Boredom is the feeling that everything is a waste
of time; serenity, that nothing is.
- Thomas Szasz
Only boring people get bored. If you never get
bored, you will understand. If you are the kind of
person who gets bored, face the truth. But you are
unlikely to be a bored or boring person because you
read worthwhile material.
A bored person usually wants someone else to
provide the stimulus he needs to get out of his
boredom. It's not that he doesn't have initiative or
succumb to the same motivations as others. It's
simply that the bored person needs someone else to
kick-start his interest in anything because he
doesn't know enough to be able to interact with
others in a good conversation.
The bored person is unhappy with his own company.
He needs the company of others so that he doesn't
have to think about himself. When he thinks about
himself, he doesn't have enough to think about. He
is not aware of his own problem, only that he needs
someone else to help him not be bored.
Any kind of meaningful conversation requires at
least one person to be knowledgeable enough about
the subject under discussion to be able to make a
contribution to what the others already know. A
bored person often knows too little about all
subjects to be able to add much of substance to any
conversation.
The great difficulty for a bored person is that
he doesn't want to make the huge investment in
learning a skill that others will admire or to learn
sufficient information (knowledge) about a certain
subject that he can participate in conversations
actively, gaining the respect of others for his
contributions.
Knowing or having enough of something that makes
friendship worthwhile for a bored person requires
hard work, usually over a prolonged period of time.
By the time a person is old enough to be bored,
others have already learned the skills or knowledge
they need. Little kids seldom get bored because
their imaginations kick in to give them something to
do no matter what their circumstances. Bored people
lose that power of imagination.
The bored person may like to "hang with friends."
He likely enjoys his music loud because that
precludes the need to produce any meaningful
contribution to conversation. Being with people is
important to him, but he wants conditions to be such
that he doesn't have to contribute much to what
happens.
The bored person is a follower because of his
need to be with other people and his lack of
leadeship skills. Leaders always must know more than
their followers or have something special to add to
the group (money, charisma, tickets, music sources)
that will make him attractive as a friend and
leader.
Bored young people naturally gravitate to gangs
where the leader provides the stimulus for whatever
is necessary to keep the group alive and active.
While gang participation may sound risky, it
provides the environment that a bored person needs
and wants. Bored young people who do not join gangs
may be the loners we read about in the newspapers,
ones who use guns to scare or kill their peers who
they may feel unfairly rejected them. That feeling
of rejection may be generalized to peers the bored
person hasn't met, such as other students of the
same education institution.
In general, bored people lack the life skills
they need to gain the knowledge or skills that will
earn them recognition in social groups and they lack
sufficient social skills to be able to attract the
kinds of friends they really need.
Unfortunately, the kinds of friends that good
people don't need are the easiest to find and
acquire. The ones who provide drugs, for example,
and encourage an antisocial lifestyle that requires
theft to get enough money to buy more drugs. The
right kinds of friends are much harder to find and
develop relationships with and this may be nearly
impossible for people who lack a range of social
skills.
Bored young people are not often bullies, unless
their gang is led by a bully and they play along
with the group. Bullies that act alone are usually
well aware of their lack of social skills and their
inability to make friends, whereas a bored person
may not be aware that he lacks sufficient social
skills.
A bored person is bored with life because he
doesn't have enough knowledge about it to find it
interesting. That, in turn, makes him boring to
others.
A bored person is an accident waiting to happen.
Without intervention by others who know what to do,
it will happen.
If you know a boring person, you know a bored
person, or vice versa. Now you also know what that
person needs. You may be able to help.
