Most people do not like being bored, same with myself. We seek stimulating, or at least acceptably so, things to do when we feel bored.
In the year 2026 being bored usually involves reaching for your phone. Having the little dopamine device in your pocket prevents you from ever being completely bored, just scroll some more or hit refresh! But using this constant drip of less-than-stimulating (or over-stimulating) material to try to solve that bordem is creating problems not just for society but for ourselves and our ability to do things as simple as learn. Being bored should cause us to want to do something, not cause us to continue doing nothing. (Excluding meditation, but if you are someone who meditates then you know that already.)
Recently whenever I start scrolling on Reddit, HackerNews, or YouTube I get a feeling that I just do not want to read any of this. The comments on Reddit annoy me often, as Redditors tend to be scared of the real world and try to convince others to be just as scared. YouTube encourages negativity with its algorithms. HackerNews has too many AI evangelists, even though the counter-crowd does make up a loud and sizable group.
On the contrary, not being on sites like these can make you feel lonely if you do not have an active social life. Look, other people to talk to! And sure, that is partly true. But these days a lot of those “people” are just AI bots. One has to wonder if cultivating this feeling of loneliness in their users when they are away from the sites is by design.
So I am learning to be bored again. I am going to start having periods of my day where I don’t reach for devices and just struggle to figure out what to do. And it is going to be glorious, eventually.
I am going to be honest, it is a bit rough at first. I can find things to do for a lot of the day, but there comes times where I just want to flop. And when the flop comes the hand reaches for the phone, but I am starting to catch myself. I think that once I experience bordem normally for a few weeks I will fall back into a more childhood style boredom where I go find things to do besides just stare at my phone. I was going to say “stare at a screen” but video games are something stimulating to do, and can be good for your mind if they are puzzle or narrative heavy.
There was a Reddit post I saw ages ago where someone said one of their coaches instructed them that if they ever got bored and could not think of a single thing to do then they have two choices: read or exercise. I want to get back my childhood reading habit where I could swallow thinner books in a day and not feel bogged down by it. If I owned my own home I would build a climbing wall in the garage and play with that all the time, but my hang-board will have to do for now.
So what kind of things can I do when I am bored? I could make a list and paste it here, but I am not going to make a list. I have a tendency to over-list things and do a lot of up-front cognitive work and burn out on stuff. Instead, I will find things to do such as hobbies that have fallen to the wayside, or read or exercise.
I am typing this on an AlphaSmart 2000, a late 90’s/early 2000’s LCD screen type-writer…thing. No internet, minimal distractions. Getting the text off of here is a bit annoying because it uses PS/2 but my PC has a PS/2 port and it still works (just have to remember to reboot the PC for the PS/2 to be picked up).
I want to decide what I want to do. I do not want my day-to-day, my beliefs, my interests to be shaped by wealthy tech bros or their AI bots or their algorithms. I will go out and meet people in the real world. I will take my mind back. I will take my time back.
I will learn how to be bored again.