Speaking as a guy who has been married a long time (34 years next May) I've observed a thing or two about the differences between men and women. One of those is this: If a woman notices her husband sitting, looking out the window, saying nothing, asks what he's thinking about, and he replies "Nothing," he's telling the literal truth. If a man notices his wife doing likewise and asks what she's thinking about, and she replies "Nothing," she's thinking about him, and he's probably in trouble.

I spend a fair amount of time sitting and looking out the window, and sometimes, yes, I allow my mind to just go blank. This can be a rewarding experience. A year or so back, I was standing next to our woodstove, looking out at a typically snowy Alaska winter day, thinking diligently of nothing, when I saw a big red fox run past in the woods on the south side of our property. Things like that are their own reward. I learned this, as I did so many things, from my Old Man, who, when his chores for the day were done, could often be found on his park bench on the porch of his Allamakee County, Iowa home, just watching the creek and the woods.

So, when my good friend and colleague Brandon Morse wrote a piece this morning on the value of boredom, it piqued my interest.

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Brandon made a very good point:

Today's social media platforms are no longer about human connection; it's about keeping you hooked with catered content. It's manipulative, addictive, and wildly unhealthy on many levels. There's a good reason why the people who run these social media platforms don't allow their families to engage in it themselves. 

Now, in the age of AI, you're being fed cheaper and faster content, which might scratch the itch, but the issue is that it feels like slop, and that's because it is. It can sometimes reek of hollowness, and Brooks uses that exact word when describing how you feel while in the midst of the addiction. 

The cure is boredom and spending, at a minimum, 15 minutes a day in the DMN. For many people, this is easier said than done, but like exercise helps your physical body, time in the DMN helps your mental health. It can break the dopamine addiction you have if you adhere to the practice, and as Brooks notes, you'll start becoming more satisfied with normal or mundane things, you'll feel less depressed, and your outlook on life will improve. 

So put down the phone, go for a walk, don't bring headphones, and just be bored. Your brain will hate it... at first, but that's just the dopamine addiction talking. 

That's good advice. But there's a little more to it than just boredom. A person with intelligence and imagination will never be truly bored, after all, but it's important to shut down and just let the gray matter free-wheel for a while; put your brain in Neutral, as it were, for a time, and just let it go where it will. So, how to do that? It turns out this is something I have some experience with. Here are three ideas.

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I prefer being outside in these valuable moments. Your mileage may vary.

Brandon correctly notes that we're too prone to getting drawn into the increasingly fast-paced technological world. The problem is, technology changes a lot faster than biology. Biologically, we are still hunter-gatherers, wired for long periods of sitting and watching, of slow movement and careful examination, punctuated by brief moments of intense activity. Our modern world tries to push us to reverse that behavior.

Resist that urge. Take some time. Look out the window. Go for a walk. Close your eyes, and if weather and season permit, feel the sun on your face. These are things you will never get from a smartphone or a computer screen.