570 The art of doing nothing Part 1 What is boredom? Oct 11th 25

 The art of doing nothing: Part 1 what is boredom, and what is triggering it?

The negative impacts of being bored:                                                                                          

When we’re bored, we become unease, uncomfortable and restless like a withdrawal from addiction. Why? Because, in our Western culture, being bored carries strong ego-driven negative feelings such as  loneliness, laziness, being useless, unimportant. Our self and social images are  wounded. Doing nothing is unacceptable.  Our ego says “ I must be busy and show to others that I am busy  ”When someone is asking: “ How are you doing?”, in around 87%  the #1 reply among active adults is “busy”

History:                                                                                                                                                    

The word “boredom” was used for the first time by C. Dickens in the 1850s.                                   

Before then boredom was never mentioned. In earlier times people found meaning and connection through village squares, church and social gatherings. The rat race did not exist. 

Boredom is a secular disease:                                                    

Being bored is a secular disease because our culture and education is teaching us that               

“Being is doing, doing is being” : Again, we want , mostly subconsciously, to show a busy self & social image. Nobody will say to  someone “I am not busy” 

Also because:                                                                                                                                                  

We are in the rat race,                                                                                                                                              

We are multi-tasking,                              

We create a mandatory “To do list”.                                                                                                      

We are addicted to IT which, by-the-way is now recognized as a medical condition similar to chemical addiction since the level of dopamine (so -called molecule of happiness) increases while we are interacting with the screen.

What is triggering boredom?                                                                                                   

Mind-made boredom occurs during 3  main instances:                                                                        

1) We can be bored when we are facing repetitive, automatic and non-stimulating   activities  such as daily duties, routine work, social events and even people. I call it active boredom.          

2) When we are disconnected from our addictions such as IT. This is passive boredom.                   

3) Because, sometimes,  we have nothing to do, even for a few minutes. In other words, boredom appears because, probably,  our ego-driven mind prefers the more exciting daydreaming worlds such as being in the past or future.

Remember: 

You are not bored, you have boredom, one of zillion feelings popping up.

Being bored is not shameful, it is a privilege that few can afford. Next week I will talk about how to deal constructively with the feeling of doing nothing w/o being bored.