The Lost Art of Boredom
When I was a little girl in I used to seek out patches of sunlight in the house. I can still remember the feeling. I would watch bugs crawl on the window and wonder where they were going. I would watch the shadows shift outside and ponder the deep greens and vibrant glowing ones. Closing my eyes I could feel my sense of self hovering above me, much bigger than my body. I wondered how I could fit myself back in sometimes. It was a glorious feeling. It was magical, needless, timeless. It was what I later learned might be called boredom.
When we learn about boredom, it comes with negative connotations. Yet, there was nothing negative about these magical "nothings" of childhood.
Boredom as a negative comes with the knowledge of lack - there is a feeling that the world is not enough, that we ourselves are not enough.
We are enough. YOU are enough. And boredom is gift. My gift to you this week, and yours to keep. It is the forgotten jewel at the bottom of a cluttered box. Boredom is the velvety black soil of a fertile mind.
Turn off your phone. Sit down.
Close your eyes or don't. I am daring you to do nothing. Do nothing for ten minutes.
Overachievers? Win this one by underachieving. Do nothing for an hour.
This is not meditating- no need to reel in your mind. Let it wander. Do not try to tame your thoughts.
We are bigger than our bodies, bigger even than the lives we live.
We stuff our enormous selves into containers and create distractions to keep ourselves there. What happens when we deliberately put them away?
The consciousness begins to weave its way around the room, changing shape, creating new potential universes. Emotions come in too. They ask to be felt and moved through us. This is healthy. We were born to be conduits of emotions, of thoughts, of energy.
Maybe stresses will come in. Things You have been trying avoid thinking about. Be with them. Let them come in. Just sit. Perhaps new solutions or ideas for how to solve them will come through.
Personally, this dare has been hard, so challenging for me that I have been putting it off for days. You see, my youngest daughter Evalina left for Indonesia this week to become a Shark Warrior with the Gili Shark Conservation. This leaves my husband Matt and I with an empty home for the very first time. So much of my identity is wrapped up in being a mother. The last thing I thought I needed was emptiness. But, I did it. At first, every time I sat down, my eyes would fill up with tears. I don't cry often. I almost ached to get up and do something, anything. Instead I stayed- I dared to. The tears began to roll, pretty soon my shoulders were shaking. It was a rolling storm of a cry. It lasted a long time.
Who wants a thunderous cry? The thing is, it was exactly what I needed. Beneath the tears, there was love, a deep clear love, for myself, for my family, for the very nature of being a sentient being. The emotions I was blocking with distraction were also standing in the way of my ability to tap into infinite love and peace.
Be bored. Allow your consciousness to go wandering outside of you. Expand. Whatever comes up it is exactly right. Ideas and solutions can be found here.
There are gifts in your nothing. Treasures in your boredom. Enjoy. This one is on the house. You're welcome.