In my life there have been plenty of times where I was actively bored. At work during a lull, at school in a mandatory class, or maybe just on a summer day when it’s too hot to ride my bike.

However, there seems to be a second type of boredom that tends to come in during otherwise pleasant parts of life, emotional boredom.

I think media, of all sorts, paints life with bright colors, vivid greens that make our trees seem dead in comparison, beautiful tans that make our own bodies seem pale, and bright blues that shame the real sky. But more sinister, media, traditional and social, posits that reality is a constant melodrama.

In writing, we learn to ask a question when writing, “is this the most exciting part of the character’s life? If not, then write about that instead.” And all media mimics this formula. It’s why we never see characters go to the bathroom, brush their teeth, eat corn flakes, or go in for a routine physical where the results are all just OK.

This is fine, as what I just described sounds like a horrible form of entertainment. The problem becomes when we stop actively reminding ourselves that all media, from Instagram posts to blockbusters is the most exciting slices of a person’s life cultivated and designed to provoke an emotion. We begin to look at our own life subconsciously as lesser, and more sisterly begin to seek drama.

This emotional boredom becomes the basis of dissatisfaction. Comparison leads the person to stimulate their lives, and many and young man has fallen prey to this.

The man might seek out partners who are not healthy, but are exciting. He might reject all sensible jobs to do something risky, not because he actually believes in it, but because the idea of his life being ordinary, happy, contented or mostly ok bores him.

Be wary of creating or joining drama.

Not that you shouldn’t get involved with things your a geuninely passionate about, what I am saying is don’t invent or seek out problems that aren’t yours.

Sometimes we hang out with our friends and they vent to us, and suddenly we find ourselves as stressed out as the person actually experiencing the situation. We might day dream solutions, or even follow the situation with bated breath. But in the end, that’s not our business.

Being a human is boring sometimes. Learn to sit with that, be ok with it, and be wary. Sometimes things are worth fighting for, but more often than not you just might be bored.

(PS: If EVERYTHING is boring, go see someone if you can, that’s a symptom of depression)