boredom as a coping mechanism.
Is boredom actually a foreground for productivity?
I realized that I find myself consistently in a weird state of boredom often. I have this this feeling of wanting to do something and nothing at the same time. For as long as I can remember I have identified with this way of being, feeling indecisive about what I might want to do with my free time. Maybe she’s born with it?
During quarantine I found myself sitting on my couch watching TV, feeling bored and realizing I didn't even remember sitting down. As a result of this, I started to find myself unsure of how I wanted to spend my time. There is such thing as having too many options! So, I have been keeping a folder on my phone called “Let’s get it when we can” since I was in college and decided to start using it again. It houses the brain-dump of ideas that I have as a resource for when I am bored but might not want to be. From passion projects to grad school research to different books I am interested in reading. Maybe it fuels my workaholism, BUT I very much am in denial so, no thank you for any feedback.
It has been so helpful to have, as a person of waaaaaaayyyyyyy too many interests. If that’s even a problem to have. It helps me to reflect on the "have and have nots" that I have enjoyed or things that have failed to keep me interested that I reluctantly need to give up. Productivity in quarantine felt like a distant memory for a while. The last thing I wanted to do was pick up a new hobby in my house that I now had to work, eat, live, and breathe out of. But as soon as that went away I went into overdrive mode. I do this thing where I get so inspired I just genuinely have to start somewhere. It feels like my blood is boiling if I don't exert myself in some way or form. So I started drawing, painting, and collaging and just getting myself used to get creative. Eventually, this idea of being productive started to seem familiar again and the comfortability that came from staying home 24/7 now turned into an opportunity for a little bit of an escape.
Having this list has helped me to cope a lot with the feeling of being productive. Since starting my 9-5 I realized this idea of productivity that I had in college would not work anymore. The productivity you have while working is geared towards the betterment of the company compared to school where it was mainly geared towards your own knowledge being gained. College was a strong ME time for me. Like hella strong. You could not tell me anything, cause I was already doing it myself. I was finding my independence and I was the MAIN character. I did a lot that was productive towards my own well-being and had way more of an understanding of how to direct my time and make myself feel productive. Now, the idea of putting those expectations onto a job sounds like an awful mistake and mindset to have. Trust me I learned that the hard way.
Now don't get me wrong I definitely don’t use the list half as much as I could but it does comfort me to have as something to reference since I often can forget to finish many things I begin. I found myself listening to Boredom the other day and remembering when I heard it for the first time and that shit hit me very uniquely. I found myself so deeply enamored with the lyrics. “Find some time, find some time to do something”. This really resonated with me as I am a person who continuously feels like I am in a race against time. I found myself questioning is boredom technically unproductive? During this pandemic, I often felt this feeling of a suppressed boredom, lack of interest in things I used to love, lack of motivation, wow reading this back was your girl depressed? I continuously berated my thoughts with this idea of really pushing myself despite having actual motivation. Sometimes somehow boredom ended up giving me that kick that I needed to get back up.
Thinking back on my childhood I can recollect times that I had these sparks of inspiration. Now don't get me wrong being bored doesn't always pose the smartest ideas hell my friends and I used to have rock fights?! Where we used to literally throw rocks at each other from across the creek behind our apartment complex. I remember playing with friends in my neighborhood and one day decided to make my own tetherball out of boredom. I consider it to be one of my best decisions to this day, don't read into that. I put a bouncy ball in a Kroger bag (it is as sad as it sounds) and used a jump rope to tie it to a light pole. It created a fun new game for me and my friends for about 3 days then it broke and I think we got bored of it.
Regardless when feeling bored, I definitely always take it as a reminder to check in with myself and for that I am thankful. Boredom is one of those things I find so unifying as it is something we have all experienced, randomly it kind of unites us. Hell, have you seen how easy it is to bond over the love of a shared Tik tok?! And whos on tik tok if not to solve some sort of boredom. I would love to hear what you do when you are bored? Do you embrace it? Do you do anything?
As always thank you so much for reading, talk soon, Lots of love always
Rose <3