In one of his gloomier moments Pascal said that all man's unhappiness stemmed from a single cause, his inability to remain quietly in a room. 'Notre nature,' he wrote, 'est dans le mouvement ... La seule chose qui nous console de nos miseres est le divertissement.' Diversion. Distraction. Fantasy. Change of fashion, food, love and landscape. We need them as we need the air we breathe. Without change our brains and bodies rot. The man who sits quietly in a shuttered room is likely to be mad, tortured by hallucinations and introspection.
Some American brain specialists took encephalograph readings of travelers. They found that changes of scenery and awareness of the passage of seasons through the year stimulated the rhythms of the brain, contributing to a sense of well-being and an active purpose in life. Monotonous surroundings and tedious regular activities wove patterns which produced fatigue, nervous disorders, apathy, self-disgust and violent reactions. Hardly surprising, then, that a generation cushioned from the cold by central-heating, from the heat by air-conditioning, carted in aseptic transports from one identical house or hotel to another, should feel the need for journeys of mind or body, for pep pills or tranquillisers, or for the cathartic journeys of sex, music and dance. We spend far too much time in shuttered rooms.
It's a Nomad Nomad World, Bruce Chatwin
from, Anatomy of Restlessness
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