Consume boring content and do boring things

In this episode, we discuss why everyone should be consuming more “boring” content and doing more “boring” things. Boring has a bad connotation, but boring is actually good, because when nothing is happening, then nothing bad is happening. Unfortunately, “nothing bad happened today” is not a newsworthy story. However, there are people in certain parts of the world that would love to live in a predictable and boring western society. Boredom is actually a luxury.

We go on to talk about how people are getting more addicted to sensationalist media. They want something big going on, and they want to catch some bad guy redhanded and point the finger at him. The reality is though, that most of the pain and discomfort in the world is not due to some huge event or some grand conspiracy, but just a whole bunch of people making small decisions of low integrity over and over and over again, and these little decisions are very insidious, and they add up and accumulate, and things just slowly get worse and worse. So improvement of a society is really just a matter of tipping the scales, and slowly turning the boat in the more positive direction, and day-by-day making better decisions. It is really a boring a process, but it is a process that will get you where you want to go (a better/more positive world).

When I say “consume boring media”, I mean “read textbooks, consume tutorials, learn how to do useful things to pick up skills you need to be valuable in society”. That’s how you change your life, improve your financial situation, and ultimately, improve your little corner of the world. But when you get there, don’t expect it to be some grandiose, heavenly event or accomplishment. It’s going to also be boring. Once you improve your financial situation, you’re still going to be bored, and that’s okay. If that inherent “boringness” of existence bothers you, you can take up meditation, which allows you to see the vibrancy and beauty in even the most mundane aspects of life. You can have amazing experiences just by focusing on your breathing, and what could be more boring than focusing on your breathing?

Every viable solution to real, systemic problems, involves a boring solution. There are no sexy, explosive, quick fixes to things like that. These problems have to be uprooted slowly, using dull, boring procedures day in and day out that improve things until you get where you want to be. And once you get where you want to be, that’s also not going to be exciting. It’s really about the journey.

Think about the universe. It is mostly empty space. Seems pretty boring, but it’s not. The universe is still awesome even though it’s largely an uneventful place.

There is lot more amazing content packed into this wonderful episode. I highly recommend.