Boredom

Thirty years ago, several wives asked me to start a discussion group for their husbands, most of whom didn’t seem to know Jesus personally. These women felt this way because their husbands never talked about Jesus as they would any other personal relationship. I knew some of the men and felt these women were intuitively right.

So I launched the discussion group. About 30 men showed up to the first one. I handed each man a 3x5 card and asked them to write one word that describes how they imagine heaven. The men wrote, folded their cards and handed them to me. I silently read each card. Almost two-thirds of the men wrote the same word: boring.

Now here’s why I’m telling you this story (which I’ve told on these pages a few times). In my last post, I gave a micro example of the left hemisphere of the brain acting as master, not servant: my iPhone. This week, my macro example: boredom.

Boredom has become our modern malaise. But people didn’t start talking about feeling bored until the 18th century, which was the age of the enlightenment where everything had to be rational and explicit, everything had to be made better for us.

But here’s an irony. Boredom didn’t crop up in all strata of society but rather among those who were most at ease – aristocrats, the wealthy, and “those whose lives were actually running very smoothly,” notes Iain McGilchrist. He feels this explains how, in modern westernized affluent societies, people are more unhappy and the rates of suicide are highest; not in societies where people are poor and struggling.

Now there are some great benefits of the Enlightenment (i.e. air-conditioning on muggy days) but the idea that we can control things is hubristic, which is a characteristic of the left hemisphere of the brain. It likes controlling things. It likes comfort and familiarity.

So do I. But McGilchrist has helped me see how the left hemisphere often overplays its hand. One example is how comfort and familiarity have become our masters, not our servants. The result is a sensation-numbness cycle, an over-reliance on manipulation, measurement, and control. It leaves us stranded in a disenchanted world, swinging endlessly between novelty-seeking and a flat alienation, which is boredom.

So it’s no surprise that the entertainment and travel industries have exploded since the 18th century. Both offer endless novelty. Both are booming, as Boomers are wealthy, healthy, and driving a global travel boom. But both entertainment and travel render us easily bored.

Now I’m not against travel per se. Kathy and I are taking a cruise this fall. But how many of us remember that our word travel comes from the Old English travail, which means “a journey fraught with danger?” Travel was dangerous before the 18th century. You might run into robbers. Those who did travel often called it pilgrimage, because the danger was running into God. You might discover who you really are… and Who is really God.

Which would definitely not be boring.

Overcoming our modern malaise means stepping back from constant digital stimulation and allowing space for silence, depth, and a direct, unmediated connection to reality – which is what the right hemisphere of the brain offers us. When it’s the master, not the servant, the right hemisphere helps us discover an “unholy trinity” explaining why almost two-thirds of those men in that group thirty years ago wrote the same word: boring.

We’ll discover this “unholy trinity” in my next post.