As long as you believe you need to get rid of boredom and uncomfortable feelings, the brain is going to use that to get you back into old habits again and again.
Today we introduce one of the most challenging techniques we will explore in this course: the practice of doing nothing. We’re going to get bored, and not do anything about it.
Many people will approach boredom as different from other feelings they struggle with and do compulsions around. They might want to learn how to deal with anxiety or depression or regret or jealousy, recognizing now that the old ways of trying to control and avoid them has only fueled the problem, but people often see boredom as something they should get rid of. The thing is, boredom is no different. The more we try to avoid and control boredom, the more we feel it, and the less capable we are of handling it.
As long as the brain knows it can use boredom to push you back into old compulsions, guess what? You’re going to experience A LOT of boredom. So throughout the weeks ahead, changing your relationship with boredom will be a key component of changing your relationship with all of the other brain stuff that can come up when we break our old online habits.
But I don’t want to be lazy. I want to be productive!
How much time and energy have you wasted online? All that clicking and searching and scrolling was a ton of work. You’ve been working unpaid overtime for your brain and the VCs that benefit from inflated start-up valuations you keep propped up by opening apps repeatedly. Learning how to do nothing is about learning how to go slow so that we can go fast later. This is about learning how to handle uncomfortable experiences so you can choose to spend your time and energy on things that actually matter to you. The weeks ahead in this course are all about that. By learning how to pause and allow feelings to be there, even feelings of boredom or laziness, you’re putting yourself back in charge of your actions.
In the very first exercise, when you cut out the online compulsions, one of the supports we suggested was to have something you could choose to do instead, like a book or a sketchpad. But that was for helping ease our way out of the compulsion by giving us a distraction. Long-term, it’s also not sustainable to need to shove a book in your face every time you feel an urge to check social media. We’ve got to build up the skill to have an uncomfortable experience, like an urge or boredom, and allow them to be there. That’s what we’ll start to practice with today’s exercise. There are two ways you could do this exercise. Pick the option that makes the most sense for you, and enjoy doing nothing!