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Biking

I am not sure why, but lately I have been feeling quite down. The pervasive air of pessimism and sadness envelopes me. I no longer feel motivated to go to class or write my college essays. This awful mood went away when my parents told me to bike and go outside. At first, I was annoyed because that would take away an hour of my life. As I biked, however, I realized I forgot how beautiful the world was beyond my neighborhood court. I enjoyed the sunlight and the warm weather. I found joy in the simple things in life, whether it was the sunlight that shone through the yellow leaves or the quiet countryside road. I breathed in fresh air and felt the gentle winds caressing me as I biked.

After biking for 15 minutes, I immersed myself in my own world that was detached from the incessant noise of technology. I let my thoughts wander and daydream about the future or hypothetical situations as I went down the hill or changing directions. I noticed that I was experiencing solitude deprivation for a long time and I was unaware of this problem. During the summer, I couldn't even walk or bike outside without putting earphones to listen to a podcast. Podcasts are great, but when I listened to them every single day that became a problem. The reason is that this listening habit showed I wasn't comfortable with boredom. 

Finding these 30-minute bike adventures more appealing than sitting in front of the computer for 30 minutes at home, I kept doing this every other day. Gradually, the mental discomfort of not having any sources of input vanished and I didn't really see a point of constantly having background noise when I exercised. I took a break from my listening habit to have some moments of solitude for myself. 

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