Henry David Thoreau, an American journalist, has lived quite an eccentric lifestyle. He decided to leave the comfort of urbanization and live a solitary life in the woods for two years so that he can become self-sufficient and, in his words, experience everything and anything–and that includes living in the most natural form: away from the cities and farms and depend on nature and nature alone. The answers and enthusiastic revelations he had reached are the result of living without the distractions of daily urban hassles, which are written in his essay “Where I Lived, and What I Lived For”. Here is where he extols the virtues of individualism and self-sufficiency for it expands upon common routine and eliminates the need for dependency and
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He did not build said cabin, therefore he depended on someone else to build it for him, ruining his proclaimed title of complete self-sufficiency. Although he provided everything else for himself, he still needed services from an outside source besides the sun to make his food grow. To be one hundred percent self-reliant is to depend utterly and completely depend on oneself for survival. And the only person that could be said to be self-sufficient is Mahatma Gandhi since he went to the extreme in boycotting all British goods and in consequence, began making his own clothes. But even then, he didn’t create the looms or picked up the cotton needed for the fabrication of the robes; he still needed a web of talents to create the tools needed for his revolution. The same can be applied for Thoreau. He wasn’t relying only on himself because he needed outside help to a certain extent. It has to be said, though, that he was a brave man for abandoning the comfort of society and living in what I believe is Hell. I could never be alone by myself for so long. If I do, I get clinically depressed, like I did a few years ago because of social isolation. To prevent that in the future, I should be interacting with at least a stranger occasionally if I must live in that environment, or bring with me company who would also enjoy living in the woods with me. In addition, habiting
He did not build said cabin, therefore he depended on someone else to build it for him, ruining his proclaimed title of complete self-sufficiency. Although he provided everything else for himself, he still needed services from an outside source besides the sun to make his food grow. To be one hundred percent self-reliant is to depend utterly and completely depend on oneself for survival. And the only person that could be said to be self-sufficient is Mahatma Gandhi since he went to the extreme in boycotting all British goods and in consequence, began making his own clothes. But even then, he didn’t create the looms or picked up the cotton needed for the fabrication of the robes; he still needed a web of talents to create the tools needed for his revolution. The same can be applied for Thoreau. He wasn’t relying only on himself because he needed outside help to a certain extent. It has to be said, though, that he was a brave man for abandoning the comfort of society and living in what I believe is Hell. I could never be alone by myself for so long. If I do, I get clinically depressed, like I did a few years ago because of social isolation. To prevent that in the future, I should be interacting with at least a stranger occasionally if I must live in that environment, or bring with me company who would also enjoy living in the woods with me. In addition, habiting