Let's Get Bored

Getting something out of nothing

B&W photo by Jesse Peretz, 1987, non-silver process print.

I’ve developed a routine for writing these essays week after week. Each Saturday, I set out in the morning for a 3-to-4-mile hike or ruck. Usually I take my dog; but I purposefully don’t bring AirPods, and I only take my phone out of my pocket to take notes. I’ll keep going as long as it takes, which is usually about an hour after my mind settles down. On Sunday, I spend another hour or two writing and editing what I memorized the day before. That’s it.

I use versions of the same ritual for other creative tasks, songwriting, planning a lecture, making up a new deal structure, even solving a personal problem. I need that time away from distraction to develop new ideas and concepts, to break through the noise in my brain. It’s always worth making time for clear, uncluttered thinking. I’d say it’s necessary.

I wonder if these strategies are the result of me becoming more productive and organized, or if it’s because my mind is getting less organized and more chaotic as the culture changes? I suspect both things are true. I’m getting more disciplined, but I know my attention span has eroded. Modern life is so deeply distracting on so many levels, it’s relentless. Our minds are so constantly occupied with so little substance.

I feel a small sense of dread before setting out on these Saturday hikes. My brain sounds the alarm that an hour with no media will be insufferable. I’ll be in lost in the abyss of silence, nothing to keep me entertained. My monkey mind resists discomfort, while my higher brain actively seeks clarity and inspiration through the magic door of boredom.

It’s hard at first. When I first start walking my thoughts are a jumbled mess. By the second mile I’m getting into a flow state, able to completely focus on my narrative. I may walk several blocks so internally focused that I can’t remember anything I’ve just seen. The wild thing is when I get my brain working right, the boredom is gone. I’m working at full power, laser focused without distraction. When it works, getting bored isn’t all that boring after all.

This morning I talked to my dad, an English professor and an academic and creative writer, about his own process. Did he have similar rituals when writing? He said no, he is ready to work as soon as he sits down at the computer. The word processor is the successor to his clickity-clackity manual typewriter that used to lull me to sleep as a child. I guess I used to do that as well, at least in college and law school. Back in the 90s, though, when I wrote music as a job, I’d get in the car and drive for hours in silence to write a lyric. It’s like I need to occupy an insignificant part of my brain with something mundane like walking or driving so I can quiet down enough to hear the voice of God whispering into my mind’s ear…or something like that. My fellow creatives know what I mean. The best ideas arrive fully-formed for a quiet mind.

I’m thinking about all this as I’m reading The Comfort Crisis by Michael Easter. Easter’s book blames our present physical and mental health crises in part on our constant access to - and indulgence in - comfort in various forms. Whether mental or physical, we’re always seeking conveniences and shortcuts, which removes us from the rugged cultures that required us to do all sorts of difficult things to survive. We have access to convenient services, delicious foods, comfort-controlled environments, and all the world’s information at our fingertips. We have it easy - too easy.

Easter recommends doing hard things every day - including occasionally taking on very ambitious hard things - in service of greater health and well-being.

In terms of physical fitness, I’ve long adopted this lifestyle where I routinely and voluntarily do hard things. I exercise outdoors year-round, regardless of weather, usually pre-dawn, in a way that regularly pushes my limits. I’m not trying to go to the Arctic on months-long wild game hunts like Easter, but hey, I probably would if I had the time. The physical part is pretty easy for me to maintain through a routine. The mental part, that’s another story. I’m having to invent routines to keep my brain from becoming scattered, smothered, covered, chunked and peppered like a plate of Waffle House hash browns.

It won’t surprise you that Easter identifies digital distraction in the form of our constant scrolling as a big part of our problem. Not only are we doing something that’s harmful for us by mindlessly scrolling social content, we’re also missing out on good things like creativity.

Before the Internet, we used to be bored so much of the time. We accepted it! I’m not trying to sound like one of those GenX influencers on about drinking from the garden hose when our parents kicked us out of the house, but boredom was a huge part of everyone’s experience. When I lived in Boston in the late 80s and took public transportation everywhere, I used to carry a paperback novel and a journal everywhere I went. I’d read when things got dull, and I’d write down ideas as they occurred to me. I had times during the day when I’d just stare off into space, lost in thought. Today, like everyone else, I’d be staring at my phone.

The purpose of so much of developing tech - other than just making money - is about creating “efficiency” or “convenience.” That’s the big pitch for generative AI, taking the hard things off our plates so that we can…I’m not sure what. Not work more, because AI will do that for us. Spend more time gambling and shopping online and consuming short-form video of AI-generated images of hot people? If we have a thinking machine that’s smarter than humans, one that contains the collective experience and knowledge of all humanity, what’s the point of using our brains or bodies? Why should I spend hours focusing my distracted brain when I could simply type a prompt and get a computer to write my post? Why not use the best brain, rather than relying on the imperfect, outdated computer in our skull? We can end up just like the evacuees in WALL-E - fully evolved humanity.

I believe this is a question that will divide us, whether we’re better off outsourcing human intelligence and creativity. Tech evangelists seem to want to eradicate every hardship and inconvenience from our lives, including thinking. I enjoy so much about the world they’re creating, but they’re missing the point. Remember Descartes? Thinking defines us as human.

The Luddite movement in the near future won’t be a rejection of technology in its entirety. I believe it will be an organized recognition that all this distraction is terrible for us physically and mentally - especially with respect to our creative abilities. People in active addiction lose their creative ability. Maybe we’re all in active addiction at this point, constantly coaxing another dopamine hit. I hope we can recognize that technology is making us junkies and stealing our humanity. For all the challenges ahead, we need free-range minds.

I believe we’ll come to value human creativity more as the machines churn out all their derivative nonsense and muck up all the pipes with their fast, cheap content. It’s an empty shell, valuable only for its ability to distract. It’s up to us to find the time and space that’s free of these distractions to produce and develop original ideas from the fertile soil of our human experience. If making time for clarity doesn’t square with our definition of work, then we need to rethink the value proposition as everyone is forced back into the office cubes in front of their screens all day. It isn’t our faults we’re all so distracted, but it’s on us to come up with real solutions. For me, I guess that means unplugging for creativity…and just getting out of my own way.