This is Black Friday which somehow became the day we are all supposed to rush out and buy things in anticipation of Christmas, a holiday centered on exchanging gifts we buy. Most of us already have way too much stuff and buying more only clogs our houses and fills our storage sheds with things we rarely use. Most of what we buy is plastic and it ends up in landfills where it never decays.
The big outdoor gear retailer REI started closing its stores on Black Friday four years ago and it pays its 12,000 employees to go outdoors and experience nature on Black Friday. They encourage everyone to go outside and ski the shopping group-think. REI is doing that again this year and other companies are joining them in trying to bring sanity to our country’s frenzied consumer culture.
REI is also investing in research with the University of Washington to understand the mental benefits of spending time outdoors. All of us who are focused on the natural world know that hiking or surfing or boating or riding a bicycle or running or just sitting in the grass have profound positive affects on our mental states. In fact we can have true spiritual experience without any religion by paying attention to nature and connecting our emotions to a wild or nearly wild place.
In fact, you can find sanity in an urban setting by finding pieces of nature around you and absorbing them into your mind. Look at a tree planted by the street, notice its details and any birds in it. Look up at the sky, see the clouds, see water and leaves. Remember times in beautiful places. The city has its hidden outlets.
But we must look at and feel the world around us when we are outdoors. We cannot only focus on talking to our companion about our usual reality, about other people, about stress. We also need to find peace, something that may not be possible with a high speed bicycle ride. We need to let the quiet and wonder of other plants and animals get into our minds so we can shift away from our mental habits.
And this is true for everyone regardless of what income, race, sex or culture they come from. Sadly many low income urban people rarely if ever have experiences in the natural world. If they did, we might see fewer social problems in cities. In New Mexico and Southern Colorado we need to continue to get low income kids out into national parks and natural areas so they can build connections with nature and develop a baseline for their own sanity.
In any case, I think REI is heroic for closing its 150 stores on Black Friday. They probably lose sales to other stores and websites but they make a crucial point, that life is about much more than things and gear. It is about being outside with friends, or alone, but being outside as often as possible.
So yes, let’s opt outside on our public lands.
