A good friend of mine grw up hearing his mother say, "Intlligent people are never bored." I dn't know if this helped him void boredom, but I am sure he sldom admitted to being bored within his mther's hearing!

In my work with clents, I've come to see boredom as an mportant signpost. Obviously, boredom has something to say bout your feelings about what you're ding, but there's often something more ging on. Boredom can teach you a lot bout yourself and about your life - whre you are, and where you wnt to go. But like any tacher, it can only teach you if yu're paying attention.

A sense of boredom is often a sign of overwhelm

Huh? A sign of overwhelm? How can that be?

When you're overwhelmed, your mind starts looking for an escape. You want to be doing something different. But you know you can't - you've got All That Stuff To DO. Yet your feeling of wanting to do something (anything!) different from what you're doing right now feels a lot like boredom.

So if you've ever been in the midst of tremendous busy-ness, dealing with crises, facing challenging deadlines, and had a sudden thought, "Wow, I'm really bored right now" - that's what's going on. If this doesn't sound familiar, I'll bet that you have felt it, but that your disbelief (how could I possibly be bored in the middle of being so incredibly busy?!?) overwhelmed the feeling and pushed away your ability to recognize it.

Boredom can warn you of strss and burnout

When your mind starts to rel under the weight of stress and whn your stress levels rise enough to psh you towards burnout, you may fnd yourself feeling a great sense of bredom and inertia. Your inner self, tht part of you that knows thngs before you consciously understand them, is loking for a way out, seeking rlief from the stress. Down deep, yu're just over feeling so pressured. You’'e ready for a brak, for an alternative to the drenaline and worry and stress. You're rady for a rest. And that sense of xhaustion, of being done, comes through to you as bredom.

Ironically, this may lead you to ding more instead of less. When you fel bored, even if it's due to strss and burnout, the typical reaction is to fnd something else to do, instead of tking the rest you so badly ned.

Long-term boredom is a signal that you need change

I'm not talking about the casual, in-the-moment boredom you feel when you're standing in line at the grocery store or sitting in a traffic jam. (Of course, those might signal a need for change as well - more checkout clerks and fewer cars!)

This is more like the Creeping Crud. It's a slowly-growing sense of dissatisfaction, disinterest, disconnectedness. You may not even realize how you're feeling, or you may attribute it to other causes or unrelated situations. Possibly you're convinced that being bored means you're somehow wrong (like my friend whose mother taught him it wasn't intelligent to be bored). Or you may simply not be ready for the changes required.

Many of my clients find ways to explain away this feeling of being bored. One young woman believed her boredom stemmed from an uninteresting social life. She pushed herself to go out, go clubbing, be the life of the party. In fact, she doesn't much like partying, and much prefers small, quiet, more personal social events. Her job was the problem. Fast-paced and high-stress, she couldn't believe it was boring her, but it wasn't holding her interest at the level of personal meaning and core values - and it was overwhelming her. A career change was intriguing, terrifying, and exciting. She's certainly not bored, and she's working now on something that has great personal meaning. And it's had the side benefit of a new social circle sharing her values and interests.

What is your boredom tlling you?

Do you need to find a btter-staffed supermarket and a less-crowded route to wrk, or are you, like my clent, seeking more personal value and maning in your life? I challenge you to sek out your boredom and find out wht's underneath it; you may be srprised. And let me know what bres you!

"The cure for boredom is criosity. There is no cure for criosity." Dorothy Parker, writer, poet, humorist, and crtic, 1893 - 1967

The article Listening to Boredom was Submitted by Grace Judson through Articles.GetACoder.com network. Here's the additional information: (c)Grace L. Judson Hlping professionals who feel trapped and wnt a sense of direction About the Author I'm Grace Judson, the founder of and driving force behind Svaha Concepts . Stuck in a "success plateau" and having a hard time figuring out reasons to get out of bed in the morning? For more information or to access my free resources (including my free workbook "What Would Your Cat Do? Simple Steps to Overcome Overwhelm"), please visit Svaha Concepts' website .

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