Have you ever spent a couple of hours (watching TV, say) being passively entertained, yet when it was over, you feel more bored than ever? That's because passivity and boredom are closely linked. The entertainment may have been fun while it lasted, but it doesn't satisfy your need for a vital, engaged, expressive life.
Boredom occurs when people are not challenged by their activities. A person has many facets, from talents to personality traits, and when too many of those are underused, boredom is the result. People are bored when they can't or don't intentionally change their activities to make them more challenging.
In some ways, boredom is actually a good sign; it means that you care how your time is being used. Unfortunately, it's also an uncomfortable, frustrating, and (sadly) sometimes necessary experience.
My solution to boredom is observation. Even if I can't actively engage in the activities I find most fulfilling, at any point in time I have a mind and the ability to observe the world around me. Standing in line, doing a repetitive task, politely listening to someone repeat a story I've heard a hundred times--all of these are times when I can devote a piece of my mind to observation. Even a fly on the wall is interesting if you are curious about it!
The bonus is that those observations, from time to time, lead to ideas that I can use in my creative projects. So while I haven't eliminated boring activities from my life, at least I've made boredom very rare.
Boredom occurs when people are not challenged by their activities. A person has many facets, from talents to personality traits, and when too many of those are underused, boredom is the result. People are bored when they can't or don't intentionally change their activities to make them more challenging. In some ways, boredom is actually a good sign; it means that you care how your time is being used. Unfortunately, it's also an uncomfortable, frustrating, and (sadly) sometimes necessary experience.
My solution to boredom is observation. Even if I can't actively engage in the activities I find most fulfilling, at any point in time I have a mind and the ability to observe the world around me. Standing in line, doing a repetitive task, politely listening to someone repeat a story I've heard a hundred times--all of these are times when I can devote a piece of my mind to observation. Even a fly on the wall is interesting if you are curious about it!
The bonus is that those observations, from time to time, lead to ideas that I can use in my creative projects. So while I haven't eliminated boring activities from my life, at least I've made boredom very rare.
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