As we walked across the country there was a direct correlation between the type of road we walked on (when not on trail, bike paths or hiking cross-country) and how frequently people stopped to offer us kindness. On paved roads people seldom stopped, on ATV roads people always stopped. This comes as no surprise, it’s more of an inconvenience to stop a fast moving car than a slow one. There’s also something deeper at work which also should come as no surprise. People with a hurried lifestyle are disinclined towards kindness. People at leisure are more inclined to spend some of that leisure being social and, consequently, being kind.
In addition to promoting kindness, leisure is right in that it promotes the health, the antithesis of stress. It’s good in that leisure promotes happiness as well. A leisurely lifestyle was normal for early nomadic societies under natural conditions, despite the false images to the contrary portrayed by an “Enlightened” society.
