I'm Bored!

That phrase makes me want to swing from the chandelier. My kids would occasionally say it and I was dumbfounded. Each had two siblings, other playmates, bicycles, hundreds of toys, crayons, markers, clay, and musical instruments - and that's the short list! How is that even possible? Just the sheer number of books I want to read would keep that from EVER happening. I have always felt it was ridiculous and an insult to God to say "I'm bored."

I LOVE it when my thinking is challenged! Yesterday, my friend Donna sent an article that posits that boredom is a catalyst for great creativity. Josh Bunch says our capacity for creativity and our ability to endlessly stimulate ourselves are mutually exclusive.

"Creativity born from necessity, or from boredom. Today we have more than we need, and today we fear boredom so much we find endless stimulation.

Stimulation was meant to be fleeting. Provoking. Not all consuming. When things are always on, those things drown out that little voice telling us something new, something creative, something life changing...Some of you feel it. A gnawing feeling that says something isn’t right. That all we have today isn’t better than it was, its just louder, and brighter. There was a time when boredom set us free. When there was nothing to the right or to the left so we invented it. That day passed. Today there is little innovation, there is only imitation. Some of you don’t want to feel it. Long ago you gave up by placing everything between you and your inner dialogue. Many today welcome the distractions. We over-crowd our surroundings until that beautiful productive feeling of boredom becomes numb. When we can’t feel bored, we can’t learn growth. When there is no growth, there is empty.

Boredom is a gift. When that little voice starts in, don’t distract it cultivate it, give it room to breath. Give it a pen to write, a voice to yell, a podium to preach."


So, Josh and I are both right about boredom. I wholeheartedly endorse his remedy. Unplug. Get quiet. Look within. Give voice to your creativity and destiny. Do something NEW! I would love to discover something new with you. Call or e-mail - both are on the website

Here's to newness of LIFE!
Beth