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Boredom is the natural state of humanity: the neutral ground between positive and negative where we don`t feel anything, and where we most often find ourselves when denied some kind of stimulus. From boredom, one can go in any number of directions, productive and destructive alike, depending on one`s mood or disposition. Languishing in boredom is seldom productive and usually leads to depressing or introspective thoughts (or a combination of both). To launch ourselves out of boredom we distract ourselves with some kind of action, whether it be a creative project or goal, or merely some passive “non-activity” meant only to help kill time.

The productive effects of boredom come when we give ourselves a creative or productive task, and follow through with it. Upon completion, we feel a brief satisfaction at our accomplishment, or a longer-lasting disappointment and frustration if it doesn`t turn out the way we would have liked, or a sense of failure if we can`t finish. Then we return to the neutral ground of boredom until something else, internal or external, interrupts it.

Boredom can lead to a lot of time-wasting if we seek to replace it with something that merely distracts us rather than stimulates or motivates. Watching TV would be a prime example, but only if we hold no real interest in whatever we`re watching. TV has been called a pacifier of humanity, because it saves us from the true state of boredom, which is to do nothing but ponder the emptiness of existence. So it keeps us from feeling depressed, but from doing anything else for that matter, which is dangerous in its own way.

Workplace boredom is difficult to deal with, because if you either don`t have any work to do or for some reason can`t concentrate on the task at hand, your mind wanders to your outside life and the things you`d rather be doing, and you fast-forward to the end of the workday (when you can go home and presumably not be bored anymore, by doing whatever you want) with whatever means of distraction are available – again, wasting time.

Boredom is a perfectly natural reaction to lack of stimuli, or, perhaps more aptly put, non-reaction to the state of being. It goes without saying that if we are actively engaged in something we are not bored. If a task is tedious and becomes mechanical, and we are able to do it without thinking, our body essentially goes into auto-pilot and our mind is free to wander. Unless we have something particularly engaging to think about, we find ourselves bored again.

Boredom can lead to great things for creative, studious and self-motivated types, and conversely, self-destruction for those unaccustomed to thinking for themselves. If one is conditioned to being told what to do constantly, they are quick to boredom when authority is absent, and unused to giving themselves productive tasks. Here we find TV and video game addicts, alcohol and drug abusers, people who engage in passive hobbies which accomplish nothing but pass the time and perhaps provide the consumer with some fleeting feeling of well-being.

It could be argued that the great thinkers of our society were often bored; perhaps if there had been internet in Ancient Greece, Socrates would have spent all of his time surfing for pornography. Think about this until it bores you, and then decide what to do next.

http://www.pitlanemagazine.com/morals-values-and-norms/why-do-we-get-bored.html#more-13017