Meant To Be Used
June 21, 2023
Current location: Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA
Reading: The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz
Listening: Emotions and Math by Margaret Glaspy(if you have a moment, reply with your own 3-item status via email or in the comments)
Meant To Be Used
Our brains and bodies default to conserving energy.
This energetic setting made a lot of sense in primordial history, as the creatures that could accumulate and save more energy tended to outperform (and thus, out-survive and out-procreate) their competition.
It became even more vital as we started to develop energetically expensive organs like brains, which (in humans) gobble-up something like 20% of our total metabolic budget, despite only accounting for an average of around 2-3% of our total body weight.
From the perspective of "I want to make sure I have sufficient internal resources to outrun a lion, fight a bear, or outthink a fellow (maybe dangerous) human being," it makes perfect sense that out biological apparatuses might want us to (energetically) save save save, even when we might benefit from doing the opposite.
This stance can at times nudge us toward under-expenditure, though, which is not ideal for our accumulatory habits, nor our biases toward aspects of life that require we spend said energy (challenging things, difficult things, momentarily painful things, etc).
There are things that benefit from being protected from the tribulations and scarring frictions of life.
The microchips in all our gizmos, for instance, are incredibly sensitive and susceptible to even a single speck of dust; the process for creating them is wild and elaborate to account for this—they must be protected and preserved and coddled, or they don't turn out right.
Most things, though—to some degree at least—benefit from exposure to the necessary contortions of unsheltered existence.
Perfect, pristine leather journals are beautiful objects that arguably get better with time: every crease and bend and scar and imperfection, the jotted notes and doodles in the margins, all contribute to a unique patina that makes the artifact unique, and even more of a pleasure to hold, use, and appreciate.
Our bodies and minds, likewise, benefit from exposure to the world—to uncloistered reality.
Flexing, contorting, applying pressure, exposure to extremes; our tissues and sinews and neurological pathways expand and contract and achieve greater strength and durability as we use them.
This doesn't mean being careless with our things, of course. Proper maintenance ensures that our leather journals are still useable and appreciatable for long into the future, and our bodies and minds are the same.
But conservation and care doesn't mean locking these objects away so that they never engage with or benefit from exposure to the larger world.
I've never like the phrase "your body is a temple" in reference to treating ourselves well because it implies a sense of purity and pristine-ness that isn't realistic or (I would argue) desirable.
I prefer to think of myself—my physical and psychological manifestations—as homes, as vehicles, as objects that benefit from wear-and-tear, from upkeep and upgrades, from valuable frictions and a wabi-sabi sort of aesthetic appreciation.
A temple is visited and experienced ritualistically, but our bodies and minds are meant to be used bravely and brazenly, the remnants of stains and stitched-up tears and other us-shaped flaws incorporated into the structure, highlighted in gold and celebrated, not shamefacedly concealed or replaced.
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My Work, Elsewhere
Aspiring Generalist / Brain Lenses (podcast) / Climate Happenings / Let’s Know Things (podcast) / Never Not Curious / Notes On the News / One Sentence News (podcast) / You Probably Don’t Need
Might I suggest reading:
Interesting & Useful
What Literature Do We Study from the 1990s?
“Using Open Syllabus, which archives university-level syllabi, we identified 1.9 million entries from English Literature classes since 2010. We looked at which books from the 1990s are, today, widely assigned in college-level English Literature classes.”
The Sound of the Dial-Up, Pictured
“If you ever connected to the Internet before the 2000s, you probably remember that it made a peculiar sound. But despite becoming so familiar, it remained a mystery for most of us. What do these sounds mean?”
“The winners of the 2022 Dog Photography awards, chosen from more than 1,400 entries from 50 different countries.”
Outro
The video-making (and learning-to-video-make) process has been going well! I’m having a lot of fun learning (and re-learning) the relevant techniques and software, figuring out what sorts of content make sense for me, what I like to talk about, the vibe I want to imbue, etc.
There’s something very satisfying to me about learning to wield new tools (or familiar tools in new ways), so this (at times cumbersome and tedious) process is partly fueled by the series of “oh cool, I can do that now” moments that pave the distance between “I don’t know what I’m doing, none of this makes sense, this is going to suck” and “okay, maybe I can do something useful here.”
My plan is to start posting new videos on my YouTube channel beginning in July (alongside the podcasts that already get auto-posted), so if you’re keen to see what I come up with, you can join me there :)
What’s going on in your world? Working on anything new? Dreaming up any new dreams? Consider dropping me a quick hello to tell me something about yourself, what you’re thinking about, or just to say howdy—reply directly to this newsletter or send a fresh message to colin@exilelifestyle.com. I respond to every email I get and would love to hear from you!
Prefer tangible missives? Send me a letter, postcard, or some other physical communication at: Colin Wright, PO Box 11442, Milwaukee, WI 53211
Or hit me up via the usual methods: Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or music generated from text prompts.
Current Location- Gurugram/New Delhi, India
Reading- The Presence Process by Michael Brown & The good enough job by Simone Stolzoff
Listening- Alors on Dans by Stromae