In Thoreau’s novel, Walden, the reader becomes an insider to Thoreau’s world and how life is greatly impacted by location. Thoreau starts off his project by moving away from civilization and looking for a place to live. He finds his temporary home at Walden Pond where he starts with few resources and outside inputs. Thoreau even has to borrow the axe that he will use to cut down trees to be able to make his home for the next two years. Thoreau asserts that his experiment to move to Walden Pond is not permanent, meaning Walden Pond is not his forever home. Walden Pond is however the foundation precept of how location impacts one’s way of life. The place you live shapes the way you live and how you interact with the world around you. Before Thoreau makes the bold decision of going off the grid he lived in a normal civilization. Thoreau decides to move away from civilization so that he can find himself, because he had not been able to live a simple life in the previous place he had lived. His goal was find the most authentic way to live his life. He says, “Not till we are lost, in other words, not till we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and the infinite …show more content…
His mentor acted as a spiritual guide to Thoreau. Over time, Walden Pond became his place and his home. This is the place that would change Thoreau and his view on the world. While living at Walden Pond Thoreau really had no ties to a community or civilization, instead he has the nature of the land to live off of and connect to. This becomes essential for Thoreau’s clarity in life and his path to simplicity. When realizing that all Thoreau had was his home that he built, it becomes evident that not having anything else such as the ties to community, and material items actually helped Thoreau. When all you have is the place that you live you learn to appreciate and respect that place