Wherever you go there you are…

I think the human brain is wired for both immediacy and contemplation. Without over-simplifying, the modern world is increasingly out of balance because forces, including the relentless monetization of attention, have aggressively tilted the equation toward the former. Some of the best experiences in life are to be had, or have their genesis in, the act of letting the world come to you – a process of observation rather than pursuit.

I’ve always loved this quote from Franz Kafka: “You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet, still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet.” In our hyper-connected world of (increasingly) passive entertainment, the potential for boredom is something to be feared, rendering the idea of sitting still to be a truly fraught undertaking.

I’m here to tell you that boredom is something to be, if not exactly embraced, certainly tolerated, and often enough for your brain to have the opportunity to hum in a different way. Boredom is a catalyst for understanding – a way of allowing your deeper self to exercise its innate ability to create novel, interesting, and new perspectives in your life.

 So put away the news feeds, video games, social media feeds, shopping and all the other distractions of modern life and just sit and be alone with your thoughts for awhile – an hour or more. And to anyone who tells me they don’t have an hour of time to spare, I say this; we live in an affluent society that purports on the one hand to give everyone the opportunity to live a fulfilling life, while on the other hand encouraging everyone to set unreasonable priorities and expectations. There is nobody in our society that can’t find an hour. I don’t care if you’re a CEO, or the Prime Minister. Each of us needs to acknowledge the value of observation and in our own way find a path to the stillness that opens new, uniquely personal ways of seeing the world.