#923 Doing anything that makes you feel like a caveman

Neil Pasricha

There’s something about getting in touch with your inner neanderthal that strokes your brain stem just the right way. Accomplishing something caveman-style feels good — a combination of clenched teeth, throbbing veins, and good old fashioned feistiness that we don’t always get to experience in today’s sophisticated society.

Now, although there are a lot of things that can deliver a good cavehigh, here are some of the better ones:

•Building a fire. Yes, there’s some serious satisfaction to be had from collecting a pile of twigs and logs and sending them up in smoke. You’re in the forest on your hands and knees, coaxing life-giving heat and energy out of dry, dead wood. For the full effect, leave the lighter fluid and old, crumpled copies of Newsweek at home.

•Eating a meal that is just meat. Have you ever been that person at the buffet who loads their whole plate up with just meat? You know, slab of bloody steak, couple of pork chops, maybe some ribs on the side? Sure, you see that potato salad, you see those steamed baby carrots, but you just can’t justify eating anything other than meat. And you know, that’s okay. Your inner caveman thanks you. BONUS: Filling your plate with meats that are entirely on the bone, so you can just eat with your hands and messily spray fatty meatbits everywhere. SUPER BONUS: Eating those big honkin’ turkey drumsticks that look like pterodactyl wings.

•Ignoring body hair for a really long time. Your chin fuzz grows out and connects with your unkempt mutton chops, your hair gets long and scraggly, and you suddenly start getting Ch-Ch-Ch-Chia Back. Basically, when you start looking like Johnny Damon when he was on the Red Sox, you’re living the cave man look … and you’re loving it.

•Throwing a temper tantrum much more aggressively than normal. If you’re the kind of classy gal who usually politely bee-beeps the horn when someone cuts you off, but then one time you hold it down for ten seconds, flip the bird, and scream out your window, then that’s the one. That’s your Beautiful Caveman Moment.

So I say love it. Love those caveman days, because they’re a throwback to the simple life — when instead of eating processed cheese and watching reality TV we were clubbing saber-toothed tigers and painting caves, baby.

AWESOME!

37_cavemanPhotos from: here, here, here, and here

Illustration from here

20 thoughts to “#923 Doing anything that makes you feel like a caveman”

  3. Wouldn’t caveman littering technically just be composting? I mean, everything would be biodegradable, wouldn’t it?
    But Chad, I totally agree, littering = not awesome.

  4. Pingback: #878 The smell and sound of a campfire « 1000 Awesome Things

  5. Man.. embracing that caveman is great! This one made me laugh quite a bit and I just love the photos you use to complement the blog. They always provide a good giggle. I think a ‘caveman moment’ can be applied to letting out a good expulsion of gas from whichever end as well when there aren’t any witnesses ;)

  6. Definitely awesome! Having huge pillow fights makes me feel like a caveman. Especially when you let loose a victorious roar when you have vanquished your foe.

    AWESOME!

  7. Belching so loud and for so long that tears come out of your eyes and there’s an echo…

  8. Breaking stuff!
    Releasing all of your rage, breaking stuff with a hammer or a big stcik or whatever.
    One of the best feelings ever, swinging something at some other thing with the whole strenght of your body, causing chunks and splinters to fly everywhere.
    Just yesterday we ha to demolish some giant plaster cases from a conoe-sized sculpture inside a conteiner, using our hands and some hammers unitl exhaustion.
    Theres something so very creative about violent plain savage destruction. Specially when it is not bad.
    AWESOME

  10. I had a caveman moment a while ago and it was crazy. I lived in a cave in the side of a mountain and ate fish for about 1 week. I also had only 1 pair of clothes so I really felt like a caveman.

  11. One of my high school teachers gave us a lecture once about how the way you hold your knife when you eat meat shows how cultured you are. I asked him what if I don’t use a knife? He gave me deadpan stare and said that people who don’t use knives are barbarians. :p

  13. Eating a meal that is just meat, WITH YOUR FINGERS! literally picking up a steak in both hands and just tearing into it not caring how messy you get. AN AWESOME FEELING!

  14. barely catching up on these posts, but I had to post on this one.
    At my college, a big thing was No Shave November, aka Novembeard. Which means no shaving for a month. It was pretty manly (it was an engineering school, thus male dominated and more widely accepted), and it was hilarious to see who could grow legit, lumberjack beards, and who had ugly, patchy beards.
    Those with the best beards automatically gained respect.

  16. People kept telling me I had to give the clean-cut,suit n’tie-whitecollar guy a try. So I did and just not for me. Too hard to be refined and not much fun.
    I was born in the big city but panged for the mountains- there I found MY REAL MAN! And I love my “neandrathal man” for the most part…
    he builds…and in an inspector’s quote, “beyond perfection!”
    he can fix nearly anything that’s broken.
    he rows our canoe safely to shore, in sun or storm, when electric motor quits, while I continue to catch supper we cook on a “smokin'” fire he builds!
    he provides, nostalgically, neandrathalically(?!*) like days of OLD+
    he’s brilliant and creative too* a really fine yin’yang balanced neandrathal.
    he can clean suck the marrow right out of any big old meat bone, AND that’s the for the most part stuff…that I love :o)

  17. Yes, acting like a caveman can give you temporary relief from the strict, upright position you hold yourself in, here in the modern world.

    But when I see some large lady screaming out her window, shaking her fist, looking like she’s declaring some kind of war? Uuuhh…kinda scary…O_O

  18. Pingback: 1000 Awesome Things - Evan's Blog

Comments are closed.