The Importance of Boredom

A couple of years ago Angela from Tampa Bay Wellness Magazine sent out a request to writers to write some words on boredom. I remember writing back that I had not been bored in so long that I didn't know what to say. And it was true, Living Room Yoga occupied so much of my time and energy that every spare moment was filled up.

Last Memorial Day weekend I spent almost the entire weekend working - on social networking, website updating, catching up on emails - and I began to feel resentful. I was actually relieved when I accidentally deleted a whole file of "Top Priority" emails! Doing that made me just STOP THE MADNESS. I vowed to set better boundaries on work and play because between the two, play never got a chance! The first thing I did was change my settings to stop getting notifications everytime someone breathed on Facebook and Twitter. The next thing was to decide to go on the social networking sites only once a week. And finally, I committed myself to shutting off my computer on my days off.

My next day off I did shut the computer completely off. I knew if I even turned it on I would get sucked into the energy of working. It was really hard, I am not going to lie. But I did it. And at times that day I actually felt BORED. Yesterday was my second Friday to shut off my computer. At one point as I piled the laundry on my bed to put away Orange my cat laid down right on top of the clothes and began to purr. (Yes, this explains why I wear cat hair as an accessory). As I stood there petting the purring cat I realized that I did not have to hurry or be efficient in putting away the laundry. I could pet the cat until the cat was done with my petting and still have plenty of time and energy to put away the clothes. Petting the cat was filling up the space left by not working. It was at that moment I truly realized THE IMPORTANCE OF BOREDOM. Boredom is what happens before SOMETHING GOOD FILLS YOUR TIME. What I had done before is let work fill my time at the first inkling of boredom. In doing that I did not make room energetically or actually to allow fun into my life. Petting the cat was fun - for the cat and for me. (Hey, it's a start!).