The Benefits of Boredom

Are you bored? Got nothing to do? If you think that boredom is something to
be avoided - read this. It turns out that boredom may actually be a good thing:

But are we too busy twirling through the songs on our iPods -- while checking e-mail, while changing lanes on the highway -- to consider whether we are giving up a good thing? We are most human when we feel dull. Lolling around in a state of restlessness is one of life's greatest luxuries -- one not available to creatures that spend all their time pursuing mere survival. To be bored is to stop reacting to the external world, and to explore the internal one. It is in these times of reflection that people often discover something new, whether it is an epiphany about a relationship or a new theory about the way the universe works. Granted, many people emerge from boredom feeling that they have accomplished nothing. But is accomplishment really the point of life? There is a strong argument that boredom -- so often parodied as a glassy-eyed drooling state of nothingness -- is an essential human emotion that underlies art, literature, philosophy, science, and even love.

"If you think of boredom as the prelude to creativity, and loneliness as the prelude to engagement of the imagination, then they are good things," said Dr. Edward Hallowell, a Sudbury psychiatrist and author of the book "CrazyBusy." "They are doorways to something better, as opposed to something to be abhorred and eradicated immediately."

Here's an interesting article by Carolyn Y. Johnson for the Boston Globe (kind of long, but if you're bored reading it, don't blame me, mmkay?) : Link

Photo: Globe Staff / Yoon S. Byun


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I can honestly say I can't remember the last time I was bored. Sitting around, surrounded by quiet- yeah, I get that sometimes. Even so, I'll take boredom over abject terror anyday.
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I agree with the article wholeheartedly. One of life's greatest pleasures is that one moment is different from another and not pounded into to similarity with social connectivity or micro entertaiment.

Just to ride on a bus, staring out of the window or to stand in line in your local grocery shop, thinking about whatever happened to that girl that was in your class. To not be able to read your local newspaper when abroad. Experiencing unpleasantry, embracing boredom.

Btw, I am not against any of the opportunities that modern technology offers, it's just that it's only one of the infinite number of ways of living our daily lives.
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