ENJOY YOURSELF

By and large, nudism is seasonal. Nudists turn out in droves when the air is warm, the sky is clear, and the sun is shining. Take away the sunshine and the glow of nudism is indeed gone. To be sure, nudism means many things to many people. It's a philosophy, a way of life to many; a diversion for others; a fad or a few; a lark for a small proportion. Nudism is a year-around experience for some households; an all-too-brief interlude for others; and for many people nudism is an experience—one of many—in an individual's quest for meaning and satisfaction in this brief span of years called a lifetime.

No one can really inform you in advance exactly what satisfactions and pleasures and peace of mind you will derive from you nudist experiences. But there are some rule of thumb surmises which one might offer to someone new to nudism or to some old-timers who may have crowded upon nudism too many of the problems of the mundane world.

Our first suggestion is that you seek from nudism only those things which nudism can offer on its own: warm sunshine, the envelopment of fresh air, the serenity of feeling at home with the out-of-doors, the feeling of overwhelming rightness with the world of nature, the reflectiveness of rediscovering your natural self. These things are basic experiences which you have every right to expect from a nude life, particularly the relaxing, loungy type devoid of gregariousness. You will have missed nudism's chief satisfactions if you fail to experience feelings such as those.

Nudism can be quite ugly and very human in a social context. You can bring to nudism all of your own troubles, all of your own exasperating rudeness, all of your fathomless capacities, to foment and perpetuate trouble, and you can parade these characteristics daily as you seek merely to perpetuate and mirror this aspect of your personality. You may find yourself hypnotized by other people's viewpoints; you may receive unto your hand the transfer of the perpetuating baton of hard-feeling, dissatisfaction, and restlessness which, people being people, they have a habit of bringing into each human group endeavor. There are sick personalities within the nudist movement, and there are radiantly sane personalities. There are restless, unhappy people in nudism, and there are serenely contented people in much larger number.

Nudism itself is not a panacea. Nudism always becomes ridiculous when people try to load upon its back all of the paraphernalia of everyday life and still expect nudism to appear rational and sensible. Nudism is no vehicle to carry the heavy weight of our daily woes; it is not an institution which can replace faulty social organizations in the work-a-day world.

Many people have asked to transfer to nudism the entire range of human problems and have then wondered why nudism seemed so inadequate to carry on.

Take from nudism only what nudism can offer generously: a pause in the hub-bub of a very rushed life; a chance to stretch out nude and feel a deep inward accord with fresh air and sunshine; a chance to communicate with nature; a chance to discard the routine and the symbols of the business world. Most of us get precious little time to do these things and too many of us swing into nudist park life as though it were appointment number seven on a daily log of twenty-five conferences. We clash with people; we involve the nudist structure in too much “progress;” we want to rebuild nudism on the same scale and framework of our hectic daily life. And nudism and nudists emerge the worse for this effort.

Nudism has something very basic to offer people living in this day and age, but we tend to destroy nudism with encumbrances no different than those from which we need periodic loss of contact.

Don't stretch nudism very far. Take it what it is—not for what you'd like it to be. Don't try to remake nudism, let nudism remake you.

Mervin Mounce

(Source: American Sunbather, Vol.13, No. 7, 114th issue, July, 1961)