Bored and Brilliant: How Spacing Out Can Unlock Your Most Productive & Creative Self

by Manoush Zomorodi

From all my research, one thing is clear: We crave reflective time; we seek balance; we want a life full of joy and curiosity. That’s what the Bored and Brilliant Project is all about. A personal guide that anyone can access, this is a tool for teaching digital self-regulation and living a more conscious online existence.

once you start daydreaming and allow your mind to wander, you start thinking beyond the conscious and into the subconscious. This process allows different connections to take place.

The Reality of Daydreams Daydreams can give us new insight—or they can entertain or energize us. They are as unique as the individual dreaming them up. Still, researchers have found some generalizations. The younger you are, the more you daydream; children and teenagers daydream the most. As we get older, we still daydream about the future, but less about goals or sex—and we have fewer hostile or revenge daydreams. Eric Klinger, professor of psychology at the University of Minnesota, breaks daydreams into the two most common recurring themes: the conquering hero and the suffering martyr. The conquering hero daydream involves success and power—like signing a record contract, hitting the game-winning home run, or overcoming a psychological obstacle such as fear. The suffering martyr’s daydreams, on the other hand, are scenes played out in which a person is at first unappreciated but eventually acknowledged for his or her accomplishments or merit. Based on anecdotal evidence, men report having more conquering hero daydreams and women more of the suffering martyr kind.

You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. —Mark Twain

all photographs testify to time’s relentless melt.

Just as with adults, games expert and champion McGonigal believes that for kids, it isn’t so much about which game but how you play it. To steer children into becoming players who don’t use games to escape real life but instead become more confident, focused, social, and creative problem solvers, there is one thing no parent should ever do. “Do not shame your children about the games they play,” she said. That means never saying things such as “Stop wasting your time and do something real.” Trivializing a kid’s favorite video game will not get him or her to stop playing. It will only serve to “develop that escapist mind-set” by reinforcing the idea that their interests don’t matter and that games don’t have a connection with the real world. Instead, engage with children by asking questions about the game. How you play it. What’s hard. What’s cool. How they’ve gotten better at the game. You know, the basics. They’ll probably roll their eyes at you, but McGonigal said, “That conversation alone can really transform a young person in terms of their ability to bring all of these gameful strengths to school, to sports, to their personal relationships, and to themselves.”

Part of doing something is listening. We are listening. To the sun. To the stars. To the wind. —Madeleine L’Engle, A Swiftly Tilting Planet