That's fair, I can see why. My surroundings have a higher rate of knowingly sedentary behavior/wild overcomsumption, which affects my bias. I like your analogy.
I still think personal autonomy has an impact. I'm a food nerd and in my experience the average person does a terrible job of assessing energy in (ooh donut) versus energy out (one calorie is harder to burn than ppl like to admit). Hell, it took me 15 years to figure out.
So maybe not a conscious choice of a sedentary life, as much as the lack of understanding or awareness of how that unintentional choice affects them (plus all the factors we've discussed).
But this is just my two cents, I'm no pro lol thanks for digging into this with me 🙂
"Go to a grocery store and load up on unhealthy shit, then go back to the same store and load up on healthy shit. The price difference is insane, especially when considering shelf life."
This intrigues me, and definitely isn't my experience. Do the same thing in my country and you come out with a comparable amount of food, perhaps influencing the choice element I describe above.
One commentary I've come across about American food is that the shitty stuff is intentionally priced so cheaply as to make the good stuff seem insanely priced. My experience above suggests that this might have a grain of truth to it. If willing to share, how do you feel about this commentary (i.e., what do you think of it)?
Then we likely disagree on the cause of the obesity pandemic. In my view, obesity is a choice moderated by increasingly inactive lifestyles, high volumes of low quality food, and genetics (obviously not a choice).
Add in contributing factors of affordability, general apathy towards nutrition, ready availability of food, grabbing food for all occasions (stress/joy/boredom), and corporations (esp. major corporations; food engineering for addictiveness and flavour, rampant marketing, and low quality offerings to bolster profits and scale).
So in my view, still largely long-term lifestyle choices, with corporate influence definitely playing a part.
But you seem to think differently, what do you believe I'm not seeing?
I think I disagree with you on this one. With obesity reaching pandemic levels internationally, I think forcing simple healthy choices is actually a great solution that helps a larger majority than those who may be stigmatized by using the escalator (for what may or may not be a visible reason to choose the escalator). At the very least it increases awareness of those healthy choices.
Still curious what the speech bubble says though..
This has been exactly my feeling for the past decade or so. I love open world, when you have a good concept and a solid story. But corridor is the best way to convey that story and keep the player engaged.
For me, Assassin's Creed is the ultimate brilliance to rags example: corridor gameplay that became an open world as you progressed in the early games. Which evolved into the meandering, mindless stories of the more recent games. I genuinely have no idea what Valhalla was supposed to be about lol. I finished it, but it was 120 hours I'd rather have back. A corridor style for the late 2010/20s games would have made all of them far more interesting, as they were phenomenal concepts imo.
All this to say, I don't mind some impactful world decisions that affect story arcs, but bring back the dang corridor and stop hiding behind massive content dumps... Damn it!
Nah I think you got it. Veiling art as hostile architecture is fairly common so I think the artist lead took over and they forgot the intent of ruining someone's ability to sleep haha
This may have missed the point of your asking, but I wrote it so I'm posting it lol my apologies if it's not what your looking for:
I'm gonna advise a thought on what I had to do. I love being informed. But I reached such a level of depression and anxiety of the future that I had to do something.
So I stopped. I told myself it doesn't have to be forever, just a break. Took about 2 weeks of much less news consumption, forced myself to be brain-dead as much as possible. It led to a few conclusions:
The world turns. No matter what you do, ppl do insane shit. Taking a break for you doesn't mean stupid shit stops happening, but it makes it less the center of your world. You don't have to own it.
Life is about a lot more than what's going on in the news cycle. I have friends who never look at a newspaper, and they're far happier than I am overall. Just a thought.
The kicker - I still knew what was going on. The media milks a big story over days and weeks, so you can easily come back to your favorite website and pick it up quickly. Haven't missed anything that I could have changed regardless haha.
A great comment I saw a while back: put down the phone for a few days, and you realize it's still 2005 outside. The world is boring, but blessedly so. For your health, let it be 2005 for a bit.
Now, I just read the headlines unless something really grabs my attn. Reading the news makes many problems that aren't yours a you problem. Overall, I've realised it's the little things that make life better. Do the little stuff - help in your community, give the homeless guy a fiver, call your mom, ask the cashier how her day is (and genuinely care about her answer). If you're up for it, maybe then undertake some of the actions other ppl are suggesting about political action, volunteering, etc.
You can't pour from an empty cup, my friend. Take care of you first and the world becomes a little better ☺️
I would even argue the controversy about it is the point. It's art. It's meant to make you think about things you might not ever consider, and in the case of No Russian, it's the horror of committing a terrorist attack. Imo, it's an intentional but valuable (both financially and ethically) lesson in what art can do
I don't have sources, but I seem to recall reading somewhere that the OGs aged out or got caught, and the new gen that replaced them weren't as ideologically driven or competent or something. I think they still technically exist but aren't nearly as influential as they once were
I'll piggy back on your comment, I was gonna say something similar (and I fully agree with it 😊)
With only the information you provided, it sounds like you're potentially navigating some high functioning depression, maybe some meaninglessness. They can go hand in hand, and much of the joy of life is lost when/if you're depressed with no personally meaningful direction.
Therapy is a good starting point, or even just some gentle self analysis of what may have led you to these feelings (as opposed to the symptoms of it, which it looks to me like what you described).
It's a process, and it can take a very long time to learn how to be gentle enough to listen to yourself without judgement. So in addition to therapy, I'd add meditation to allow yourself space and journaling with personally directed questions (e.g., what do I feel, what may have led me to feel this way) that might grant you insights. Dig for what means something to you, and find a way to make it your reality.
One final thought - do try getting out there and connecting. It's hard, irritating, and exhausting. But sometimes we spend so much time in our own space/heads that we ruminate ourselves into a quagmire. Ppl and activities corner that rumination to fewer hours of the day, and gives us a break from our own thoughts.
As poster above said, you're not even 40 - lots of years of beauty, hope and meaning to be found and loved, though it can take time to really get there :)
Yup, second on this one. Exact same change made, and the gf and I love it. We even walk when it's minus 20 (though after that we'll drive). Many days afterwards we're both too beat for much more of a hard workout, so I'll hammer out some pushups to failure or smtg
That's fair, I can see why. My surroundings have a higher rate of knowingly sedentary behavior/wild overcomsumption, which affects my bias. I like your analogy.
I still think personal autonomy has an impact. I'm a food nerd and in my experience the average person does a terrible job of assessing energy in (ooh donut) versus energy out (one calorie is harder to burn than ppl like to admit). Hell, it took me 15 years to figure out.
So maybe not a conscious choice of a sedentary life, as much as the lack of understanding or awareness of how that unintentional choice affects them (plus all the factors we've discussed).
But this is just my two cents, I'm no pro lol thanks for digging into this with me 🙂