500 Words a Week - Boredom

A few weeks ago, we had a long away trip involving several hours on a bus. I had a conversation with one of my colleagues around the trip. To which he said he enjoyed it, enjoyed the time to slow down, be bored, and talk or think.

Thinking about our day to day lives, we are surrounded with things that occupy our attention. In fact, we seek them out. We can’t sit still, we aren’t comfortable viewing our own thoughts and letting them wander in whatever direction they want. We always need to be distracted.

“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone” – Blaise Pascal.

Hearing this quote, we would think it’s from more recent times. When we have more computer power in our pocket than what first sent NASA to the moon. When we have more social media apps or messaging services than ever before. Pascal wrote this in the 1600’s, before the telephone was invented. However, the statement has never felt more applicable.

If we saw someone sitting alone in a coffee shop, doing nothing, just enjoying their coffee, no phone, book or laptop out. We would consider them a bit strange. Rather than us who constantly relying on outward distractions rather than looking inward. Rather than observing our own thoughts and following their path.

I think we need this boredom, this time to think. Time to reflect on what’s occurring in our lifes. Time to establish the things happening in our life that give us the most energy and enjoyment, then looking for ways we can do more of this. Then analysing the things that drain us and seeing if we can reduce these.

Sometimes this might lead to unexpected truths and bring up things we need to act on. Sometimes this might highlight how things are going well. It’s just important that we do sit down to reflect.

Every chance I get to, I tend to listen to some form of podcasts. If I’m driving, walking or taking transport somewhere I’ll listen to a podcast. Even if it’s only 5 minutes. I’ve associated this with doubling up on effective use of time. While driving, I could also be listening to a podcast around some topic I can learn more about. Here again we see the problem. I’ve lost the value placed in just thinking to myself. Allowing time to explore thoughts rather than listening to endless podcasts.

This blog is a roundabout way of trying to say maybe we should put the phone down, maybe we should take the earphones out or turn off the speaker and just give ourselves time to think. Time to reflect.

Something my mom used to say to me when I was younger and complained of being bored; “Only boring people are bored.”