Book #59: Walden by Henry David Thoreau

Chalk this one up to life experience--a book that I felt like I HAD to have read. I kind of hated it while I was reading it, but not because it was bad or even that boring, but because it was taking me so long. Because there was no plot or even one specific point, I read it in ten- or twenty-page spurts over the last six weeks and I felt like I was getting nowhere. But I was determined to read the whole thing and to get a lot out of it. I even took notes (on my phone) of the things that stood out to me. This is what I got out of it:

- Thoreau is like THE ORIGINAL HIPSTER. He's advocating for tiny houses way before they became a "thing" (saying "Consider how slight a shelter is necessary" and suggesting that people live in the toolshed they built for railway tools) and arguing that people shouldn't buy new clothes (forecasting the thrift store movement already). About five pages into the first chapter he's arguing that old people are stupid and can have nothing important or interesting to teach him about life, and claims that "the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." He's SO much cooler and smarter than the rest of the world. Total hipster.

- He's got all these ideas and is trying to convince the reader that they should jump out of the rat race and stop trying to get ahead so that they can buy more stuff and make more money, and instead live a life of simplicity and make a living off the land so that they can enjoy their lives and not spend all their time working to make enough money to live off of. Half of the point of this book is to show how easy it is, and how enjoyable, to live like a hermit in the middle of the woods, fishing for your food and going berrying and communing with nature the rest of the time. But I feel like he's neglecting the glaring fact that most people are not single, without any responsibilities to any other human being, where they only have to feed themselves and that's all they have to worry about. It's not feasible to go live in a cabin in the woods when you have kids to take care of. Although I'm sure there are some hipster parents these days that are doing it (aka tiny houses).... It just is way, way harder if you've got responsibilities other than yourself.

- So this book is like 25% that sort of argument about getting out of the rat race, and then 75% nature writing about the beauty of Walden Pond and the surrounding forest and the animals there. Some of the nature writing was really beautiful and evoked some pretty amazing imagery of what Thoreau was describing. He talked about sitting in a rowboat on the lake at night and I could just see what he was talking about. Some of those passages were just stunning and made it worth the reading.

- A lot of Thoreau's claims seemed very gospel-centered to me (even if he didn't know it). Like:
- "I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor."
- "If you would avoid uncleanness, and all the sins, work earnestly, though it be at cleaning a stable. Nature is hard to be overcome, but she must be overcome."
- "We are conscious of an animal in us, which awakens in proportion as our higher nature slumbers. It is reptile and sensual, and perhaps cannot be wholly expelled; like the worms which, even in life and health, occupy our bodies. Possibly we may withdraw from it, but never change its nature." (The natural man!)
- "I learned this, at least by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he had imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours." (This sounds exactly like a quote I have read by Elder Ballard--"We become what we want to be by consistently being what we want to become each day.")

Although I think Thoreau was a little bit high-minded and too full of himself and his accomplishments--he thought he was way, way cooler than he really was--I really did like his goal of living deliberately. He says, "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practice resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck all the marrow out of life." And really, that is what I want to. That's what we ALL want, right? But I think that you can do that even if you are living a normal life, in a town with other people, at a job--everything that Thoreau despised. Living deliberately is not necessarily about what you are doing during the day, but how you do it. I have phases where I feel like I am living more deliberately than others. Lately I have been much more coasting and surviving and not doing as many of the good things that add pleasure and meaning to my life. I think that maybe with the new year and New Year's Resolutions I may have some stamina to get back on track doing some of those deliberate things that I CHOOSE to do instead of just getting swept along by only doing the things we have to to survive.

One of those things that I have recognized that I need is time outside. I loved what Thoreau said: "Many a forenoon have I stolen away, preferring to spend the most valued part of the day [outside]; for I was rich, if not in money, in sunny hours and summer days, and spent them lavishly." I really, really value and get a lot of happiness from getting to go outside, especially when the weather is nice and it's not too hot or cold outside. I love these days when we can go to the park every day. And even when it is too hot, I really like going for a walk early on in the day. It's not at all the nature experience that Thoreau was having, out by Walden Pond, but it's something. And it's helping me to live deliberately.

I have to say--the parts that were truly thought-provoking in this book were so good. I can see why so many people are inspired by this book. (They probably read the Cliffs Notes.) And there were some really beautiful parts of things that Thoreau observed and watched around his cabin home. But there were also a lot of pretty dry parts that took me a while to get through. Now that I've finished it, I'm really glad to have read it and to have gotten a lot out of it. I am going to try and keep this book in mind while I make New Year's Resolutions for 2016.