A discourse on 'boring'

Yesterday afternoon I was ‘bored’ by my study that I spend my whole afternoon reading a book that is totally unrelated to my subject. Yet, there is a very interesting claim in the book ‘Either/Or, A Fragment of life’ written by Soren Kierkegaard. I don’t fully understand his work, yet it is quite though-provoking. The proposition in one of his article is as follows.

“Boredom is the root of all evil”

From every generation, human always want to try to amuse themselves in every means. In the bible, maybe human are boring, that they want to become God and building the Tower of Babel that displeases God. In history, the Roman citizens amuse themselves by torturing the others, and they called it ‘games’ or public entertainment. In modern day, social and economic life seems to founder on boredom, which is most fatal at all. Something called ‘consumerism’ that the desire for people to satisfy people their want and their propensity for spend has created demand and lead to economic and technical progress. Entertainment, of course is to entertain the consumer. Sadly, culture that is rich in entertaining people is corrupted, as proved by history. So often the means to amuse people are corrupted. Yet for the desire to get rid of our boredom, we yield to this mean intentionally or unintentionally. Because of boredom, human can do anything to get rid of it, even disobeying God.

So what is ‘boring’? Some may claim that the life in the town is boring, yet isn’t it true that the lifestyle and culture in the city are ‘boring’ in some eyes? Some may say that reading bible is boring, yet isn’t it true that many gossip or so-called trendy magazines are ‘boring’ in some eyes? Some may claim that a simple family life is ‘boring’, yet, isn’t it true that a person who put pursuing amusement as their life motto ‘boring’ also in some eyes? A quiet person is boring, yet isn’t true that a talkative person with meaningless word is boring also in some eyes? Routine and normal works are boring, yet isn’t it true that staying idle without working are boring in some eyes?

Though people’s feeling are subjective, it seems that we all understanding what is boring. If we have already experience all the goodness in the place where we are, and we can’t find any external or internal stimulation when we repeat our way of life, we are bored.

Maybe human life without God is intrinsically boring. Life is not boring, unless one can discover the calling of God in our life and holding on the hope to look forward to the eternity that God has promised to us. When we are following God, we know that the best is yet to come in heaven and we know we will taste His goodness however good or bad situation we are in. Living by faith everyday to trust, to obey and to follow Him is not boring, as the goodness of the Lord will never cease and our life is yearning for it.

Well, some can challenge that being a faithful Christians is boring too, but then I can response by saying that putting God aside in your life to pursue satisfaction is boring too, not even boring, but is meaningless, and will lead to corruption of human and society.

According to the author of the book that I have read, the secret of dealing with boredom is the arbitrariness in our life. Maybe it is when we have decided to obey God to live a boring life, that our life will no longer become boring, as life is full of ‘surprise’. We can’t intentionally manipulate the ‘surprise’ in our life (If you manipulating something, then it is not surprise and it is boring). The surprise in our life solely comes from His grace when we are following Him.