Boredom was king when I was a child.
It helped me in more ways than I can count. But, now when I discover pockets of boredom, I don’t savor them like I used to. In fact, being bored can make me feel down right uncomfortable.
So what was it about childhood that allowed me to appreciate the nothingness of boredom?
To be honest – a lot of things. As a child, I was given the freedom to waste my summer days with little responsibility. June, July and August were meant to be wasted outside doing nothing in particular with a hand full of friends that lived on the same street, typically coming home when the street lights came on, dirty and exhausted.
Us neighborhood kids would weave in and out of each other’s days, between eating meals and escaping the afternoon heat, and have very little to show for it come sun down.
Some days we’d make up games and traipse around the neighborhood in a huge round of hide-and-seek. Other days we’d feed the neighborhood horses, catch pollywogs in the ditch, or chase down the ice cream truck. But mostly there were days when we’d lie on a blanket in someone’s front lawn and look up at the sky doing absolutely nothing at all.
It was day, upon day of nothing-ness… and I relished every moment of it.
Tell me something, when did a good summer become synonymous with a busy summer? For that matter, when did a busy life become synonymous with a a good life?
Summer is a time reserved for boredom, and nothingness, of wasting time, and enjoying more stillness. Summer, much like an important appointment, ought to be protected as time for our brains to catch up to our bodies and find a slower rhythm to our days.
Enjoy your boredom. Protect it. Relish it. Thank it for the space it makes in your heart and mind to care for yourself in ways that a busy life never could.
Then, when life returns to ‘normal,’ because it will, don’t leave it behind. Schedule your boredom. Schedule your stillness and take a few extra moments to lie on your back and look at the clouds.
Trust me when I say, your inner child will thank you for listening.
