Scott H Young

I don’t believe boredom is caused by a lack of things to do. I don’t think that it is even caused by a lack of things you want to do. Rather I’ve found boredom is usually mislabeled to disguise a different problem. This is why most attempts to stop boredom don’t work, because they don’t address the real problem.

Here are some tricks I’ve found to help expose the real culprit behind a feeling of boredom and get back to your normal self:

• Figure out what you really want to do. Boredom often masks a problem where you want to do a particular activity but something is preventing you. This could happen when you want to watch your favorite television show, but the cable is out. When this happens, the first step to killing boredom is to simply recognize the activity that you truly want to be doing.
• Nuke procrastination. Procrastination can cause boredom if there aren’t any distractions available to take your mind off your task. If this is the case, try one of these tips to eliminate the wait and get busy again.
• Get your compass straight. Boredom can just as easily be caused by a lack of direction. Spend a few minutes identifying your goals, desires or passions. Sometimes simply bringing up these can get you motivated again.
• Socialize. Get out and meet some friends, or make some new friends. Boredom can often disguise a lack of social energy. Even if you can’t see how to meet new people in your area and your friends are busy, go to an online forum that shares one of your interests or pick up a phone.
• Put off your boredom. Take a look at your to-do list. Commit to doing just one tiny task on that list before you find something fun to do. Often putting off your boredom for a few minutes by being productive can kick the feeling.
• Learn something new. Perhaps what you need is some mental stimulation. Here are some fast things you can do to start learning something new:
  • Read a book
  • Research a topic your interested in online
  • Write a short story
  • Pull up photoshop (or download GIMP if you don’t have it) and practice your artistic skills.
• Cut off distractions. Boredom can happen when you are doing a low value task, like random internet surfing or watching television shows that don’t interest you. Distractions can be a black hole, sucking you into a prolonged state of disinterest. Turn off the television or computer and start moving around until you find something better to occupy you.
• Fill schedule holes. Too much time is often worse than no time at all. It can be difficult to adjust to the boredom when you suddenly have a schedule vacuum. I often find myself getting irritated during holiday periods where my normally busy schedule empties. Spend a few minutes to fill schedule holes to prevent boredom in the first place.
• Become your own cheerleader. I’ve been bored due to a temporary lack of confidence. Who wants to work hard towards a goal when you’ve been dealt an upsetting blow to your belief that you will succeed? Take some time to review your wins and high points so that you can restore some confidence and keep moving.
• Meditate. This has become my default activity in cases of extreme boredom. Check out the popular article I wrote for ZenHabits about how to do it (and why).
• Journal. Open up a word document and just start writing. This works similarly to meditation, although it is a bit more active and less imaginative.
• Add a new challenge. If you find yourself consistently bored, this usually means you have a section of time where you don’t have an activity that meets your needs. Add a new goal, challenge or hobby to fill up the time.

These are just a few of the methods I use regularly when I have to combat boredom. But these are just suggestions. The best way to combat boredom is to understand why your bored. I’ve found that boredom usually has one of these five root causes. Know the cause and your closer to a cure:

1. Procrastination - You aren’t bored, just procrastinating. Figure out what tasks you are putting off and nuke the procrastination.
2. Lack of Useful Energy - Boredom isn’t the same as exhaustion, but it occurs when you have an abundance of one form of energy but are exhausted in the energy you would find useful. I’ve had this happen when I can’t get myself to keep working, but I don’t feel physically tired. Find an activity that will use the energy you have an abundance of. This could mean doing something physical after spending all day writing or doing something creative after an entire day of churning out boring code.
3. Schedule Gaps - Your schedule has suddenly changed and you don’t have the flurry of busyness to protect you anymore. Sometimes the answer is to quickly add more tasks. Other times you need to settle into the discomforting quiet and use this time for some reflection.
4. Environmental Obstacles - Waiting in line, taking a long plane ride, forced away from an internet connection for a week. This kind of boredom usually just requires you to be creative until the situation changes.
5. Lack of Motivation - You don’t have the motivation to do what you should do to eliminate boredom. In short periods, this problem can usually be overcome by using a simple motivation trick. In longer periods, this needs to be addressed with some serious reflection, goal setting and reestablishing your priorities.

You can use the first tips I suggested for overcoming boredom, or you can devise your own once you know the root of the problem. What are your tips for overcoming boredom?

Image courtesy of flickr

Is willpower really that important? I’m doubting this assumption. It seems that the more I’ve learned about improvement and psychology, the less important willpower seems. Habits, energy management, and various human quirks seem to have pushed will into a smaller and smaller corner as a means to explain or plan for success.

Now I’m starting to see that willpower isn’t much more than an illusion, a quirk of the brain designed to make us feel like we have a lot more control than we actually do.

Intuitively, it feels obvious that I have willpower. I mean, what else caused me to write this article when I could be taking a nap, pulled myself to the gym when I could have watched television or finished my run yesterday on a sun parched stretch of highway where there was a strong urge to collapse and roll into the few inches of water still held in the ditch?

But just because willpower feels like it must exist, doesn’t mean it actually works that way in reality. Just because it feels like the sun must revolve around the earth doesn’t mean it does. And just because you can’t see microbes, doesn’t mean you should stop taking medicine when you get sick. Pretty much the entire sum of our knowledge is based on things our intuition gets wrong. Could it be the same with willpower?

Willpower is a Placeholder Understanding

Probably the hardest thing to do for a person is to utter the words, “I don’t know.” But it is probably impossible for most people to say, “I don’t know,” and still not try to guess. Any theory, even a wrong one, must be better than nothing, right?

I think willpower is one of those placeholder theories for what makes people tick. It is a fuzzy view of the world that says were in control and if used properly you can do anything. But in reality this doesn’t seem to be the case. There are times when we can use our willpower and other times we fail to. What gives?

In the real world, I don’t think willpower exists at all. It is just a handy, placeholder theory most people use to explain systems that they don’t understand. Although I am incredibly far from understanding the world and human behavior, I’ve found just a couple models that are better than willpower for explaining how people function:

• Habits - This model suggests that regular behavior becomes automatic, ceasing to rely on exertion.
• Energy Management - This model suggests that our ability to do anything is based on energy. Energy is a metaphor for the physical resources, motivation, knowledge and purpose we can devote to a task.
• Motivation - Willpower doesn’t make things happen, but rather a strong drive will compel action.
• Confidence - Belief that you can achieve something will move you forward with a strong enough drive.

And these are only a few models, each explaining away willpower as some magical ingredient for success. Of course those models are still simplifications, placeholders for deeper understandings.

Breaking Down Illusions is the Purpose of Life

Knowing theories like these, you can better explain and plan. Trying to use “willpower” to get myself to write might work for awhile, but I’ll be a lot more successful if I use one of the above models. Even deeper theories of those might work better to help myself understand what to do.

An unfortunate trust is that most people settle into confirmation bias. Once you have a theory, even a grossly simplified and inaccurate one of how the world works, it becomes increasingly more difficult to change your mind. You seek evidence and examples that confirm your hypothesis and discredit the contrary evidence.

I think it is useful to assume basically that everything you think you know now, is a gross simplification. Your goal is to continually refine and seek better metaphors and examples to explain the world. This has meant for me abandoning a lot of models that work a little but don’t work great.

It might sound like I’m talking about some intellectual practice that should be reserved for bearded men in old chairs smoking pipes and sipping brandy, but I feel this process of continually striving for a deeper understanding, is the core of my philosophy. Every post I try to write has been an attempt for myself to break through the placeholders and seek a model that works better, from holistic learning to vertical and lateral growth.

Know Thy System

Everything in life is a system. Although you can never get to the deepest level of understanding, I don’t believe it is a good idea to settle for the placeholder theories you come across, no matter how seductive they may be. Willpower is just one of these illusions people use to avoid deeper explanations.

What other illusions and placeholder theories do you see around you?