Anyone else wish they could live outside of society?

[Fancycrab]

In the last few months I’ve felt like I’ve dropped out of society a bit - quit all social media, stopped enjoying things like going to pubs/out for dinner so don’t do them anymore, don’t follow the news anymore. Started to spend my weekends going for long walks with my young dc and spending time with them at home. I wfh too, get all my shopping online, so I really don’t engage with society at all anymore (apart from maybe on MN). I have a few close friends who I might go for lunch or a day out with our kids with occasionally but that’s the most I ever interact with society. I live in a really rural area too so I never see many people. But I’ve started to realise I like living like this. I want to take it even further and look into living off-grid/self-sufficiency. Has anyone done this? Would any one want to do this and why?

Excuse my ignorance, but is it cold?

I know what you mean OP and I spent quite a while when my first DD was little looking heavily into off grid living in co-operative communities. My conclusion ended up being that rather than being isolated (which is what hermit me was hoping for) they are very social, hyper social compared to our modern world, with a lot of focus on who you know and what sharing type skills you have so you can barter successfully and work together to do the work by hand at a slower pace and entertain each other. I'm not at all sociable enough for that. I also found you needed to be a lot wealthier than I am as most communities needed you to buy a stake and buy a property outright to join. Non community off grid options still require you to own the land and alternative builds can be hard to get a mortgage for. Instead I've gone for the sustainable side of things, growing our own food, living in a small house, not driving, we repair and make things, forage etc. There's lots of different approaches, I tend to read a lot about permaculture as there's a lot of information online, it's not just about gardening it's a way of life. Maybe when my kids are grown up I'll go fully wild and live in a hut in the forest.

Yes! Same to all of this. Some out of choice, some enforced, single mum SEN/finance restrictions BUT ive got comfortable with solitude. Humans needs connection, after a while it takes its toll.

Outside of society to me means no legal status, no right to vote, no health service access, no taxes, no kids in school, no job, no bank account. Not doing social media is NOT the same.

@Farewelltothatid I know what you mean

It took me ages to work out what was my fault, what was lockdown, what was a change in society that was probably going on before and I didn't notice, etc.

I'm really sorry things are so tough for you.

I found social media quite helpful in navigating that feeling of people speaking a different language.

I appreciate OP may not have meant what she said in the way most of us have interpreted it- and obviously has clarified now.

But I'm interested in these posts because I do wonder, if I had a support network, would I have wanted to tuck myself away with it? I don't think I would, but a lot of people do.

I would be completely lost and isolated without society. It worries me if more and more people want to tuck themselves away - because that's just me on my own. It's quite scary as it is. If people become more isolationist, it will get even worse.

I would love to live on an island completely away from people and have everything delivered. I am a very private person, enjoy my own company and resent having to interact with other people. I particularly hate neighbours. If I have to go into the garden for anything, say to put out the bins, I do it after dark when I am unlikely to meet anyone. If someone rings the door bell and im not expecting a delivery or a visitor I often completely ignore it. I am not curious about who it is because they do not concern me. Its probably someone selling or collecting and I dont buy at the door.

I grew up on an island, a small one, in the arse end of nowhere... population approx 100... it was shit.

We had a well (electric pump thank god) and a generator and ate lots of seafood, potatoes, turnips and rhubarb. The toilet was an earth closet (and the best rhubarb grew just downhill from there 🫢) School was done remotely by radio. My life started age 17 when I moved away to college. I have lived a lovely life in suburban bliss, contributing to and living as part of my local community ever since.

I cannot believe that people think of it as idyllic, though I guess it might be nice to play at it for a bit with plenty of money behind you.

Great vid ...but think laterally instead and just put a piece of bread on a stick and hold it over a fire until brown ?!

No, I like people, like society, love people watching, enjoy a chat.

I live a relatively isolated life but I have a husband who wfh three kids, two are older teens. My family and I are all but estranged (I see one sibling a few times a year). I don’t have friends here. We moved a few years ago and my kids get buses to school so I don’t have the school run to meet people. I do know some of the mums to say hi to at parent council and such.

I don’t work. I spend my days with the dog and chickens and cats. I am not lonely at all. One day I’ll try and build more connections but for me living very rurally, it’s peaceful and healing after an awful childhood and early adult hood. I’m not sure we are all social creatures and I think that’s ok.

Tom Phillips tried to do it but at the end of 4 years- despite probably significant help from , I suspect, his parents and/or one or two local fellow whack jobs - he only had a few crappy dingy temporary shelters with plastic tarps stretched over them and a handful of burglaries to show for it, and got shot dead when he tried to escape after one of the burglaries by shooting a cop in the head (the next cop on the scene briskly shot him dead and the whole thing was wrapped up by that night thankfully).

Sure, but you can only declare you aren't 'a social creature' because someone else is funding your days with your pets. I mean, it's possible to find a job that allows you to work remotely and have no contact with anyone else at all, but I imagine it's not that straightforward, depending on your qualifications and experience. Some jobs just have human contact built in as part of the deal. My point being that if it weren't for financial cushioning, the chances are that you would have to have a job that required you to be, at least in some sense, a 'social creature.' It would be a muscle you would have to keep working.

But lots of people manage these things far better, without being fugitives from justice.

Look at Ben Fogle's Lives in the Wild, which is full of people who struggled with living in society for any number of reasons, and withdrew to remote places, often off-grid, and lived a largely self-sufficient life, often surrounded by animals and few or no people.

As a single.mother, if you withdraw from socialising and devote yourself to your children, you may find it hard to reintegrate when your children leave home. I'd certainly not rely solely on MN and totally abandon the other media platforms. You don't need to live your life online, but it's a useful tool for other thing.

I’ll have a nice warm island, not too hot. Nice villa. Have food delivered. Endless supply of books. Then family can come for holidays.
Not too much to ask.

You resent having to interact with other people? Wow! I can imagine it ends up mutual.

That’s not private is it really. That’s oddball reclusive and profoundly unsocial to the point of being antisocial.

So judgemental. Not everyone is the same and sociability is on a continuum.

Antisocial people also cause harm to others and property. Asocial people, on the other hand, don't. They just prefer not to be sociable.

I […] resent having to interact with other people.
I particularly hate neighbours.

… and I’m the judgmental one when you hate people for having the audacity to live close to you? Have you ever examined whether your principle of hatred is utterly disproportionate to their “offence”. Is

I'm not the poster who said I hated their neighbours, but that poster is well within their rights to hate whomever they choose as long as they don't perpetrate violence against them. Or are we policing the thoughts of others now?

I’m not policing her thoughts, I’m saying her reaction is utterly disproportionate to what is fueling the Hate. Their offence is “existing within the vicinity of the poster”.

Choosing to hate people is in itself an odd (over)reaction - most people are busy getting on with their own lives, that they haven’t the time to be ruminating on a Hate List. It’s odd anyone has the time or energy to choose to direct their lives in this way.

Not everyone has the same opinions shocker 🙄

I’ve always felt that traditional urge towards self-sustainability anyway. In the old days (ie pre the housing market / wage break of 25 years ago) it was perfectly possible for working class people to dream of having a smallholding one day. Now that our economy has broken completely from what I knew - and it has become clear from the lies and propaganda that that was what was intended by the rich groups all along - then yes I would love to be on a deserted island somewhere. If I could afford land in a decent location I would just take my chances and shut out the joke that is the modern world. I wish I was ten years younger to do it, but my generation will not get the care we lavish on the old anyway, we never have.

My mum stayed where I was raised (on small island 100ish pop) and her last 5 years were anything but idyllic. She had cancer.

The nearest hospital for chemo and radiation was a ferry and flight away. She went for a week at a time instead of getting a daily taxi to the hospital for an hour and going home like she would have here. Stayed in a hostel at the hospital, walked to the ward, walked back and waited for the next day's treatment. Then home at the weekend, back the next week. In her 80s. It was grim, but gained her 5 years. It was all but impossible sorting out her home (700 miles away - 2 flights and a ferry) afterwards.

So would say to have your exit plan in place before dropping out.

I sort of already do so I don't see a need to take it to the extreme because i like modern comforts. I live in a small town, very peaceful and quiet neighbourhood. I've always been a homebody and loner but friendly to people. I went to school and socialised with people. I still ended up a homebody, recluse and loner because people drain me. I do everything I'd do if i lived offgrid except physical/manual labour. I only see people when i go to the GP, dentist, optician, occasional shops if what i wanted isn't online. I like that i have neighbours but I dont need to interact with them except smile and say hello or wave when we see each other.

I like to see people walking past as long as I don't have to socialise regularly. I'm friendly with tradespeople when they come even though i dont like people in my personal space. They come, do what they need to do and go and I go back to my peaceful comfortable home life.

I see most people go to the extremes in threads like this: "We didn't see anybody and we were messed up" or "We went to school and we thrived because we had all these people around". Realistically, there is a middle ground.

I have dc who are thriving in the way that best suits them. We lived the opposite of how we live now when they were younger because I didn't want my natural preference to overshadow anything they needed to grow. Now they're older teen and young adult, they choose to live this way, against all my suggestions. They stopped wanting to do anything (unless it necessary) outside because they're happier at home. It's their choice. I'm happy knowing they have options.

Hating people for existing where you might encounter them isn’t an opinion though, is it?
Is it possible that the thing that poster finds so objectionable is her own behaviour and demeanour being reflected back to her?