It’s hard to imagine life in America without an automobile. Getting from our homes to work, school, stores, and other events would be impossible, or at least infinitely more difficult for the majority of people sans automobile. But as with so many things in modern America, cars have become much more than basic instruments of utility. They are big. They are fancy. They are rolling tributes to the infinitely expanding debt that our economic system has produced. Although I find our economic system a very important topic worthy of many posts and in depth conversations, today I want to focus on something less macro. I want to talk about the daily dividends my crappy car pays me in the form of mental peace.

The real problem with the fancy cars that so many of us drive around in is that, deep down, we know we can’t afford it. We have loans outstanding that often rival a year’s worth of our salaries. And so what do we do? We obsessively guard the cars. We are on the lookout for runaway shopping carts and grandmas with less than perfect control over how far they swing their car doors open. We buy Armor-All in bulk and refuse to take trips so we don’t “put a ton of miles on the car.”

All of this worry is detrimental to our physical and mental health. Stress is already an epidemic in America, so why are we so eager to pile more on? I like to simplify my life, and to not have to care about the small things. That’s why my car is a piece of crap.

But lest you think that is a disparaging remark, allow me to clarify: I love my piece of crap. I’ve named him Pete. You may have guessed it, but “Pete” comes from the fact that he’s a Chrysler PT Cruiser. 105,000 miles. Dings in the doors. Rust on the back. Stains on the seats. Kelly Blue Book tells me he’s worth about $1,500 on a good day. But the value here is so much more than monetary.

Just last week I was in a Walmart parking lot, when a stressed out mother of a young child nearly fell apart when her daughter flung open her back door into my car. It was hot out, and both of us had our windows down. I heard her gasp and say “oh my god” and jump out of the car with a litany of apologies, clearly very worried about the new dent now in the side of my car. I simply got out and took a look out of curiosity. I then had the opportunity to look another human being in the eyes and say what I believe to be one of the most beautiful phrases in modern English: “Don’t worry about it.” The pleasure I received in that moment by releasing another human from an unpleasant situation was far more gratifying than driving around in a beautiful new car. If I had been, then I likely would have reacted differently, and two people, myself and the mother, would have walked away from the encounter bitter and angry.

The point is, driving my old car allows me to not care. I have the freedom of not being worried if something happens to it. It’s worth almost as much in scrap metal as it is in drivable condition, so I don’t worry even if a major incident happens. It is paid off, so I owe no debt, and there is no lienholder on the title. I may do as I wish with the vehicle in any moment. And the amount of money driving it saves me in insurance premiums and rapid depreciation is enough to fund things I truly care about.  When the time comes to replace Pete, and I certainly hope that is far off in the future, I will find another just like him, cut from the same cloth. A car who isn’t high maintenance or self-important, with few worries and a quietly calm demeanor. Because eventually, those traits rub off on the owner, and the car becomes once again a bearer of freedom instead of the modern day leather wrapped ball and chain.

If there was one thing you could do right now to improve the quality of your life, and your ability to think, what would it be? The answer is: Improve your vocabulary. Words are the outward manifestation of our internal thoughts. It’s the mental creation that we send out into the universe. Poor vocabulary begets poor thoughts, and as our thoughts go, so goes our life.

The English language is very rich indeed. The choice of words for any given situation is astonishingly large. But instead of drawing from this vast repository of language, most people opt for commonplace words and expressions. In actuality, this is mental laziness, and the person being cheated is the speaker. By foregoing the use of more nuanced terms in favor of pedestrian phrases, detail is omitted and control relinquished. Your words truly do create your reality, and this cannot be stressed enough.

A useful exercise: Next time, before answering an email, think through what you are saying. Ask yourself if you can use different words that align more closely with the message you wish to convey. The goal is to evoke imagery and emotion. You want what you’re saying to really have dimensions instead of being a flat response. Perhaps as you write, take a few moments to look up some synonyms for the words you planned to use, and then really look at the definitions that each word has. You’ll be surprised at how often you discover a new term that aligns perfectly with the mental picture you are trying to paint. As time goes on, you will build your linguistic repertoire, and take better command of your mental space.

When you master your thoughts, you master your life. And because all of our thoughts, both internal and external, are constructed in language, mastering your language is a crucial first step. Start today, and consciously integrate more refined terminology into your daily routine. The results will be nothing short of miraculous.

We live in the Information Age. All of our questions can be answered at the touch of a button via Google, and problems that have plagued the world for centuries or more are being solved at an ever accelerating pace. Sounds fantastic. But is it?

Time for a vocabulary lesson. The Sesame Street word of the day is “Inundation”. That handy little Google that I mentioned spits out the following definition:

1. An overwhelming abundance of people or things; 2. Flooding. Glut was listed as a synonym.

Perhaps the term gluttony conjures images of a portly guy stuffing his face until he is totally immobile, relegated to spending his evening in his chair until he passes out. He then wakes up the next day to consume another egregiously excessive portion.

With this physical gluttony, the body simply cannot digest all that it has been forced to consume. Our information inundation is no different. All this constant consumption, and no way possible for our brains to absorb it all.

So what happens? Think back to the last time you drank too much. I mean the last time you got unequivocally hammered out of your mind…. Did you throw up? Feel like you were going to? The alcohol went from being something you enjoyed and something that benefited you, to something that was poisoning your body. It was simply too much to be handled. And if you did in fact vomit, then the excess was pushed out of your body. This is what happens to us with an inundation of information.

But what gets pushed out of us is where our real concern begins. In order to consume more information, our brain pushes out our quiet space. This quiet space is essential to our humanity. It’s where we form our moral conscience and judge the world around us. It is where our creativity comes to light and where we spawn new ideas. It is where we retreat from the world and practice just “being”. What this means is that in order to begin critically examining the world around us, and thereby reclaim our humanity, we must first reclaim our quiet space.

A few tips for doing so:

1. Less TV – The ultimate in unproductive distraction, TV watching drains your energy and kills your creative thoughts almost as fast as a bullet to the head. Not to mention the mental havoc that is wreaked by the parade of advertisements one is subjected to while watching. If you must watch, budget a set amount of time and hold yourself to it.

2. Sit in the Silence – Feel uncomfortable sitting alone? That’s because, unlike in the past, we always have “contact” in today’s world. A phone, a TV, a laptop. Another person’s words or ideas are always available to fill our mental voids, shutting down thinking. Spend some time alone in silence, and learn to love your time away from it all.

3. Meditate – Finally, and tying into number 2, is meditation. I know it’s a dead horse that has been beaten to nothing but formerly horse dust particles by every talking head and internet source imaginable. And yet, unlike most oft repeated things theses days, this one is actually helpful. You cannot clearly think with a million information driven voices in your head. So first think of nothing. Do nothing. Practice simply existing. Once this is down, you will be much better able to tackle the questions that have troubled your mind.

I hope that, if nothing else, you walk away from this post with an awareness of what too much information can do to your mental space, and perhaps a few basic tools to combat it. As a final note, realize that philosophizing doesn’t have be metaphysical, although it certainly can be. Thinking critically about the more down to earth implications of circumstances and decisions in your life is a perfectly valid form of philosophizing, and the one from which most people will derive the most benefit. Take your time, work through your thoughts without beating yourself up, and have fun. Time spent in thought is never time wasted.