Bill McKibben wrote an essay in 2001 called "What's My Damage. A Call For Mental Environmentalism." In that essay he describes our minds as a landscape that has been polluted: "The mental environment is under siege from a particularly difficult variety of pollution." He says that things like advertising and television and the internet are changing our mental environments and we need to start practicing "mental environmentalism."
Describe your mental environment. What is the landscape like? What pollutes it? How polluted is it? What do you think of this analogy and idea? What might practicing "mental environmentalism" look like?
"Sorry, I haven't been getting much sleep lately. That's probably why", I tell my Art teacher after stumbling through the room, knocking over a bunch of art supplies. I walk quickly back to my desk and wonder why this has been happening so much to me lately. Although the sleep thing was true, I doubt it explains the fact that I can barely see anything anymore- which is what caused me to stumble. I've had to apologize to four people already, this week!
After coming home after school, I decide to tell my mother about my "predicament" and see her take on it. She totally freaks out. "You could be having an eye infection!" she yells. I roll my eyes at her ridiculous suggestion. "That's really impossible, but okay," I tell her.
We go to the doctor anyway. I sit up on a high white leathery doctor chair patient thing as he begins to perform the regular doctor checkups, you know what I mean, the heart-beat, looking into your throat with the wooden stick, etc., just the basic uge.. (usual)
As he's looking into my ear with the little microscope thing, he gasps. "What? What is it?!" my mom begins to freak out. The doctor is speechless. "It's... um, it's... unlike anything I've ever seen before," he finally replies. His facial expression has now turned from horror-stuck to awe, and then glee- as if he'd make some life altering discovery. Had he?
"Would you mind sharing with us what is so 'unlike anything you've seen before'?" my mom says impatiently. The doctors informs us that my head is filled with 'things'. "Well yes, I know that- she's a teenage girl, aren't they all?" My mom says, still unsatisfied with the doctor (Pretty sure we're never coming here again btw) No, he tells us, not normal things. My head is ltierally filled with things. "Like there are things flying around the inside of her head," he tells us in a very serious tone. My mother's face begins to chance, as I see she starts to believe him (how gullible, right?). "Describe it to us," she then says, with a story-time expression of a 3-year old on her face. And he does:
I see a large white space, filled with many different things. It's very polluted. With boys, mostly. There's also a lot of food items, floating around everywhere. Random little things too like facebook icons, pets, friends, homework, clothes; but the major items that 'dominate' the space include music, literature and memories. There are dark spaces all around the corners filled with media and celebrities like the Kardashians. The black space is growing, and taking over the white.
"Ah. I seem to have found the problem," the doctor annnouces. There seems to be a growing mass of nonesense in your brain. It's really a medical contradiction, none of this makes any sense- but it seems to be the source of your recent blindness.
"How can I fix this, doctor?" He told me I would have to start enriching myself with information, basically increasing the white positive spaces in my brain. "You need the white to overthrow the black," he informed. And so I went home, to follow his advice and read the Kardashian's new biography "Kardashian Konfidential."
Describe your mental environment. What is the landscape like? What pollutes it? How polluted is it? What do you think of this analogy and idea? What might practicing "mental environmentalism" look like?
"Sorry, I haven't been getting much sleep lately. That's probably why", I tell my Art teacher after stumbling through the room, knocking over a bunch of art supplies. I walk quickly back to my desk and wonder why this has been happening so much to me lately. Although the sleep thing was true, I doubt it explains the fact that I can barely see anything anymore- which is what caused me to stumble. I've had to apologize to four people already, this week!
After coming home after school, I decide to tell my mother about my "predicament" and see her take on it. She totally freaks out. "You could be having an eye infection!" she yells. I roll my eyes at her ridiculous suggestion. "That's really impossible, but okay," I tell her.
We go to the doctor anyway. I sit up on a high white leathery doctor chair patient thing as he begins to perform the regular doctor checkups, you know what I mean, the heart-beat, looking into your throat with the wooden stick, etc., just the basic uge.. (usual)
As he's looking into my ear with the little microscope thing, he gasps. "What? What is it?!" my mom begins to freak out. The doctor is speechless. "It's... um, it's... unlike anything I've ever seen before," he finally replies. His facial expression has now turned from horror-stuck to awe, and then glee- as if he'd make some life altering discovery. Had he?
"Would you mind sharing with us what is so 'unlike anything you've seen before'?" my mom says impatiently. The doctors informs us that my head is filled with 'things'. "Well yes, I know that- she's a teenage girl, aren't they all?" My mom says, still unsatisfied with the doctor (Pretty sure we're never coming here again btw) No, he tells us, not normal things. My head is ltierally filled with things. "Like there are things flying around the inside of her head," he tells us in a very serious tone. My mother's face begins to chance, as I see she starts to believe him (how gullible, right?). "Describe it to us," she then says, with a story-time expression of a 3-year old on her face. And he does:
I see a large white space, filled with many different things. It's very polluted. With boys, mostly. There's also a lot of food items, floating around everywhere. Random little things too like facebook icons, pets, friends, homework, clothes; but the major items that 'dominate' the space include music, literature and memories. There are dark spaces all around the corners filled with media and celebrities like the Kardashians. The black space is growing, and taking over the white.
"Ah. I seem to have found the problem," the doctor annnouces. There seems to be a growing mass of nonesense in your brain. It's really a medical contradiction, none of this makes any sense- but it seems to be the source of your recent blindness.
"How can I fix this, doctor?" He told me I would have to start enriching myself with information, basically increasing the white positive spaces in my brain. "You need the white to overthrow the black," he informed. And so I went home, to follow his advice and read the Kardashian's new biography "Kardashian Konfidential."
What an incredible idea for this blog. I loved the imagery that you presented.
ReplyDeleteomg boys pollute my mind 2. thats so funny were twinz
ReplyDelete