Lean Out: A Meditation on the Madness of Modern Life

Listen, I don't want to disparage the criticism of modern life. I've read the back to basics paens, I've had involuntary reactions to claims that everyone needs a side hustle, I've worked 22 days in a row, I left housing-crises Vancouver. I'm just left with a feeling of so now what? I found security in a reasonable job with reasonable hours and a reasonable manager and that doesn't necessarily mean I feel like I have time for rebuilding the community I left behind. Do I get to lay on a couch for three years and recover from modern life now? Do I wait till everything explodes in 5 years?

Also - hilarious that community connections are vaunted during a global pandemic that has us all hiding at home and waving at people on video chat. It's finally spring here and children are playing outside and I'm as depressed as heck.

It's lovely to imagine that our discontent is not our individual problem alone... But what needs to change to fix it for everyone else? UBI is suggested, what about our crazy housing hotspots? What about our dependency on car culture? Our anemic transportation systems? One mayor isn't going to do more than change one city. As the youth says : “our house is on fire”