How to Be Bored Quotes

“Reading creates a sense of human fellowship. It is never (or rarely) a public activity, but in putting us in direct contact with other minds and sensibilities, it is a form of solitude which banishes loneliness. It can offer the consolation of knowing we are not alone, in our pleasures or in our suffering. It is in situations of deprivation that the value of reading – the deep need for books – becomes more vividly apparent.”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“Reading is not a project of moral improvement, but by broadening our perspective, it can make us less susceptible to the immediate seductions offered by our environment; and in the best-case scenarios, it can enlarge the scope of humane understanding, and of empathy.”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“We cannot fully be human without thinking about what being human means. Our forms of momentary self-indulgence are many, but it is hyperactivity which is out favoured as well as most pervasive form of hedonism; and by its very nature, it is a form of gratification which undermines reflection - and well-being - of a deeper or more sustained kind.”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“Our contemporary forms of reading threaten to reduce that amplification. Aside from the fact that overusing digital technologies eventually makes us less mentally agile and more forgetful (as research increasingly shows), the kind of segmented, bite-sized reading we do on the internet fragments and constricts the ‘space to think’, instead of expanding it; in a sense, it reduces or even rubbishes our mental experience. Our minds”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“Reading of this kind cannot be done in a hurry. To enter a very good, or a great book (the latter are admittedly rare, but there are good reasons why we refer to them as classics), is to enter a world: the world created by the text, and the implicit world of the author’s voice, style, sensibility – indeed, the author’s soul and mind. This takes an initial stretching of the mind, a kind of going out of the imagination into the imaginative landscape of the book we hold in our hands. It is often a good idea to read the beginning of a book especially slowly and attentively; as in exploring a new house or place – or person – we need to make an initial effort of orientation and of empathy. Eventually, if we are drawn in, we can have the immensely pleasurable experience of full absorption – a kind of simultaneous focusing of attention and losing our self-consciousness as we enter the imaginative world of the book.”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“But the fundamental reason for taking the time to read is because books (good books, that is; books that matter) are the best aid to extended thought and imaginative reflection we have invented. In our own time, this is particularly important, as an antidote to the segmentation of thought encouraged by digital technologies. Cruising among the infinite quanta of data offered on the internet is fine for finding out information; but the disparate fragments we look at on our various screens rarely cohere into continuous thought, or a deepening of knowledge.”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“In the long term, the fragmentation of attention, a breaking up of focus and mental continuity, can disrupt neural connections in the brain and eventually lead to a literally ‘shallower’ neurological structure. It makes us – on the physiological level of the brain, as well as of the mind – less capable of concentration and continuous thought.”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“If we rush ceaselessly through disconnected activities without checking in on our moods or motives, we can lose track of ourselves; in a sense, we lose the ability to experience our experiences. A”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“Observing what is around us and registering errant impressions is a state not so much of passive inaction as of alert receptivity. Allowing ourselves to notice, to be open to our surroundings, is a way of awakening our curiosity in the world outside ourselves. The”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“True engagement – the ability to give ourselves deliberately and unreservedly to a task or a personal interaction – arises from a clear sense of our own desires, goals and intentions. It is when our energies and our perspective are replenished that we can return to our active lives with a renewed sense of pleasure and commitment. In other words, it is only if we periodically disengage, that we can become truly and effectively engaged.”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored

“Momentary pleasures of hedonism are distinct from deeper and more lasting satisfaction; and in order to achieve such satisfaction, we need to reflect on who we are and what our lives are for. We cannot be fully human without thinking about what being human means.”
― Eva Hoffman, How to Be Bored