I had a comically bad day yesterday, like dropping things, almost lost my keys down the drain on the sidewalk, spilled soup at the store near a makeup section, almost tore my pants, got back from the store only to find out I was out of TP, etc.
It was more funny than anything else, like so much random trivial bad luck in one day is like something out of some 90s Tom Hanks comedy.
But there was one thing that actually annoyed me - on my way back from the store on my grocery trip, my phone suddenly went from a healthy 7% to 0% and died. I was stuck with no music for the remainder of the walk back.
Soooo I was forced to listen to the sound of well - nothing at all basically.
Just birds chirping, wind blowing, leaves rustling, all as I walked the same path I walk all the time and see the same things I’ve seen hundreds of times, just waiting to get home.
Don’t get me wrong I love where I live and everything, it’s a really cool city with good pedestrian infrastructure, I almost never even get close to a car and it’s not some smelly euro village either, but seeing the same things I’ve already seen and having no stimuli at all, it wasn’t that big a deal but it was unpleasant.
That got me thinking - I sometimes see folks not wearing earphones outside, and I’ve heard on more than one occasion from some acquaintances that they don’t listen to music outside, and I wonder - why’s that?
Why would you choose to do that?
And, what do y’all like, do, exactly? How do you deal with the monotony of your grocery trips or things like that when you don’t even have music on? Do you just never get bored of walking the same roads/neighborhoods w/e day after day?
I never listen to music. When I’m running errands, I listen to the birds and the wind. I watch the leaves change colors. I chat with people I know by sight. I stop by stores I don’t need anything from just to chat with the owners. I meet friends doing their shopping and we decide to go to see a play next weekend. I sit down at a terrasse to have coffee with my kid’s former piano teacher. Think the movie Amelie, but in small-town France instead of Paris. I love my life.
I actually pay attention to my environment? I don’t walk onto a busy road without looking?
Outside with other people is a dangerous place. Environmental awareness is needed. You’ll need your eyes and ears to sense danger.
Enjoy the world around me. Using the extra sensory input to avoid being run over by cars.
Is it really that bad in America? Like I lived in London where cars were plentiful as well but honestly I never had to worry about them, even when I crossed a red by accident or something like that they go so slowly that it was fairly easy to dodge them.
I look at and listen to what’s going on around me, and think about what I see and hear.
I think the question is best answered by reversing it. Why do you choose to listen to music?
Now don’t get me wrong I listen to a ton of stuff. I have an mp3 player for air travel and I listen to all kinds of things in my car and for my whole shift at a manufacturing job I used to have.
But out on the street, on a bike or on the trails I never have any music on. From a practical standpoint it’s simply safer to be aware of what’s going on, but that’s not the point for me.
I use that time to just let my mind wander and internalize info I learned that day or to look back on things that happened recently. That boredom is soon replaced with thoughts and daydreams and feelings and memories. And it’s nice to see my part of the world as it is, without any filter and seeing how places and people change day by day.
Same exactly for me. I listen to tons of music at work and at home on my own time. But never outside.
I don’t use a car, almost all of my travel is by walking. So I listen to music for the same reason you listen to anything in your car or at your job.
But for me it is also a way to forget about work and tune out the shit around me and focus my inner thoughts and inner life and also observe the world and get inspired.
Y’all must live some pretty unsafe places if you need to pay attention to your surroundings that much. My condolences.
I don’t listen to music in my car or at work, music is more of an active thing for me. I want to pay attention to it and sing along! If I’m focusing on something else, like driving, I just tune out the music anyways. I Sometimes I’ll get stoned and play the OoT soundtrack in the background while I draw, but that’s about it. I don’t even think I own headphones, unless I have some packed away with my old iPod nano. It’s pretty cool how we all experience the same world in such different ways, isn’t it?
Are you trolling us?
If not, try getting into meditation, so you can learn to appreciate the moment for what it is, rather than seek constant stimulation.
Technology is ruining humanity, no wonder so many people are lonely and depressed.
Da hell? I’m not lonely or depressed, are you nuts?
Carrying grocery bags to and from my flat isn’t “appreciating the moment”, I do this every other day, it’s just boring and routine so I throw some music on to keep it fun and so I can do something more proactive mentally rather than just stare off towards my feet or surroundings I literally always see anyway.
All I’m saying is it’s clearly a big issue for you not being constantly stimulated if you took the time to create a whole post about this and answer every other stranger’s comment. Meditation is just one of the options to address this issue, the best one IMO. You don’t have to be sad or depressed to practice meditation.
you took the time to create a whole post about this and answer every other stranger’s comment.
OP’s not here for an answer. They’re here for an argument. That’s why they’re replying to everyone to disagree.
Or maybe I just disagree with the insane amount of judgement and projection aimed at me in this thread for no fucking reason at all, after posting about something fairly common and uncontroversial, therefore I am replying with what I think.
Some of us are actually intellectually honest, we agree with the ideas we agree with and disagree with the ideas we disagree with, not everything is motivated by some animalistic desire for an argument like you seem to imply.
I’d much prefer to agree with likeminded folks or hear some well-reasoned perspectives but alas, I’m not going to agree with shit takes parroting LLM pop-psych influencer buzzword bullshit about muh stimulation muh technology in a condescending tone like I have a problem - when i never implied the opposite even though I easily could have done so and would have if I really wanted a fight - (and I would’ve made an art of it, too).
I will keep replying and stating my point and my case no matter how many cookie cutter morons yap about “meditation” or w/e else comes out their monkey-ass cranium.
I fundamentally don’t care about any of this, but I will keep replying because I want folks here scrolling by this thread - horrified by the behaviour of the commentariat swarm - wondering what they must have smoked that people parrot pop-psych bullshit about dopamine as if it were gospel and hold up their life in a Christian heaven/hell dichotomy like a 50s housewife all clued up on what’s the trendy oppressive shit to spew.
I want those folks to know that the hivemind is frail and weak and cannot stand the smallest challenge, challenge that I pose purely by existing and just saying the inoffensive and largely uncontroversial IRL things I think in a calm manner and that they are not alone in being reasonable and rational and normal people still exist out there in the world, I’m just sorry they have to read through the rest of this thought toilet of a comments section.
Thank you for proving my point.
I created this post on the toilet while I was taking a dump at work.
It’s a random thought that occurred to me. It’s not an issue and it’s not big and I don’t have an “issue” or any fucking “issues”, and it’s fucking insulting for you to insinuate anything of the sort.
Meditate on that you condescending prick.
You also might wanna work on your anger management.
Weird how you’re getting shit on for asking a question in “no stupid questions.” Fucking NT people acting high and mighty.
This reads like satire but I assume you’re being serious.
I’m not really doing anything instead. I’m listening in both cases - only the what I’m listening to changes. Listening to music - or podcasts in my case - is a bit of an distraction. I don’t want to be distracted all the time. I’m more present when I’m listening to the world instead, and it gives more space for my thoughts. I never even have the radio on in my car because to me, driving is almost a meditative experience and I like to just sit there in relative silence and focus on the driving itself. I’m stimulated one way or another for the vast majority of the day anyway. I think it’s good to have these intentional moments built into your daily routine where you let yourself be bored. It’s good for you.
That’s interesting, for me music helps me focus, otherwise I just end up endlessly distracted and completely away from the world.
Obviously I understand the point about boredom and am aware of it, only the most brainrotten people think boredom isnt good for you, but I am still bored when walking, out of all the senses, only my ears are occupied, almost everything else is kind of an autopilot, like in those studies where people who drive down the same roads for decades end up being dangerous because their brain is no longer actively processing their surroundings.
For me it’s more like music is a way to direct my thoughts or to set a tone for them. Maybe I’d like to think about something nostalgic, or something new, and music sets the tone and tunes out distractions in the world so I can stay cognitively engaged.
otherwise I just end up endlessly distracted and completely away from the world.
Can you dig more into what you mean by that? I assume you mean distracted by your thoughts, rather than the world itself.
No, distracted by the world, away from my thoughts on the world.
When I pick my music, I set a tone and vibe of the mental journey while my body autopilots to the store and back, then everything else - inner ambitions, dreams, ideas, thoughts, observations immediate and past etc. slots in.
Edit: downvoted for a literal description of my life lol.
Just birds chirping, wind blowing, leaves rustling
To me that just sounds kinda nice
I agree. This is exactly why I don’t wear headphones a lot of the time. So I can listen to those exact noises.
Sometimes I hang out on the porch just to listen to the not very loud noises of nature. Very relaxing.
I’m taking steps to stop myself consuming content constantly so I’ve stopped listening to podcasts when I’m out. If I’m on a long train or plane journey in the future I’ll probably bring my earphones along but only then. Now I just walk and think.
I play music in my mind.
Just birds chirping, wind blowing, leaves rustling, all as I walked the same path I walk all the time<
This would be one why I don’t wear headphones outside. Hearing the natural ambience of a space is rewarding.
The other personal reason is that I’m in front of a screen about 12 hours a day and crave those few hours of respite from being hooked up to technology.
Yeah, once, twice - sure. But you’d be insane to want to listen to largely the same sounds over and over on the same walk day after day. That’s peak brainrot tbh.
Even though I am listening to podcasts almost all the time I am outside, doing groceries, commuting, running errands, I can totally get that there are people whose brains are wired differently than mine that need what you might describe as auditory monotony because listening to familiar sounds in a familiar surrounding gives then safety and is easier on their brains.
I don’t find this surprising because most people need some degree of routines or rituals to function so I don’t see why this human tendency to reduce complexity (see: Niklas Luhmann) wouldn’t apply to what you’re listening or not listening to.
This doesn’t have to do anything with brain rot, just that brains work differently and need different stimuli.
Hey if the people ITT don’t owe me the benefit of the doubt for being ever so slightly different than their hyperonline idea of a person - so much so swarm downvotes at the very notion of someone just existing who’s basic experiences contradict their faulty assumptions about what’s what - then I don’t owe them that either.
Huh? I mean… I agree that a lot of people in this thread act surprisingly hostile to you but I wasn’t even referring to those people, just trying to give an answer to your question, that feels kinda underrepresented in this thread: We’re all wired differently and need different forms and levels of stimulus to function properly. 🤷
That much is obvious of course, though that’s not to say I don’t appreciate you saying so, frankly it’s like a breath of fresh air after spending time watching poop be flung by monkeys with a passion for it.
Their hostility is unsurprising to me.
As a trans person I get it all the time in the form of vile transphobia.
This isn’t the same of course, this is harmless, absurdly pointless type of discourse, but it stems from the same place ultimately.
All it takes to threaten the hivemind’s simulacrum and bring out the disciples of the distorted reality fed to the closeminded and the afraid by their holy algorithmic funnels is stating the most inoffensive things plainly as they are without mincing words, and voila - holy war.
It depends how much exposure to Tech you have and whether taking a break is important for you. For most people the exposure to constant stimulus is too much.
Phones and technology have essentially eliminated boredom from our lives, and I don’t think that’s a good thing.
Why would you choose to do that?
I’m easily distracted and am usually occupied with my own thoughts. So, not hearing traffic, other people, and my general surroundings is actually stressful for me; relying on vision alone would be dangerous. I do a lot better keeping my ears open so I can relax, muse about this or that in my head, and let any sudden sounds or irregularities in my environment catch my attention.
Edit: By musing, I’m actively problem-solving fix-it situations in my house, thinking about software projects I have going, exercising mindfulness for better mental heath, self-assessing where my body aches/hurts, building fictional narratives for D&D, and so on. It’s seldom idle time up in here.
/boggle
I don’t require constant stimulation.
I do, but the leaves rustling and birds chirping provides it for me. OP describing that as a bad thing is what boggles me.
I like it too, but obviously it gets a bit boring in the same area after the 5th through to the 365th time
I take one of two routes for an evening walk almost every day. It’s never occurred to me to listen to music or anything else while I do.
I live in a rural area with nice scenery. If you pay attention, it is different every day. Something new is starting to grow/bloom/die back, new birds have arrived or departed, the clouds are different, the air feels different, neighbors sheep are being silly in a different way.
I go specifically at sunset, so I find that very stimulating and no two sunsets are the same. I think about my day, my plans, goals, etc. It’s peaceful.
That’s crazy, I would go nuts from the monotony of something like that.
I don’t live rurally and I love it, I have nice scenery as well, and I notice all the same things and think about all the same things just like you, but keeping one of my senses busied and tied down is important to facilitate mindfulness, not the opposite.
It is interesting to hear your unique and unusual perspective though.
I’m sure you have a bunch of songs you don’t mind hearing over and over, so it’s not that different to enjoy your environment even if it’s mostly the same every day.
do birds chirp on a loop near you? Mine keep a certain cadence but its always unique.
