the Tommy|Zor era

There is an epidemic that is striking the world today. From every corner of every basement, there is a phrase that is uttered among the lips of all those afflicted:
“I’m bored.”

This is a growing concern and if we don’t do anything to cure this ailment, I’m afraid all will be lost with generations to come. It is an odd epidemic, considering 300 years ago the word ‘boredom’ didn’t exist. People would say that life was simpler at that time, but I would strongly disagree. You did your duties for the day and then you enjoyed your life afterwards. The labour was tough and modern technology didn’t exist to make tasks any easier. That is what made ‘after hours’ and ‘weekend’ time so enjoyable.

Today, there is a notion stuck in people’s heads that they need to plan every minute of their time. If they aren’t doing something or working towards something at every available moment, they are being ‘unproductive.’ They then spend every waking hour dreaming of and looking forward to that illustrious free time when they can have time to themselves to do whatever it is they want to do. The time finally arrives and they end up doing nothing and complain that they’re bored. It’s either that or people find themselves in a situation where they have a lot of time on their hands and will complain about always being bored.

I have a solution: unbore yourself. Rather than sit there and think about what you want to be doing, just go out and do it. Your entire waking life should be spent anxiously awaiting for those times when you can pursue your passions. It should be your driving force – the reason behind your existence. Don’t have a passion? Find one. I’m not suggesting it should be the be-all, end-all of your entire life. Pick something that you’ve always wanted to do, i.e. read a particular book, juggle fire, play the laser harp… and spend time checking it off your life list. Be the person that everyone envies because you took the time to do shit you always wanted to accomplish.

Because you’ve always wanted to build one and put an out an eye

Need some motivation? No problem. Being bored makes you complacent and easier to manipulate. Guess what? I’m going to be the person on the other end manipulating you when that happens. So now you have to ask yourself a question. Would you rather be the manipulator or the manipulated? It sounds callous, but if it’s the motivation needed to trigger a gut level emotional response, I’m going there.

I’m keeping this article short this week because I want you to stop delaying. Close facebook, stop channel surfing looking for something interesting to watch, stop reading the same 4 pages for the third time today (and haven’t been updated) and go unbore yourself. Let’s start a revolution today and kill boredom once and for all. I’d like to end today’s article with an excerpt from Richard Linklater’s Waking Life:

Next week’s article: Busyness Kills.