesterday and see where it leads.
Why our obsession with medicine is killing us all
I went to the doctor for a blood test yesterday. Standard check-up, nothing to raise alarm for.
Except every single blood test should be raising alarm.
Plastic syringe cap: removed and thrown into the bin. 3 plastic syringe tubes: filled with blood, to later be disposed of. Single use gloves: bin. Case for disinfectant swab: bin. Sticky tape securing gauze: bin. I could go on and on.
And I will. But this time pointing at our more recent obsession of covid. Your average person (whether wilful or otherwise) took two hits, plus however many tests they needed to take. Plus, masks in plastic packaging (all individually sealed).
Not to mention bottle after plastic bottle of disinfectant sold to ‘stop the spread’.
And look, I get it. Nobody wants to die, and if it’s possible to save a life or two, why not.
But the people in the future probably aren’t too keen about dying either. Suppose all the people saying that covid is going to kill us all are the exact same people saying that our environmental disaster is going to kill all the people of the future. In that case, I wonder if that isn’t a little bit hypocritical?
This is what I feel every time I go to the doctor’s office. In an effort to preserve the individual lives of all the people living and breathing today, we are apparently putting at jeopardy the individual lives of all the people not yet living and breathing.
If I was a ‘shock-jock’, I’d refer to them as CHILDREN OF THE FUTURE, but you’re here because I’m better than that. (Or am I?)
The age of medicine (or perhaps we’re in the age of science) seems to be piggy backing on, and heavily promoting, the age of fear. And it is SO fucking boring.
Instead of taking risks, making bold decisions, and living full (even if they’re shorter) lives, we’re sitting in retirement homes until we’re 90 glued to a television set, sustained by as many pills as our liver can handle before tapping out from a cancer.
But you know who’s not doing that? Tech bros and all the other billionaires. This is a tremendous problem. Because these guys are taking risks and making bold decisions, they’re shaping the future in all the ways we probably don’t want it to be shaped!
What can you do to take medicine into your own hands?
Get off the internet, for the love of God.
Stop reading this email, I don’t care if it hurts my open-rate or impacts my click-throughs. If the sun is shining and you could be looking at a tree, or at the sky, and instead you’re mindlessly passing a combination of 1s and 0s over your eye, you’re priming yourself for that retirement home TV.
Stop eating shitty food with no nutritional value, and ‘supplementing’ all the deficiencies with more pills and powders. (Sidenote: not a doctor. If you need supplements for some reason, do your thing. But I’m looking at all the trend-juicers and whatnot with this line – you know who you are)
Stop spending any time on social media. Honestly, create a 3-month plan where you decrease by a couple of minutes every day, until you hit zero. When you hit zero, and you have the mental freedom to check it every so often, have fun. Do your thing. There is definitely a social aspect to it, but goddamn that social aspect is BURIED beneath manipulative programming intended to KEEP YOU ENGAGED.
Which, ironically, is the most disconnected you can be.
“But Nick, you’re telling me that anywhere between 2 and 7 hours of my day are not being spent well. What on earth should I do instead?”
Great question, I’m so happy you asked. Here’s a couple of outrageous, crazy ideas:
· Move your body. That can be going for a walk, it can be doing sport. Whatever. But your body wants to move
· Spend time with friends and/or family. Don’t have any? Well, now you see the cost of the internet. Go find some. Don’t know how? See the next point
· Take up a hobby in a group. Dancing, mixed martial arts, group painting, cooking courses, Internetholics Anonymous (probably not yet a thing but I will bet the farm on it being a thing before this decade is out). Spend some time out of the digital arena with actual people
· Read a book or write your own. With every hour I spend on the internet, I find myself more and more interested in what I can consume. With every hour I spend reading and writing, I find myself more interested in what I can create. Of course, life needs both, but we are totally hooked in the wrong direction at the moment
· Move your body. Yes, I’ll say it twice. You aren’t moving enough unless your daily job involves physical labour, or you are already serious about your health and fitness.
If you don’t have time for any of these things, I salute you. It means that you must spend almost no time on the internet because you’re too busy providing for yourself and your family or sharing time with other loved ones. Congratulations.
But if you say you don’t have time for any of these things, and your phone battery is ending below 80% despite the fact that you charge it every single night, you have time for some of these things.
And the time you save today will be time away from the retirement home TV.
Is any of this backed by science?
If you need common sense to be backed by science, you’ve lost the ability to think for yourself and my emails probably aren’t landing in your inbox.
I don’t need a double-blind trial in controlled conditions to tell me that excessive computer usage is bad for me, my eyes, wrists, forearms and hamstrings tell it to me all the time. Tune in to your body, I suspect you’re getting the same message.
Do I need a study to show me that I feel good when I spend time with friends and family? Hell no. We are just as addicted to science as we are to social media, and it is probably just as much to our detriment.
The ancients, although they didn’t all live to 90 and get to watch daytime TV for 15 years of their lives, were still alive. They still had full lives. They lived until they died. The time between those two points wasn’t decades, and that is something we should do well to remember and see as a positive.
I’d rather tap out at 70 because my body has called it, than be artificially sustained until 90 and have to watch shitty soap operas as some poor person cleans me (with single-use products all over the place). The idea of long life isn’t all it’s cracked up to be unless it’s a HEALTHY long life.
Ah, I knew there was some juice in here. I had to lean into the ‘Lets rip’ part of the title and give you all a good finger-wagging lecture.
That’s it, I’m done. Time to do some of those things on the list above. I hope you find the same time in your days, and as many of them as possible, and for as long as possible.
Because if we are killing the children of the future just to sit in front of a TV watching garbage, we deserve to be abandoned by the youth in our old age.
See the cycle? Let’s be better.
Until the next time – hopefully on happier themes 😊
Much love
Nick