Escapism
Let's set the mood of the story in the woods of a hilly region, foggy weather and mesmerizing sunrise once a week with a river flowing nearby.
In a world where mobile phones have taken over humans like anything there lived a guy named Sherpa who didn't even own a cellular phone, all he had was a telephone that too of a booth to talk to his parents every once in a while. What did he do, you may ask. Well nothing apparently. He used to farm, to survive obviously. His wife was also the same type and both of them were planning to have children there in the woods itself and continue living the way they were; reading books, writing, making art, singing with the folks nearby and farming for survival. You see they migrated from the city to such a place so it's kinda obvious for them to feel restless initially but they settled in and now the hill felt like home.
Isn't this the ideal way to live of one seeks peace from the materialistic world? Well, in a first glance I would say yes, but then when I saw them living such a life, I was curious what was the meaning of life to them? Sherpa said, well we were kinda fed up of everyone in developed countries as they're so much into making money, running after fame, having no genuine human connection and living without purpose. So, we decided to sacrifice all of it in the pursuit of happiness because that is what makes life worth living and here we are, happy in our world. More so, we even feel we have a genuine community here when we were just strangers a year ago. I was pretty convinced with what he said actually.
It was after I went he started to contemplate. He gave me an answer which made sense and what was relevant but the question still remained vaguely answered. He want to get rid of everything that people use to escape from their real world and live in imagination. Alas, he finds his imagination to be his reality; meaning, he has escaped from the real world into one where he is the most comfortable in. Yes reading books, and art are probably better ways than being on the phone 24/7 but isn't that also escapism? You see humans have been fond of escapism since time began. Before phones there were books, magazines, newspapers and if you go and watch movies from the 90s, say some scene of people traveling by train, you'll see everyone to be self occupied by some form of media, so phones are just a new form of it. Now it made no sense to him to leave the city to live in the woods because he felt like as escapist of the ultimate degree. He went to the booth and called me up explaining what was going in his mind.
You see, in decision making process, we usually tend to be biased, what he thought was not incorrect but why was he thinking everything from a pessimistic point of view? You see he did find a community which is great, learning agriculture is awesome, it's just that he could also have helped the locals over there in someway or the other coming from a developed place; that would probably give more meaning to his life, that's about it isn't it? So, you may ask what is he doing now. He actually came back, mainly because the facilities and comfort of a place however questioning it maybe is of no question when it comes to your wife's pregnancy; hence, he came back and now he is involved in his regular work but has also started to contribute to people who are under-privileged with basic medical facilities and education sometimes by visiting the hills and helping the locals, sometimes by charity and sometimes by being actively involved with an NGO.
