Anybody else find life to loud, colourful and fast? Looking back at old tv things has made me long for the past.

[Superhansrantowindsor]

Am I being silly or is life just too hectic and busy. Big screens everywhere- on the bus , in the waiting room at the doctors. Loud music in shops with bright displays. Even billboards at the bus stop change and flicker.
I was watching an old documentary on YouTube and it just seemed like like was duller in the past but calming and just nicer.
Anyone else feel like this?

edited to say I’m sorry about the typo in the title.

Yes, like in to quiz programs, there’s a massive difference between todays compared with say bullseye in the 80s. Today you’d have a drag queen contestant and other loud or ”out there” contestants. In Bullseye they were all just quiet normal people. Same with all the bright graphics and images.

Old classic tv programmes are so much calmer and not the same onslaught on your senses.

That translates into everyday life. A train journey starts at a station with electronic bill boards advertising al kinds of crap, after you’ve bought your ticket online subjecting you to bright pop up ads. Then on the train it’s never ending announcements and ever changing screens again not just the basic destinations but also bright adverts.

Its exhausting and no surprise at all that people, especially kids, are permanently hyped up and have the attention span of a goldfish - this constant stimulation is causing untold problems.

The one thing I enjoyed about Covid was the brief period where background noise was kept to a minimum (I believe to prevent laboured breathing and spitting as people increase their volume to be heard over it). As bonkers as this reasoning now sounds, it shows that we can survive without constant background music, announcements, tills and machines on full volume all the time.

I agree OP, everything is just so hyper these days! My mum showed my DCs some of my favourite children's TV shows on YouTube and they were so slow and gentle. DSs seemed calm down and relax into them. I really limit YouTube in our house as all the things that are popular with dcs now are so loud and shouty. It's still weird to me that little kids are watching grown men play video games while shouting 'bruh' at each other.

I watched an old video of our local shopping centre the other day, it was busier but everyone was walking around so slowly! The place was decorated with plants, flowers and fountains whereas today everything is stark but with screens and lights and people rush in with a purpose and straight out again.

When I was growing up 60s and 70s, you never had neighbours playing loud music in their gardens, occasionally next door would have the cricket on the radio as he sat in his deckchair but you could barely hear it.

You also never had the banging, misfiring crappy cars speeding up main and residential roads like you do now either.

We have one in my road, I'd love to shove that stupid exhaust up his arse next time he comes up the road at 2am. Tosser!😡

Yup. I remember my own childhood being really calm and peaceful. I’d read for hours in my bedroom. You turned on the tV or radio for specific programmes and then turn it off again. I’d play with toys for hours, just simple things, using my imagination - that morphed into hobbies as I moved into the teen years. I’d just listen to music with friends, or hang out with them in the play park or go cycling with them - lots of companiable silence, we were just happy to hang out and didn’t feel a need to be constantly entertaining each other with jokes, banter, etc. I suppose we were a younger version of the stereotypical old men in a pub nursing a beer all night and barely talking to anyone, but just content with our thoughts.

We brought our son up in a similar way, but he’d really struggle at friends houses as he’d come home exhausted and grumpy as it’d been a barrage of senses of noise, chaos, activity, etc. He’d want to go obviously but couldn’t cope with it. It took him a long time to find “calm” friends who have endured the test if time and even as an adult he’s maintained a few friendships with random primary school classmates and neighbours - the quieter ones! The ones he can sit in a quiet pub with and just have a couple of pints all night without pressure to perform nor entertain!

This sums it up for me!
https://www.tiktok.com/@unlockingnostalgias/video/7418987640927669536

This comes across well in the original Herriot series. Simple but content lives. People very important, far more important than belongings or things. Everyone knows eachother, importance of the village pubs, shops and church for meeting people. A great sense of society and community. The characters just content to sit and watch the world, to sit quietly in a pub or lounge just happy to be there and no pressure to constantly talk or banter. Such simple times.

Yes! I’ve just moved to a village for this reason. I can hear…. Absolutely nothing! I cannot tell you how much it’s improved my wellbeing in such a short time.

It really does, doesn't it?

The second / modern version is utterly manic!

When I think about all the kids programmes I used to watch, they were all really gentle like Camberiwck Green and Bagpuss. With the exception of Rhubarb with was a bit psychedelic.

I was shopping in Sainsbury's yesterday and it was so busy and there just seemed to be so much 'stuff' not just food. I could feel my stress levels rising and the thought of xmas sends me into a bit of a panic nowadays. So much waste and expense.

I find things like this genuinely offensive. It's gross.

This is why my 3 year old only watches the original Thomas the Tank Engine.

God that is one of the most depressing things I’ve seen for a long time! Wtf have they done?!?!

Yup. I think back to the gentle singing of Brian Cant in trumpton, chigley or camberwick green and compare it to the manic bouncing around on CBeebies - and the calmness of Tony hart’s quiet art programs. So much of modern kiddy tv is loud, bright and manic. Just no need.

Yes, they even hyped up Thomas - the later cgi generated ones were an assault on the senses compared with the originals with calm commentary by Ringo Starr or Peter angelis filmed using proper model trains.

I normally get my shopping delivered but this is exactly why I shop at Aldi or Lidl when I do venture out to a supermarket. Less Muzak, less choice, no screens, fewer bleeps… I get sensory overload in places like Asda, Tesco, Sainsbury’s. Can just about handle Waitrose but even that’s pushing it!

This thread is really interesting. Often hankering for the past even though things are meant to be ‘better’ these days. I find myself seeking out books set in the past too, I find reading about simpler lives to be very calming. Dd1, who is a literature student and 20 years old says that she finds such books preferable too, so it’s not just me being an old woman, I think our brains simply aren’t meant to have so much shit thrown at them.

I’m going to put my phone down now and head out with the dog 😊

Watching Strictly last night made me feel old. They didn't use to screech and jump up and down every 2 minutes in previous series. It was like hyperactive toddlers on a sugar high.

I live at one end of a large village and work in my small office at the other end. Most of the time absolute bliss. Pretty quiet at home, mostly quiet elderly neighbours although the husband of one side did have a summer of crisis a few years ago playing loud rap music in the garden every morning but she soon chucked him out and divorced him!

A lovely mile long walk along the canal footpath each morning to get to work, just the sound of birds and occasional narrow boat. Work is literally a small office in effectively a basement (steep sloping drive) so opens out at the back away from the road. Nice and quiet as very little road noise. Work mostly on my own so no mindless chatter, no banging around by other people, no random bursting into song or laughing or tears or whatever. Any noise is noise I make. Absolute bliss. I even have the office phone on a very quiet setting though mostly I leave it on divert to answering service so I do t get interrupted by that either.

Go out for a couple of mile walk at lunchtime either further up the canal or a woodland loop or a slightly longer walk along the coast.

My mental and physical health has improved massively. Use to live and work in towns, and I became a nervous wreck, binge eating, generally unhealthy and unhappy. Moving to a village and going self employed so I’m in control of my work, client choice and workplace, all for a quieter and more peaceful life has literally transformed my life.

This reminded me of going to my grandparents house for sleepovers. Just so much calmer. No mobile phones. Everything followed a little routine right down to the 8pm cup of tea and biscuit.

And why does everything have to beep? Dishwasher, microwave, air fryer, kettle? 😩

Son said he preferred paper at university too. He couldn’t do with online text books and online lecture notes. He spent a fortune on paper text books and printing off the lecture notes. And he’s not a swot by any means. He just couldn’t concentrate with online learning due to the colour schemes, random sounds, pop up ads, etc. All too distracting.

ironically where he now works is 100% paper free and all on computer, but they use their own software for absolutely everything and don’t even use word nor excel. Apparently it is all written in calm colours, minimal graphics, easy to read text fonts etc and he says it’s really calming. It’s also locked down system, so no pop ups, no advs, impossible to load apps or other programs. Even incoming voice calls and emails start with minimal notification so you don’t jump out of your skin with a loud ping or ring tone. He absolutely loves it! Been designed that way because a lot of staff are maths and computer geeks, so many on the spectrum, and the in house programmers probably like the quiet life themselves.

There's something to be said for why period drama's are so popular.

Agree!! Those little minds being bombarded with the speed of that 😐

I left London for a much smaller town because I found I was spending every weekend looking for ways to get away from the crowds and noise. I don’t know if it’s my age (late 40s) but my job is now mostly online/spending hours in Teams meetings and by the time the weekend comes I am completely exhausted even though I’ve spent the week barely moving. I notice a real difference on the days when I am outside on site visits - I’m still tired at the end of the day but I feel energised by the fresh air, not wiped out mentally.

YES! Sensory overload is such a thing now, never used to be. I'm so overwhelmed by life, there's just too much going on. I make sure I'm outside in nature as much as poss.