Why do I put on weight? I think it has to do with my lifestyle. Well, duh! Of course it has to do with my lifestyle! If I don’t get enough exercise, and eat the right food, I’m going to get fat. So what should I do? The obvious answer is to schedule exercise into my life, and ensure that I eat a balanced diet, right?

Wrong. At least, that’s what I’ve decided. Looking at the book “Permaculture: A Designers Manual” by Bill Mollison, it is pretty clear that everything in life is supposed to work in concert. No single activity or element in any design is supposed to stand alone. Rather, pretty much every process has to be benefited by one or more other processes, just as it benefits one or more downstream processes.

So here’s my question. Why should I have to make exercise a stand-alone process? It’s so hard to make it work that way. It seems pretty clear to me that exercise should be a natural and inherent part of my lifestyle, not just something extra I have to cram in so that I don’t die of a heart attack at 45. I think that there is something profoundly wrong with my lifestyle if I have to schedule in bits and pieces.

Think about kids when they’re not glued to a TV or a game console. They ride bikes, they run around, they chase each other, chase wafting dandelion seeds, chase dragons, hit each other with sticks, defend forts, fall in creeks. They’re keeping fit just because it’s who they are; it’s what they do.

What changed for me? When did it change? I reckon it was in my latter high school years, when it suddenly became very important for me to be studying. Of course, I didn’t study: I read books in my bedroom. Don’t tell my kids. Kids, don’t read the sentence about me not studying. The fact remains, I pulled out of what I now regard to be a natural lifestyle, and became … well, for want of a better word, Westernised. Study hard, get a good job, climb the corporate ladder. Work in an office, because that’s somehow better than being a labourer (why? because it’s less strenuous?).

The more I think about it, the more I believe that this is just wrong. I have an invalid lifestyle. Remember that this is a techno-geek speaking. I make my living out of writing software and making other people’s computers work properly. Nevertheless, I’m sure that if I had to work to grow the food I ate, I’d be a lot healthier. If I have somewhere to live and I can provide for myself and my family (and by provide for, I mean actually produce food) what more do I really need? Welcome Maslow, and his famous hierarchy of needs. The thing that gets me is that nothing in his hierarchy really requires offices and cities. It requires health and community, but it seems to me that our culture herds us towards illness (obesity, malnutrition, STIs) and isolation.

I don’t know … maybe I’m undergoing a mid-life crisis and evolving into an anti-tech hippie throwback, wanting to move into a commune. I do know this … I no longer blindly accept that our Western social structure is the best one for human beings.