I grew up in a small village but almost my entire adult life I spent in degenerate big cities. At first, I enjoyed this quite a bit, and this also led to the unforeseen outcome of me writing books about picking up women. As I got older, I also reflected more on not only myself but also societal trends and manipulation techniques. It took me a decade or two, yet eventually I realized that cities are abominations, and living in bigger cities drives this point home even more. Of course, I did not exclusively spent my time in shitty Western metropolises. I also quite frequently visited friends and family who live in small towns or on the countryside, or on the outskirts of cities. This certainly provided a welcome break but in the back of my mind there was always the thought that I had to return to the shitty big city soon. These thoughts had the nasty habit of sometimes cropping up when I was most at ease, for instance during a lengthy walk in a forest, which turned it into a somewhat melancholic experience.

Due to some decisions I made years ago, and a bit of luck, I am now in the position that I can work fully remotely. With some employers, I had a gentlemen’s agreement that they would not care where I worked and did not ask me to come to the office, yet I did not want to prematurely want to escape the big city as this would have, technically, constituted a breach of contract. Funnily enough, or perhaps not, I know of people in a similar position at those company who were ordered to work from the office for three days a week later on, and this includes some people who thought that they would be able to work from home indefinitely.

My approach was to build up a track record as a remote information worker, more precisely: a high-IQ wage cuck. This put me in increasingly better positions throughout the years, and now I am indeed able to work fully remotely. With my most recent job I even got the chance to pick among several countries. This was reason enough to seriously consider leaving those degenerate cesspools behind. I now live in a largish village, perhaps a bit too large, but it is a good start. There is easy access to nature, reasonably fast Internet (and if not, I could just get Starlink), and even two grocery stores. In short, everything I need I have, and a lot of the things I do not need I do not have to suffer through. There are virtually no graffiti, and none on buildings. You can open the window without some cultural enricher walking past your building, with a boombox on his shoulder, smoking a joint. In that regard, the situation was so bad at my last place, and we are talking about living in a pretty highly sought-after district, that I could only air my apartment if I got up early in the morning.

Knowing that I can be here indefinitely, or in anywhere else in the countryside, has improved my quality of life a lot. I do not think I am unique in that regard. For instance, if you can just walk or take your bike and minutes later you are in a quiet forest, you basically get an effect that is very similar to meditation. You do not need to sit in the lotus position for half an hour, trying to clear your mind. Instead, you can just walk around in a forest, pay attention to chirping birds, or listen to the rustling leaves. This also has an intense meditative effect, and it is even better when you know that you can do this multiple times a day now if you so desire, and basically until the end of your life.

My sleep has much improved, too. I thought I had no sleeping problems, and it probably would be a bit of a stretch to say that I had, but here, probably because there is little to no background noise, I get tired earlier, fall asleep much more easily, and wake up naturally in the early morning hours. Even in the city I did not have to use an alarm clock but I did not feel as refreshed in the morning as I do now.

I may chose to live in a village or a hamlet that is a bit more remote. One reason is that there is a modicum of diversity here. The other day I even noticed a group of pre-teen cultural enrichers who exhibited behavior and body language they probably taught themselves from watching rap videos. Of course, this has absolutely nothing to do with genes or low IQ. Well, there is some welfare housing in the area, too, and even some Ukrainian refugees are around. At least the situation is not intolerable. I nonetheless would prefer not to be reminded that my tax money is used to finance the lives of such people.

Interestingly, I spend less time in front of my computer as well. Sometimes, I just sit in the garden, doing nothing, or I take a walk. In contrast, in the big city I sometimes had the need to spend an hour or two reading news or commentary, playing video games, or watching videos almost mindlessly. Sometimes, I had an intense day at work, which ended up with me having dinner with my wife, and afterwards I just vegged out in the living room for a few hours before going to bed. Of course, this was not my typical day. In contrast, today I had a pretty intense day at work as well, but I am completely relaxed despite having spend virtually no time on consuming media.

Life is pretty good here and the big city already feels incredibly far away, geographically and temporally alike. This is captured very well in an anecdote: Shortly before I moved out of my apartment in the big city, I injured myself. It was nothing major; I just hit my toe in an unfortunate way. On my second day here, I stepped on something hard, which caused me some pain and my first thought was that I should probably go see a doctor if I still feel pain that easily, only to reconsider after realizing that I injured myself just a few days ago. At that point, it already felt as if I had been living in the countryside for weeks.