Sunday, August 22, 2010

Boredom And Me

It is said that growing up is the realization that there is no one out there for you. You are alone right from the beginning for ever. Everything that begins is with you only to end with you.  Luckily, this truth dawns on most of us in bits and pieces. But if it happens through one big tragedy, life will be a trauma.

I have friends, quite many of them, both in real time and on Internet. I correspond with them. Quite a few of them quickly shift on a platform of exchanging personal matters, sometimes most guarded secrets of life. And in this matter of discussing personal matters, at least some of us, do it without hesitation with remote Internet friends than the real time ones. Strange though, it is truth. Why do we do this? Each of us is in eternal loneliness and we illusion that by sharing our innermost feelings with someone we ward off our loneliness. And when it has failed with known friends, we try with unknown and remote ones. Is it not so? But that loneliness promptly returns like homing birds and the nights, as usual, are long.

There are many people for whom a day is not complete if they do not chat on messenger with somebody. For them life is a bore without a message a day. For some, it is gossip and for some other it is a TV serial. We have invented millions of ways not to be bored; if it is business for you, it is on-line share trading for me. If it is keen interest in tennis and such other sports and games for you, it is spiritual, intellectual or science magazine reading for me. The funny thing is, the very method you adopt to get away from your boredom, could well be boring for me! While tennis is just a boring toss of a ball for me, you could be sacrificing your good nights sleep watching American Open on the TV.

If I do not solve at least one SU DO KU puzzle every day, I feel something amiss. A friend of mine goes to the nearby park where half a dozen senior people gather in the evenings to play chess. While two of them play, others take sides to make back room suggestions for the moves. For them the day does not pass without a game of chess.

We indulge in a lot of circus to get away from boredom, don't we?

What is boredom? Is that not a form of being alone? Is there a permanent solution to this problem of boredom? We have invented many things to counter our boredom, but boredom returns with vengeance. In fact, indulging in these so called solutions to our problem of boredom, many a time it turns out to be an addiction posing a new problem; is it not so?

So what is the real solution to our boredom? I think it is in realizing the eternal fact that we are all alone within. By turning inward and seeing deep inside us, gives the real solution to not only our problem of boredom but all our problems. That, in my opinion, is everlasting bliss; nothing outside me can give me this bliss.

1 comment:

  1. Great article! So true! We're all basically trying to run away from ourselves - but we believe that even though we can't live comfortably with our own selves, we will live successfully and happily with others - which is why we search for love eternally. Please keep writing. You have a very interesting and engrossing style. Best, Aparna

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