Walden Essay

        

           People have forgotten what it means to live a simple life. Spending time with family and relaxing at home is now considered a luxury, compared to earlier days when it was not. Henry David Thoreau is a strong believer in simplicity. He would be shocked if he saw the world today. Technology has become a huge part of our everyday lives and people of today could not imagine living without it.  Technology has become such an important part of our society and so advanced, that people are not able to simplify their lives in the modern age.

            People cannot simplify their lives in the modern age because of technology. Technology has become such an important part of everyday life. It is agreeable that times were much simpler back in the day. There were not any cell phones; there was no facebook or twitter to distract from the more important things in life, like spending time with family for instance. People forget that simplicity is beautiful. “Let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand…keep your accounts on a thumbnail” (Thoreau 491). This quote from Thoreau’s Walden is completely relevant to today. Our world runs on the pace of a cheetah. Everyone had has at least five different tasks going on at once and a million things to do. Simplicity while using the technology of the modern day is dead. People are so attached to technology that it has become a major factor in their lives however, they are constantly having to learn something new.

            Always having to learn something new with the technology of today makes it nearly impossible to simplify lives today. Most of the human race has trouble keeping up with what it the “new” technology. There seems to be a new amazing tool out on the market before one can learn how to use the old product efficiently. With man always having to compete, they always want the newest, best, or coolest items. “Simplify, simplify. Instead of three meals a day, if it be necessary eat but one; instead of a hundred dishes, five; and reduce other things in proportion” (Thoreau 491). Thoreau goes to the extreme with his ideas on simplicity, but he is right when it comes to how excessive the human race has become. The people of the world all want more and more material goods. Life cannot be simple with everyone becoming obsessed with technology and improvement. Man has lost the sense of a down-to-earth way of living.

            Technology has become so complex and such a significant part of the world today, that people are not able to simplify their lives in the modern age. Humans cannot stop using their technology for long enough to obtain simplicity in their lives and they cannot learn and master the technology they have before something new is out that they must have. People need to listen to the words of Thoreau and set down their iPhones and take a look at the simplistic beauty all around them.