Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Escapism

Escapism has become a daily occurrence in our lives.  We have mulitple ways to create this escape;  anything from watching a movie to getting drunk on a Saturday night.  What are we escaping from? Is the world we live in not enough?

Eckart Tolle describes watching TV as living through the unconcious.  It is almost a mindless state. Unless we are watching something informative, we are really like a vegetable. Not engaging the mind is relaxing and a form of escapism.  Like TV, alcohol and drugs have a similar effect.  They allow you to think and act on an unconcious level.  Why do we need to mask and submit our mind? We all do it in one way or another, but why?


During the daily grind we are placed in a repetitive routine, and society hinders our inner desires and personality traits.  We suppress a lot of what we actually want to do versus what we need to do.  By bottling all this up thorugh a 5 day span, the weekend comes and we need to release our inhibitions and be free.  We want to watch movies that we know can never happen in real life and we want to get a buzz on so we can sing at karaoke in front of a crowd.  We also carry our past on our shoulders and, when supressed, can create an unhealthy outburst and the need for a strong and fast escape.

I thought of ways that I escape in my own life and I narrowed it down to three.  Sleep, alcohol, and exercise.  When I sleep, I can sleep away the pain of what I am going through.  This happens through dreams or just the general time that passes so that when I awake I feel different about a certian situation.  Alcohol definitely allows me to surrender to my unconcious and release inhibitions that usually hold me back.  Exercise, which I don't do as often as some people allows me to "black out" during that moment and let my body do the work.  I focus on the task, whether its a personal goal or completing a crossfit workout and nothing else. 

In short, being able to escape is liberating.  We are running from social norms that confine us.  Constant escape is not facing reality and not escaping is becoming a slave to your responsibilites. 


ESCAPE-

–verb (used without object)
1.
to slip or get away, as from confinement or restraint; gain or regain liberty: to escape from jail.
2.
to slip away from pursuit or peril; avoid capture, punishment, or any threatened evil.

2 comments:

  1. alcohol use to be an escape for me, but i realized that i can get drunk only so many times until getting hung-over took its toll...i think surrounding myself with good people helped me a lot, not to escape, but to deal...but if i need an escape, a bunch of burpies usually does the job

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  2. Surrounding yourself with good people and allowing them to help you through the tough spots is key.

    And yes if you want to escape to hell, usually burpies does the trick. ;)

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