I came across this short article over the weekend and was fascinated by the thought that maybe boredom is a good thing.
I agree with the author's premise that back in the day we used to get bored pretty regularly, but that was the spur to all sorts of exciting adventures and a greater sense of appreciation for what was happening around us.
We've put some pretty clear boundaries in place for our kids - 1 hour of screen time per day (they can choose whether that's TV, Wii, computer, etc - Josh does get an exemption to be able to watch NBA highlights over breakfast though ; ) ) and I'm actually encouraged to say that often our kids do get bored and we tell them to go and find something to do. And do you know what... they do! There's not much of a more awesome sound than hearing the two of them playing together - whether that's with their lego, stuffies, old boxes, cars... so great.
Personally, I'd go further than the author of that article does and say it's not just the internet that's the problem. I think it started with TV, then computers, then the internet and now smart phones and laptops. I hear all the time that people are so busy, but I'm more and more convinced that we just feel busy, because we never switch off - our phones are always telling us about how many emails we've missed, facebook updates we haven't read, tweets we haven't been inspired by. I actually wonder if the feeling of busyness is directly related to the amount of time we feel bored - if we're bored often enough, obviously we have spare time, so we don't feel busy. However, if we never feel bored, we assume we must be busy. All the time. But if that is simply boredom being alleviated by distraction, rather than by doing things that are productive, should we be complaining...?
Now, I'm not a techno-hater by any stretch, but it is healthy for us to reflect on how often we're bored - and when we are, what our default is. I know for me, TV is the old faithful boredom-killer/distractionado (especially with Netflix... mmm, TV and internet together...), but I think next time I'm bored, I'm going to choose to go and sit on our porch and be bored for a while and see what happens. What about you?
When was the last time I was bored? What did I do to stop being bored?
When was the last time I thought "I wish I had more time to...?" How much has my boredom-killer/distraction become a re-creation-killer?
What can I do to choose to get to a place of boredom - and creatively find a different way to fix it?
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