Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Creation >

This Thread Will Change Your Life: Experiments in the Philosophy of Everyday Life

01:41 / 12.12.04

I've never read either one of the two books that inspired this thread - This Book Will Change Your Life: 365 Daily Instructions for Hysterical Living, by Benrik or Astonish Yourself!: 101 Experiments in the Philosophy of Everyday Life, by Roger-Pol Droit... but who cares?! The point is that the idea is cool and that the combined power of a board full of artsy, intelligent, counterculturals should be able to come up with a pretty kickin' list similar to those in the books.

I'll get the ball rolling:

see how long you can go without talking
call in sick to work or school
hunt, cook, and eat an animal
try a new food
blame someone for a mistake that you made
fast for a week
write a poem
tell someone you care about (whom you don't usually tell this to) that you love them
steal something
sleep in the wilderness
insult someone
move everything in your bedroom besides your bed to a different room for at least one night
answer all questions completely honestly for one day
go a day without wearing any clothes
say yes to every request asked of you
say no to every request asked of you
repeat a word until it's phonetic properties become more interesting to you than it's meaning
watch a movie with the sound turned off (try this with both one you've seen and one you haven't)
burn a dollar bill
purposely inflict pain on yourself
pick an address at random from the phonebook and send a gift to it
burn a bible
read a book in one sitting
sing in public
take a drive to nowhere in particular
stay awake for 24 hours
go to sleep when it is light out, and wake up when it is dark
insult a police officer
contemplate the fact that someday you will die
make a painting with your hands
refrain from using electricity for one week
read something (of substantial length) in a language you don't understand
learn ten new words
stop using punctuation for a day

add your own!

(If you don't know what this is all about, click the links above)
(Oh yeah, and thanks to Squirmelia for the idea)

07:09 / 12.12.04

repeat a word until it's phonetic properties become more interesting to you than it's meaning

This one is funny. I remember once I repeated a word over an over and suddenly found that it had become completely meaningless to me.
Luckily it was temporary. What would happen if all words could only be used a set number of times before you had to replace it?

17:35 / 12.12.04

Avoid expressing ownership for a week. (Like, don't use words like my, your, his)

Less searchable M0rd4nt

22:51 / 15.12.04

Damn, I remember having done about 50% of those (I have a sneaking suspicion I may have done some of the others but I'd have to check with my drinking buddies). BTW, does insulting a police officer count if you're 5 and he's your uncle?

I do this one--repeat a word until it's phonetic properties become more interesting to you than it's meaning--all the time since moving to Spain. Seeing your own language from the outside is awesome. Oh yeah, and I read something (of substantial length) in a language you don't understand every so often--mostly Catalan newspapers. Oh, and the new food thing. A very lot. You know, like octopus and stuff.

Now, on todays' menu we have some nice fresh Teach someone to read, with a side order of even better if it's an adult someone. To follow, we have Plant a tree; for dessert, perhaps you'd care to try the Get the wrong bus on purpose?

09:14 / 16.12.04

a variation of sleep in the wilderness is sleep in the street. I tried this some months ago.
Of course, you might want to think about which neighbourhood you do this in to avoid arrest or mugging.

12:54 / 16.12.04

Stolen from other threads and other places:

Bed Head's suggestion in the Tea and Crumpets thread:
Butter your crumpets with oil paint. (Or if you see that as a waste of food, since you then probably should not eat them, dip them in wine instead).

From the Wandering notebook thread:
Give a stranger your notebook.

From the Mail Art community on LiveJournal:
Turn your love-letters into an art work.

21:40 / 16.12.04

I'm a bit of sucker for this kind of stuff after getting inspired by Ken Cambell years ago saying something simple like, 'Everyone should do something they've never done before every day of their lives' So i try to keep to that.

Also got a bit carried away with the Dice Man a couple of years back and decide to have a Dice day. Rolling a dice every hour from 8am until 11pm. Half choices i'd like and half choices i wouldn't and having to do whatever the dice says. Had an interesting day to say the least. I won't bore everyone with the entire day but by 11 i'd bunked off work, spent an hour reading Farmers Weekly, hopped up and down Wardor Street on one leg for an hour, shoplifted a book, had a pint, sat down and meditated cross legged in the middle of a busy shopping street for an hour and got in a fight.

As for new ideas...

Everyone should carry around one of those plastic snowstorm ornaments that you shake up and the snow goes everywhere. Carry one with you and whoever you meet shake it front of their faces and say, 'That's it. DO YOU GET IT!'

02:24 / 17.12.04

wow, really great stuff so far guys!
I'm going to have to actually try some of these some time. ghadis - your dice idea (even though it's not actually your idea) sounds like it would yield some particularly exciting results.

03:56 / 17.12.04

If you tried that snowglobe thing on me, I think I'd punch you in the face. I have extremely low tolerance for anything christmas related.
But, hey, I've never been arrested before, so that would still be a new experience

09:17 / 17.12.04

Dice are fun, although I am usually too lazy to actually manage to do the dice thing.

Snowglobes that you insert your own picture in are available, so maybe you could choose a really meaningful picture to put in one before shaking it in front of someone's face?

16:11 / 18.12.04

Maybe put a sigil inside a snowglobe?

18:40 / 25.12.04

Just seen Learning To Love You More which has assignments such as "Recreate an object from someone's past".

13:33 / 30.12.04

repeat a word until it's phonetic properties become more interesting to you than it's meaning

Oh, jiminy christmas, that's my job! I spend my days reading three-line extracts in MonoConc Pro, and it doesn't take long before you can't pronounce basic English words...

~L

18:24 / 14.01.05

Put on an different accent.

there were a couple months that I wore an English accent most of the time. It was really fun. I'm sure I sounded completely phoney, but there were a few people who were convinced that I wasn't from here. I guess strangers naturally assume that you'll talk to them in your own natural accent.

This week I heard for the first time ever an English person putting on an American accent. I might have passed her for an actual american, but the way she drew out her R's was a tiny bit unnatural. Interestingly, Mexicans do the same thing when they speak Spanish with an american (gringo) accent, only they make their r's 10 times more unnatural.

09:22 / 15.01.05

Run away to the North East of England ( Gateshead, Whitby Bay, it makes no difference, ) and swim with the seals.

19:11 / 30.07.05

I'm bumping this thread because I stumbled upon it today and had forgotten how wonderful it was/is.

keep adding to the list, people!

19:34 / 12.11.05

bumping again, and adding a few new ones:

- in a public place, take out a marker and write on the walls (I thought of this because yesterday I spent alot of time on the subway and the train, and felt a strangely strong desire to vandalise a few of the posters, but a) didn't have a marker on me, and b) was too much of a chicken)
- pretend to be someone you're not
- walk into a fast food restaurant, sit down, and eat a meal you have brought from home (without ordering anything)
- walk up to a stranger and start a conversation
- get together a group of people and sing loudly (maybe dance too?) in a public place (try to get others to join in)
- don't shower, dress up in some dirty clothes, put some dirt on your face and in your hair, and sit out on the street pretending to be homeless person asking for money for a few hours (you should probably give any money you get to real homeless people)

neverendingeyes

21:18 / 15.11.05

damn this is a good thread! I know what I'm doing on my next day off work...

here's a good one:
sit at a bus stop or public place, and see how long you can stare at someone near you- even if they look over.

Isn't it interesting how taboo that is??? why????

00:10 / 16.11.05

Give away a prized possession.

By a large canvas and paint a scene of your daily life (include yourself as a figure in the painting).

Smash a mirror and/or walk under a ladder.