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> Does anyone else actually enjoy going to the grocery store or walking to a local place to pick up food? No, I hate it. Supermarkets especially are a horrible

by Aaargh20318 10y ago

> Does anyone else actually enjoy going to the grocery store or walking to a local place to pick up food? No, I hate it. Supermarkets especially are a horrible place, they are way too crowded and I don't like being in situations like that. I will cycle to the grocery store and if I see there's a long line for checkout I'll reverse course and try at a later time in the hope there's less people. I do my grocery shopping stormtrooper-style. I'll be in and out in as little time as possible (think 3-5 minutes for a typical shopping trip). > What, exactly, are people doing that gives them so little free time that this is necessary? Stuff in grocery stores costs money, you get money by having a job. > I seriously don't understand the mentality that working all the time is good for you. And yet you claim not to understand why people hate doing more work ?

SnacksOnAPlane 10y ago
Well, there you go. You just explained why you don't like going out; it's because you don't like being in situations with lots of people around. I'm personally not like that (used to be, but with a lot of effort, got over it), but it's good to see someone else's perspective.
- Aaargh20318 10y ago
  > You just explained why you don't like going out; it's because you don't like being in situations with lots of people around. It's not just that I don't like it, it's super exhausting to me. I literally start feeling depressed and lose the will to live if I spend too much time around people. The less time I have to spend with people, the happier I feel.
  - SnacksOnAPlane 10y ago
    Gotcha. I used to be like that but something in me flipped and now I generally like to be around people...although I definitely need "alone time" or I get cranky and irritable.
- kazagistar 10y ago
  I think the other reason was more important... People see chores as work, and have more enjoyable things they could be doing.
  - SnacksOnAPlane 10y ago
    There's a certain zen in being able to enjoy doing your chores. I think learning to change yourself so you don't dread chores is important self-work.
  - Aaargh20318 10y ago
    That too. I always feel rushed when I do chores because it all feels like a massive waste of my limited free time.
dkarl 10y ago
And yet you claim not to understand why people hate doing more work ? This is really the key. Lifestyle articles romanticize anything they want for the sake of clicks, and if you take them at face value, you can end up feeling guilty for not getting deep satisfaction from shopping, cleaning, and every other kind of drudgery imaginable. Going to the grocery store is supposed to be an opportunity for social connection. Picking up your dry cleaning nurtures your ties to the community. And if you prefer to spend your time on a stimulating and challenging task that you actually chose and are good at, you are a joyless drone. The MO of this kind of writing is to take really nice but unusual experiences -- like when you exchange a few words and a smile with the checkout clerk and it brightens your whole day -- and suggest that these are bread and butter experiences for other people. That other, better people don't often find the grocery store boring or stressful. It ratchets up the insecurity by presenting idealized versions of every scenario. You aren't pushing a cart through a crowd at the middlebrow grocery store picking up stuff you wish you didn't have to buy and comparing prices because you haven't saved enough this year. You aren't fighting traffic in the parking lot trying to find a space, any space, because you had to leave work at the same time as hundreds of thousands of other people and _had_ to shop because you're out of twenty essential items. You're taking a nice healthy stroll or bike ride to get ingredients for dinner tonight. Everything fits nicely on your bike because you only got what you need right now and you don't have a family that has its own needs and its own timelines. Of course it only contributes to the malaise and stress because it makes you feel like you should really be having peak experiences all the time because other people are and if you aren't there's something wrong with you. It hits you from both ends by creating anxiety that you aren't keeping up and hope that your life contains a vast untapped reservoir of potential happiness. Honest social commentary never uses this sleazy self-help formula. That's my tl;dr if anybody wants one. Finally, think about how sinister it is to equate the desire to occasionally be free from something with a spiritual inability to enjoy it. This is the kind of logic that oligarchs use to romanticize the lives of the people they exploit. You don't want to do this work? It's drudgery to you? It must be because there's something spiritually wrong with you. You don't appreciate how this work binds you into a greater spiritual whole with the rest of society.

SnacksOnAPlane 10y ago

Well, there you go. You just explained why you don't like going out; it's because you don't like being in situations with lots of people around. I'm personally not like that (used to be, but with a lot of effort, got over it), but it's good to see someone else's perspective.

Aaargh20318 10y ago
> You just explained why you don't like going out; it's because you don't like being in situations with lots of people around. It's not just that I don't like it, it's super exhausting to me. I literally start feeling depressed and lose the will to live if I spend too much time around people. The less time I have to spend with people, the happier I feel.
- SnacksOnAPlane 10y ago
  Gotcha. I used to be like that but something in me flipped and now I generally like to be around people...although I definitely need "alone time" or I get cranky and irritable.
kazagistar 10y ago
I think the other reason was more important... People see chores as work, and have more enjoyable things they could be doing.
- SnacksOnAPlane 10y ago
  There's a certain zen in being able to enjoy doing your chores. I think learning to change yourself so you don't dread chores is important self-work.
- Aaargh20318 10y ago
  That too. I always feel rushed when I do chores because it all feels like a massive waste of my limited free time.

dkarl 10y ago

And yet you claim not to understand why people hate doing more work ? This is really the key. Lifestyle articles romanticize anything they want for the sake of clicks, and if you take them at face value, you can end up feeling guilty for not getting deep satisfaction from shopping, cleaning, and every other kind of drudgery imaginable. Going to the grocery store is supposed to be an opportunity for social connection. Picking up your dry cleaning nurtures your ties to the community. And if you prefer to spend your time on a stimulating and challenging task that you actually chose and are good at, you are a joyless drone. The MO of this kind of writing is to take really nice but unusual experiences -- like when you exchange a few words and a smile with the checkout clerk and it brightens your whole day -- and suggest that these are bread and butter experiences for other people. That other, better people don't often find the grocery store boring or stressful. It ratchets up the insecurity by presenting idealized versions of every scenario. You aren't pushing a cart through a crowd at the middlebrow grocery store picking up stuff you wish you didn't have to buy and comparing prices because you haven't saved enough this year. You aren't fighting traffic in the parking lot trying to find a space, any space, because you had to leave work at the same time as hundreds of thousands of other people and _had_ to shop because you're out of twenty essential items. You're taking a nice healthy stroll or bike ride to get ingredients for dinner tonight. Everything fits nicely on your bike because you only got what you need right now and you don't have a family that has its own needs and its own timelines. Of course it only contributes to the malaise and stress because it makes you feel like you should really be having peak experiences all the time because other people are and if you aren't there's something wrong with you. It hits you from both ends by creating anxiety that you aren't keeping up and hope that your life contains a vast untapped reservoir of potential happiness. Honest social commentary never uses this sleazy self-help formula. That's my tl;dr if anybody wants one. Finally, think about how sinister it is to equate the desire to occasionally be free from something with a spiritual inability to enjoy it. This is the kind of logic that oligarchs use to romanticize the lives of the people they exploit. You don't want to do this work? It's drudgery to you? It must be because there's something spiritually wrong with you. You don't appreciate how this work binds you into a greater spiritual whole with the rest of society.