Does anyone else feel stressed at how busy/overcrowded everything is all the time?

The incessant sound of cars. It's relentless. I've only experienced a truly silent night once in my life, staying in rural Spain. I long to live somewhere away from roads. It's like a knawing unnatural soundtrack to everything. I just want a little peace.

I absolutely hate it being busy everywhere. It makes everything stressful, time consuming and miserable.

I try to do errands at random times. Our Tesco is open until 11pm so I often go later on. I always avoid attractions/days out on bank holidays/half terms. Absolutely horrible and when I did do it, I wished I had never gone out.

Im currently on mat leave so tend to go out at random times for various baby groups etc. Let’s say 1:30pm on Tuesday. The roads are so busy, local Costa always have the longest queue ever etc. Where is everyone going ?! Is no one working full time anymore ?! Roads are absolutely packed in the middle of the day… I really don’t get it.

Sometimes I crave silence. I often think life never used to be this noisy and so busy. The roads are crazy here. I would HATE to live in the city where it's never quiet.

We used to have a caravan in the middle of Wales and I miss the quiet so much. No noise apart from sheep.
Honestly it used to make my heart happy.

Traffic drives me crazy ...add the road works and the delays the diversions ....I can't 😭😭

I think you need to move house. I live in a village in the south east. Perhaps I'm lucky but you just have to walk down the road to hit a footpath, and there are loads locally, where you are most unlikely to see/hear anyone.

I moved from London to the countryside and although rural life isn't for us longterm, and I missed the hustle and bustle, when I visit a city now especially o on public transport, I LOATHE. the incessant phone noise, reel watching, music blaring etc. I don't mind people as I used to live near and work in a tourist spot so super busy it ugh, the noise
I'm.scared to move back to civilisation tbh as I've gotten used to the silence and thi gd are never crazy over full here even in the towns, I.keep applying my Surrey _London mentality to get there early before the crowds at kids stuff and its never heaving!

Have recently moved to a new family home in the middle of nowhere to get some peace. I open the windows and all I can hear are the birds. And some cows !

Please don’t suggest this! It’s got way busier in the last decade!

To be fair, I can still walk out of my door for 5 minutes and experience birdsong trees, wildflowers and a few Bronze Age burial barrows.

What? Do you mean 30 million? Where did you get 3 million from? There were 5m people in England alone in 1700.

At times, yes. I live in London, work in The City, and commute in on the train, so there are a lot of people around.

It helps me to make my home as much of an oasis of calm as is possible. My husband and I have separate bathrooms and dressing rooms, and separate home offices (and yes, I know this is a luxury.) We take time out alone when we want, with the other taking over the child care, to get some space.

Listening to music alone helps, as does reading.

Ok another anti immigrant thread. Haven’t had one of those for a while. 🙄

Tbh, I don't think it's busier than it used to be. I think we just cope with it less as we get older.
I used to love busyness and hustle and bustle when I was in my 20s.
Now I'm pushing 40 and it's all too much.
I am so glad it's not my turn to host Christmas this year because I literally don't think I can face another Christmas food shop with all the PEOPLE buying their sprouts. It was incredibly stressful.
20 years ago, I'm not sure I'd have even noticed them

Go out in the rain?
I live 20 m from a big park which was nearly empty on Saturday, even when sun was shiny ,bcz it's been so rainy. I also went to a busy shopping centre on Saturday which was heaving. But the park, the nearby streets, very empty, just bcz of threat of a little rain.

Move to Scotland or maybe not 🤣. England is only 1.65 times the size of Scotland but your population is 10 times the size and 70% of Scots live in the centra belt. And our population long term is declining. A busy day on my local beach is 4 people. A local beach very popular with tourists etc on a sunny summer day maybe 50 if you’re unlucky. I so rarely meet people when I walk my dogs I’m always completely surprised when I do!

I live in suburban Birmingham. It's crowded, noisy and dirty. There is rarely silence, I don't sleep well so often get up in the night and even then if I look out of the window there are cars going past. I hate saying it, but there are just too many people for the space we've got. More countryside is going to be taken to build more houses, destroying more of the natural world. I'm not surprised people have so many stress related mental & physical health problems.

Not far from where I live there is a Bronze Age ancient monument. Sometimes I think about the Bronze Age people who must have walked across this area & how different it was here 4000 years ago. The air must have been full of bird song and butterflies. What wild flowers they must have seen.

I went to an out of town shopping centre today (Monday) and was surprised at how busy it was. Carpark was nearly full.

Is this a typo?? I actually went to look up the last time the population of the British Isles was estimated to be that low - the 1500s!

Yanbu i think because less people work 9 to 5 now and more people work from home , you don't get the quiet times in the middle of the week like you use to

Has it? So why do we keep hearing all this stuff about how career bitches aren’t having enough kids and the UK is going to be an aging population and etc?

I'm a Londoner, but do not like the constant movement and noise of towns and cities. I left London a long time ago to live in a rural location. I visit London for a few days once a month to see DM. I feel irritated and on edge when I'm there. The constant noise, emergency service sirens, dodging people to get out of their way, etc.

Couldn't agree more.
I live in a busy seaside town and dread the hot summer days because of the influx of tourists who leave the place like a shithole 😤. Everywhere is gridlocked no matter what time of day. People don't seem to have spacial awareness so not only is it busy, they just stand in the middle of shop doorways or pavements to have their conversations, they don't look behind them before changing direction or just suddenly stop dead right in front of you! 🤣😬

No such thing as 'just popping into town' which is a 2 mile journey because the roads are nose to tail the whole way. Major shopping centre near me, you have to allow additional 10 mins to get in or out because its gridlocked.