So sick of living inside the machine. Where to go? page 2

[Him]

You are not living in a machine - the machine lives inside you.

[OneDeltaTenTango]

You are not living in a machine - the machine lives inside you.

This reminds me of the indian in Ken Kesey's "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" whose mental derangement (or not) was that the "combine" had its wires in him. The book is an interesting allegory and relevant to the discussion here.

[Tribal Rob]

At least there is the chance of some wilderness in the USA, only little bit here is in scotland and it's pretty uninhabital unless you are a shetland pony.

You have to detach yourself from the machine bit by bit, I'm as detached as I can be right now - biggest jump for me was going self-employed, that gives freedom in a way you can never get working for someone else. Other steps were taking the kids out of school, and making the mental shift away from consumerism and the capitalst economic system that only helps the rich.

Once we've got a bit of land we will be as detached as we can be on this small island, won't be all the way, but as off the grid and out of the capitalist system as possible.

We have come to the conclusion that we have to dance round the edges of society and contribute in a way that suits us - we can't not drive on the roads, or use hospital systems for example, that are maintianed by society, we need to use money as a universally accepted exchange system to take payment for goods or services we provide and buy things we can't make ourselves, like tea bags or pans.


But before that - traveling in an RV traveling and crafting and wwoofing and temporary jobs and volunteering at festivals and cheeky free stop-overs

[Roary]

Alaska. If you don't mind the winter, you can still get very deep into the woods and still be a member of the community --- hunting parties, cabin repair groups, like and such. If you have a greenhouse you have a very valuable commodity for trade. It's not for me, not a bit, but people of that mindset seem very happy.

[IvyBlue]

Keep working but stop spending. In a few years you'll have the FU money and you'll find that that in itself changes your whole perspective.

People really are doing it in Alaska but I do think there can be a real anti-social aspect to it. Good luck. You're at an age where you can do it, give it another 10 or 15 and you're on the train for the last stop.

[ryanmercer317]

Sadly you don't have much of an option (in most of the world anyway) unless you have millions of dollars. Plenty of open land in the U.S., with a huge pricetag. Ideally to take care of yourself and your family you are going to want 100+ acres in an area with a good growing season, 40-50 of that is going to need to be wooded minimum just to handle your wood needs if you plan on using wood for heating/cooking/etc, and to also get game out of during the respective legal seasons.

It really stinks

[Diana Renata]

Read Joseph Campbell, and Dan Miller. There's some good perspective.

[Uncephalized]

Keep working but stop spending. In a few years you'll have the FU money and you'll find that that in itself changes your whole perspective.

That's the other half right there, and the other motivation for us to move into a homemade RV. It's going to slash our (already low) spending probably in half due to no rent, utilities, etc. (aside from gas, but it's conceivable that due to no daily commute, even this bill will decrease despite living in a ~12MPG camper van). And we'll still have enough income potential even while mobile that we should be able to keep putting away money. It means financial independence is much closer without having to work a soul-crushing corporate job "climbing the ladder" for a decade or more. The trick is not needing much money so you don't have to make a lot of money to be comfortable.

[Lewis]

Why don't we take to the trees again?

shall we follow
The deception of the thrush? Into our first world.

Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot

It's not what Eliot is talking about, but the same applies: you can never go back.

[Crofter]

We moved to the Isle of Lewis 7 years ago for pretty much the reasons you're all mentioning. We can't escape totally but we have 5 acres and a good house. We provide Bed & Breakfast in Summer, I do some Blacksmithing and OH does Reiki and Reflexology. We farm our land, have a cow, goats, pigs, sheep and hens. We grow veg, make cheese and feed ourselves.
We reckon we live on about £5,000 a year but we are happy. No boss, not too much red tape, comfortable house and the best of food.
We work damn hard, sleep well, and look forward to each day.