Bored

Last night a group of friends were taking about boredom. One woman had mentioned that she was dealing with boredom and everyone made suggestions or talked about how they dealt with boredom. A lot of good ideas were offered and she seemed grateful.

I said that I found one way that I deal with boredom is just by saying to myself, "I'm bored."

That's all there is. The world is not boring, people are not boring, life is not meaningless. But I am, at this moment, feeling bored.

Does it mean the world is going to end? No.

Does it mean I am going to do something crazy? Not unless I choose to do so.

All it means is that at this moment, I feel bored.

When I feel happy, [horror of horrors!] all that means is that at that moment I feel happy.

Boredom will pass. Happiness will pass. Yesterday was warm and beautiful. Today we had severe storms. Tomorrow it will be dry and cool.

Summer goes, fall arrives. Fall passes, winter comes. Snow melts, spring comes. And so on.

Boredom is just a season. And having spent three decades in the monastery, sitting silently for an hour each morning and another hour each afternoon, I learned a lot about dealing with boredom.

One thing I learned is that I do not have to entertain myself. I can just be bored. It's not a moral or emotional failure. It's just boredom.

 Does this mean I am never BOTHERED by boredom? No way! I am not always serene. But I try to move in that direction by continuing the practice of sitting quietly each morning for half an hour and being ... bored. 

And when I am bored and not distracted by other things, not even by my own desperate efforts to distract myself, I notice things about myself and my inner workings that I miss otherwise.

I am not saying that this will work for everyone. But it works for me.

PS -- As for Dorothy Parker's remark, the definition of curious is

1. having a desire to learn or know more about something or someone
2. strange, unusual, or unexpected

Personally, I think I qualify on both counts.