The experience of boredom is more depressing than a black canvas of depression painted over with the blue colors of loneliness, loss, panic or longing for past pleasures. And more intensely, the experience of boredom gets wrapped tightly around your success axle and can gum up your progress toward where you want and need to go.
BORED STIFF
Being “bored and blue” is a very painful way NOT to “travel down the road less traveled,” as author M. Scott Peck goaded us on. Boredom makes the engine knock loudly, both in the blue cars that Empathizer-type communicators drive, and in the burnt orange talk cars that Instigator-type communicators drive.
DESTRUCTIVE BOREDOM
“Destructive boredom” is experienced differently by E-types and I-types in these two subtly different ways:
1. More sensitive Empathizers (E-types) are hurt more by EMOTIONAL BOREDOM…not feeling fully engaged in emotionally stimulating, interesting and satisfying life projects in work, personal growth and romantic relationships.
2. Less sensitive Instigators (I-types) are intimidated more by INTELLECTUAL BOREDOM… not feeling fully engaged in intellectually stimulating, interesting and satisfying life projects in love, personal growth and work.
BOREDOM DRAINS YOUR COMMUNICATOR CAR BATTERY
In short, feeling “bored and blue” is emotionally fatiguing for E-types and intellectually fatiguing for I-types. So much depends on your communicator type; including what works as a cure.
HOW DO YOU KNOW IF YOU ARE BORED AND BLUE?
Typical symptoms that form an anger-depression cycle when your heart and head are bored stiff are:
- You steadily feel down and blue…BUT justify “BUT IT’S NOT ALL THE TIME!”
- You feel like a trapped cat…pacing…jumpy…unsettled, agitated
- You feel irritated easily…have a short fuse…even strangers can get your goat
- You snap…feel like a madman/madwoman…grumpy…ill-at-ease
- You see R.E.D…you have Random Explosive Disorders where you pop off out of the blue
- You can’t get no satisfaction…and sing the sob song…”Is this all there is?”
- You feel anxious because of “I guess my life is over” negative thinking
- You are set off by any idiot for hours instead of just minutes
- You begin sounding like the criticizing dad/mom you vowed never to sound like
- You feel like “Dear Abby Normal”
- Ignored boredom drains your creative spirits and the physical health battery of your life.
BOREDOM AND YOUR COMMUNICATOR TYPE
Boredom is a form of depression that can deplete your spirits. Consider this metaphor: Six different plastic tubes are inserted into your torso. You see a blue or red color liquid draining out of you body and running down through the tubes…blue liquid if you’re an Empathizer and red liquid if you’re an Instigator communicator. You feel weaker and weaker as your “life energy” runs out of you. That’s boredom…it drains you a little at a time, vampire-style.
SOME TIPS TO DEAL PRODUCTIVELY WITH FEELING BORED AND BLUE
1. Be aware of feeling bored and blue. Example: Ask yourself, “Could I be feeling bored and blue and not in touch with this?”
2. Feel the drudgery of going through the “emotions of the motions.” Example: “I don’t respect myself for giving up at work instead of giving up on giving up!”
3. Play the WHAT IF game. Example: “WHAT IF I tried doing….how would that feel to me?”
4. Make a list of your negative thoughts and then turn them around. Example: “I have a short fuse” becomes “Wait a minute. I typically have a long fuse, so what’s bugging me so much?”
5. Be wary of distracting yourself with psychodrama. Example: Try to avoid moving away, spending money rashly, having an affair, fighting with a sibling or co-worker, driving too fast, etc.
6. Hire a communications coach to vent. Example: Hire a change expert to talk to, someone who won’t think you’re nuts if you use your boredom to make new career plan…a new relationship plan…a new personal growth plan.
BORED AND BLUE
Sam Keen wrote about how feeling “bored and blue” is one of the trickiest emotions to handle intelligently and productively. And just when I thought I was getting a handle on feeling anxious and the anger-anxiety cycle!
ABOUT COMMUNICATIONS PSYCHOLOGIST DR. DENNIS O’GRADY
Dr. Dennis O’Grady observed how boredom affected the incarcerated forensic patients he treated as an individual and group psychological psychotherapist on a locked forensic unit in the 80’s for the State of Ohio. Even with the aid of psychotropic medications, varied activity therapies, library privileges, group therapy, visitations, informal discussion groups, etc….the mostly male residents paced like lions in a cage until the pain of boredom was unleashed. O’Grady is a keynote speaker and author of “Talk to Me: Communication Moves To Get Along With Anyone” which is available on his site and at Amazon.