what mindless scrolling does to you
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 30 ก.ค. 2024
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Have social media, smartphones and digital technology robbed us of the benefits of boredom? In this video, Taha explores if there is a hidden value to boredom by, well... being very bored. Turns out, he was thinking about boredom all wrong and learns that there are many types of boredom, some of which, we may not recognise as boredom. So what's the answer? Should we quit social media? Do you think you need to be more attentive to when we are just scrolling? Let me know what you think down below!
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SOCIAL MEDIA
Sabrina
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Melissa
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Taha
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CREDITS
Produced by Taha Khan
Video Editing by Taha Khan
Motion Design by Sabrina Cruz
Sound Design by Taha Khan
MUSIC
Epidemic Sound. Get started today. share.epidemicsound.com/answer...
RECOMMENDED READING
Boredom: A Lively History by Peter Toohey
Flow: The Psychology of Happiness by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
TIMESTAMPS
00:00 - taha confesses he is an ipad baby
01:22 - epic boredom montage
02:02 - taha has a breakdown
02:30 - back to the drawing board
03:27 - ad read: thank u morning brew :)
04:29 - taha chats to a boredom expert
09:41 - uh oh, there is nuance
12:34 - thank u for watching,, patreon & newsletter!
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Welcome to the joke under the fold!
Visiting the dentist is actually pretty,,, boring once you know the drill.
Leave a comment with the word "drill" to let me know you were here :)
I hate how I found this while scrolling mindlessly
@@DyslexicMitochondria Hey bro i watch ur videos. Love ur channeI
nothing better then scrolling mindlessly to find what happens when you do it
I found this comment while scrolling mindlessly
Google probably knows when we're bored
My first thought too
This is why depression is so bad. It makes EVERYTHING, even meaningful things, feel meaningless.
Gosh i feel that
Yup. It’s horrible.
I thought everyone was like this
Everything's pretty meaningless to me but I don't think I have depression I've been like this since a long time so idrk
+
*as I’m mindlessly scrolling*
Uh huh?
hold up.. aren't u that person that makes polls?
Woah a verified person without a shit ton of likes
I'm scrolling through the comments rn :(
I like your polls
if you want to cure yourself of this you need to train yourself to immediately stop the moment you realize you're doing it. if you force yourself to do that for 30 days it will become a habit and you won't mindlessly scroll anymore. it takes some willpower but it's very doable and worth it.
Thank you very much for the advice, I needed it and I will definitely try to do that.
I've found preventing the ability to mindlessly scroll (deleting social media apps from phone) really helps. I still pick up my phone dozens of times everyday just to find there's nothing to do on it really, but after a few days I don't even feel like I need those apps anymore. Though here I am on youtube while I should be doing something else :)
Although I sometimes excessively scroll looking for and checking out music nowadays, this was what I did to eventually end up quitting Facebook and reducing my time on Twitter. In my case it just happened out of the blue despite actively using both for more than a decade.
that sounds like a really useful challange and i think im going to do it
I'm with you man
...And that's why solitary confinement is an inhumane punishment.
I feel like the video Sabrina did on isolation also points that out.
Some controlling bosses will also get upset if you do anything not relating to work, even if there's literally nothing for you to be doing. ie, if you do anything but sit there being bored. Definitely, solitary confinement is worse, but being forced to do nothing is along similar lines of treatment.
yes rape is inhumane too (⌐■-■)
yes thats why death penalty is best
@@lilylemach103 exactly why are we paying to keep a rapist/a murderer alive
Dont lie people, we all found this by mindlessly strolling.
Yep
It was the second video on my recommended. Really, I didn't have to scroll at all.
Yes
Ah yes, strolling
@@purrplaysLE holy shit that’s *exactly* how I found this
I've given up on tiktok, stopped focusing on famous Instagramers and started focusing on my life and I gotta say I am SO MUCH HAPPIER. I am no longer comparing my life to other people on the internet 🙃
Good job dude 👏
@@karri17 thank you!
Same bro/sis 👊🏻
@@nocapfacts9330 awe thank you 😊 im gender fluid so either works haha
Proud of you!! 👍
I think that when you are not constantly "preoccupied" by things you have time to think. Do I like my job, how am I feeling, do I have any goals, where am I headed? I personally notice that I tend to preoccupy myself with unnecessary things so I can avoid how I might actually feel or what I think. While in doing so I never actually move anywhere and nothing changes, I just need to look for the next thing to hold my attention long enough, and so on.
Its good that you have noticed this. Now you can try and bring a change. Goodluck
So true, well said
That sums it up perfectly. We scroll mindlessly to dodge our responsibilities and feelings, because it's way more easy and comfortable.
@@lauruva4314 That‘s exactly what I‘m doing right now, and it‘s kinda frightening. I need to stop.
Amen
Currently deleted all social media except TH-cam so - here we are lol.
You can do it on TH-cam as well
And youtube stories are the devil
EXCEPT FOR LMAO 😆🤣
The same here. I did this a while back. It just felt like i was gambling only the prizes were funny videos or just funny pictures. Or desperatly waiting for a new track from an artist. I just began to hate it. I dont want to be stuck to my phone. So im not missing anything
I did this a few years ago, but I started consuming videos more and more regularly and now I'm the same place as before, just being bored and watching a lot of stuff that I'm really not that interested in (not this lol) and putting aside more useful and meaningful activities like studying or tyding up around. Taha says it best, we need to better detect when we are not enjoying our time with our electronic devices and put them aside for a while, and be simply bored until we find out what we actually want to do. I'm doing this as I stop writing this comment. Cheers!
(A gentle reminder for everyone that if Animal Crossing has gotten boring for you, it's okay. Your villagers will forgive you for going missing awhile. It's fine.)
my minecraft dog on my hardcore world :'(
Not the ones on the ds thogh (not 3ds, ds)
@@daruween1398 mood
I got bored of it so quickly and it makes me really sad cos I feel like I haven't got my money's worth out of it 😂
It makes me feel bad though.. especially for T-bone cuz he is my fav 😂
Social media fills up a part of the mind that we want to be filled, however being bored inspires some of my best creative ideas
Well said
Same almost all ideas for my projects came from the time when I was bored
i don't know if my depression came from my phone addiction or my phone addiction cam from my depression
@@yourmomprobably9104 First part
I mindlessly scroll soooo much and the tbought of “let’s go do something else” is in the back of my head the whole time but I just can’t stop mindlessly scrolling like it takes forever for me to finally put my phone down 😬😬
Same. Then I regret it ALOT.
Exactly!!
"Basically, I've challenged myself to do nothing for 24 hours"
I've been doing this for my whole life
Don't talk yourself down like that, you're awesome for trying to put a smile on people's faces writing this comment. Just don't make yourself the bud of the joke, your inner child thinks you mean it
@@catcat4697 We need more love soldier like you
And yeah esoda keep it up 👍
@@Zian08 thank you for the appreciation (:
I mean you're posting a comment, that's not "nothing", I'd probably believe it more if you just sat down and didn't even think, because that would count as doing "something". We wouldn't even know who's doing "nothing" because they couldn't be online to do it. :V
Lol
You missed the chance to say “I hope you didn’t find this video boring” at the end
I wouldn't know if he did or didn't because I got bored halfway through despite watching at 2x speed :(
@@loiseauxmort9568 me too, I just went to the comments.
@@loiseauxmort9568 I started scrolling through the comments while watching the video. I don’t really have a short attention span but it’s a habit I have to learn to break.
@@myathegrandma I've done that so much that now i actively check people's channels in search of playlists, help
@@loiseauxmort9568 Hey, I think that's ok, maybe it was just not the right time to watch this kind of video. Sometimes I feel like a video has too much information and I can't keep up with it, like... I'm too tierd or mentally overloaded (too watch it) . So sometimes it's better just to pause the video and stop those feelings. I'm not here trying to say you don't know your feelings but maybe you were in a similar situation as me. Maybe the video was too much and so you weren't interested. Ammm, what I wanted to say is: whatever it was, it's ok, your feelings are valid, take your time. Hope you have a good day
I feel like I learn so much on TH-cam, but retain about 25% of what I watch. I think it would help being able to talk about the things I learned to retain/apply the information
there's a video about this
@@ondablock0304 link ?
same
It’s stick a bit more for me if I summarize it in a journal (digitally). And I can go back to it every once in awhile
10%
I've been in this "boredom" stage for far too long, I'm unmotivated to do anything, meet anyone because everything feels pointless. I work most days only to earn enough to get by. Other days, I'm too mentally exhausted to do new things. I try to read, exercise, meet people once in awhile, pick up a new hobby but I never seem to be able to stick to it. I was diagnosed with ADHD a few years ago and have been trying to understand it a bit more so I don't just use it as an excuse to not be able to find anything stimulating enough for my brain to enjoy it. However...nothing has been working and I am feeling unchallenged, bitter and I feel like my life has no purpose. If anyone doesn't mind sharing some tips or advice or even your experiences on how you got out of this boredom, please do share!
I used to get really bored in class. Since kindergarten to highschool. So I would just stare at the walls and I would daydream. I created my own universe. It got to the point where I had a magic system and a few planets. I got really addicted to it since its way better that the real world. I tend to stay in my universe until something important comes up in the real world. It's like another me is interacting with people and doing things while I am somewhere else.
But maybe a Rubix cube might help. 🤔
But I do know, that making a list of stuff you want to do and check it off when you get it done. It will help with a sense of accomplishment.
That's been my life as well , now i think you should learn about yourself more in other words use the time you by yourself to get to know yourself and understand yourself better some people have goals and dreams in life since young age they know the path they want to lead and others like myself tend to live a life of emptyness that feels meaningless cause you don't have those dreams and goals and don't feel them but it's not cause they don't exist but cause they hidden by a lair of fog that you need to get through by experiencing life and knowing yourself more so i found lot of times that those 18 years of loneliness and emptyness i lived actually made me really know myself More and with that i began to understand which path i might lean towards just cause on those 18 years of boredom and living like zombie i actually was progressing myself mentally in an amazing way which gave me lot of insight into the psychological aspects of us humans and got me to discover my passion of psychology which i kept growing until it became a goal for me , what I'm trying to say is that if you focus on yourself , understand yourself better you'll begin to understand the thing that roams around your mind that might have always been your passion , your path but you never understood it or perceived it cause you never focused on it , You have path you just need to find it even if life is empty you can achieve lot just by yourself and every experience even the ones you give up mid way are always experiences that will further develop your knowledge and sea of skills and what i would suggest to try to do as first thing is to "write " write about yourself , about your feelings , about your life and about your mind , not only it will help you mentally and to further know yourself but it will express your life into words and different colors that might become an amazing story that i would love to read .
Anti depressants
@@fadeintotwilight5728 That sounds like textbook maladaptive daydreaming- you might want to talk to someone about that.
@@fadeintotwilight5728 that sounds very scary and dangerous dude, like you're not in the real world, your perception is so flawed to where it is affecting you severly negatively. It may seem like its helping in the moment but it could get to a point where you're so disassociated of your real self.
Things to try when you're trying to do nothing (or at least not scroll)
1: Meditate
2: Write
3: Go outside
4: Sit in a coffee shop, coffee and thought
5: Rearrange a room
6: Clean your bathroom
7: Make a box fort for your cat
8: Take an extra long shower, skincare, ect
9: Organize your laundry
Thanks lovely stranger
Do not take longer time for skincare or shower. There is a limit of putting your body in water. It damages the skin & hair easily.
@@big4headedGangster The point is to relax not take an hour long shower everyday you walnut.
@@themothman3726
Silly goose. Then you should have worded it better. It seems like it’s implying worse.
+
I recently learned "the art of slowing down." It's from an Asian American activist (the name is lost to me, I'm sorry) and her main point was that allowing ourselves to slowdown and take it our time. We live in such a busy world, esp as of recent, so it makes sense to keep our cortisol levels at bay. For me, I paint and man... the worst part is the waiting for the paint to dry. 🥴 It's therapeutic though.
As a Jew-- this is the purpose of Shabbat. A weekly day of rest. There's a lot that isn't allowed because rest is sacred.
Is really therapeutic? Or the paint vapours are drugging you?
Contrary to popular belief, cortisol is released in the body to help you _recover_ from stress. Having less cortisol is actually a bad thing.
are you apart of the LGBT community
@@mr.asdasd2345 Bi, not shy, and easily cries.
The problem is that whatever you do to avoid passive scrolling, there‘s always the possibility to come back to it because there‘s a community for everything. I started knitting a few months ago to avoid social media only to find myself mindlessly scrolling through knitting related things on instagram. The same goes for literally everything you can do to avoid your phone.
As difficult as last year was, all the time inside, alone truly gave me time to reflect. Two things I noticed was that a) social media actually made me feel more lonely than connected, b) I was never getting around to the things I really enjoy such as reading, painting, and learning languages because scrolling through social media made me feel like I'm doing something when I'm really not.
I know some people can't part with social media because of work, family, or even because sm might be a source of income. But for me, deleting all my social media and calling friends instead of liking a post, getting into a book after work instead of scrolling, and also, just taking 30 minutes to just sit and do nothing after a long day has helped me immensely.
It’s like the line from Inside
“Boredom is a crime”
Apathy is a tragedy
@@randomuser5443 anything and everything, all of the time
Could I interest you in everything all the time?
Tru Dat!
@@G.F.SF55 could I interest you in everything, all of the time?
I believe there was a study that showed that having a mind not occupied by your current task is important for certain cognitive processes that lead to, e.g., innovation. This is why you get all of those great ideas in the shower, while your mind is free. This is different from just sitting in a room doing nothing for six hours, though.
Yup. And also different from scrolling through social media I think?
Shower ideas are the besttttt
That's why artist back then were at their peak, they literally had nothing else to do, scroll through insta? message hommies? watch porn? hell no, Imma finish this painting
@@TheEtherny umm no?
@@TheEtherny Art is subjective, there is no peak in it's history.
Art too is very bound by the tool and technics one can apply, and of course time to apply those ideas, but artists in the present and past will always have the time to have idea, but not always the time to apply those ideas.
I think the worst part is when you get overwhelmed about this existential boredom and you just break... And simply start to ignore your body screaming that you should do something to change the situation and simply engage in an automatic mode that you just stop feeling everything... And suddenly 10 years fly by and you realize you are wasting your life...
I feel like crying. I fight with boredom and easy escapes constantly, procrastinating my tasks… and this video was so helpful thank you so much
"apathy's a tragedy and boredom is a crime"
Could I interest you in everything all of the time?
Wait where does that quote come from?
@@lobaloxrajobs9354 it's from bo burnham's welcome to the internet. it's a song
@@solshuji9582 Oooh yeah I forgot. Thanks a bunch pal
@@lobaloxrajobs9354 a little bit of everything all of the time
I have noticed that even though you try to overcome boredom by consuming media, consuming media itself becomes more and more boring over time. Will you stop? No, because it’s not like you have anything better to do.
Bingo !!!!!
You hit the nail on the head! This is where I am now 🤦♂️
I don’t know if anyone else is like this, but I’m very “frugal” with music. I usually only let myself listen to a unique song once or twice a week. (Though, I can listen to well over a hundred unique ones in a week.)
Anyways, my point is, I’m afraid that overplaying them is going to ruin their utility, so I’m not the kind of guy that just mindlessly puts a song on repeat. If you were to go through my Spotify listening history, the amounts of streams I have per song on a particular album are probably going to look roughly equal. (If it’s an album I listen to in its entirety, that is)
Ikr ughh
@@tashaenadekle pfp doe
*me scrolling mindlessly and thinking “I should get to bed it’s late I’m tired but I wanna keep scrolling” and then sees this video pop up:* TH-cam is reading my mind-
As a person who has actually spent a whole 24 hrs doing absolutely nothing even though i’m quote on quote “addicted to my phone”, I actually found it to be very relaxing
Live stream it. I don't believe you.
@@jonahs8143 lmao, I said it was relaxing not that it was easy, I’m not doing it again 😭
@@jonahs8143 Why don’t you believe them? It’s not like they ended world hunger or something like that.
"It's just miserable" lol welcome to the world of those of us with the type of depression that makes you want to do nothing but then you're frustrated about doing nothing
Felt through every inch of my body
I get this in a way
Bruh u got me
This is sooo me 😭
ooff this hits home haha 😂
I really felt that when you said that it’s scary how meaningless activities don’t feel boring. My city’s lockdown keeps getting extended, so in order to bring some dopamine to my brain, I downloaded this adorable game called animal restaurant. I spend 4hrs a day playing it and I’ve been playing it for 25 days. Literally ignoring my homework just to play it. There’s all these mini challenges that incentivise you to play daily. At first it was just a cute little game that made me happy but now, I feel like I keep choosing poor decisions that will negatively impact my future.
Try to slowly reduce the hours you play until you do it only a few hours at night.
Many times happens after two or three days break you don't care about the game anymore 😂 or are engaged with something more meaningful like the video said
Have had this happen quite a few times with a few different games! Not sure why but around 3 weeks I just suddenly get sick of the game and immediately uninstall it cold turkey
sponsered commeng
@@FZ-bk9kh that's why i said it! Last games i played (phone ones) i was grossly addicted like i wouldn't even cook or clean for weeks then few days i stopped for friends/other social media etc. and i couldn't find the motivation to come back to the game even if i wanted to... it's like the video said the dopamine is deciding what you do 😆
I never cared much about the game i just got hooked after two days of playing it at work and my body ''learned'' that that's what i had to do. And it doesn't help that i live alone and have nothing short term interesting to break out the habbit
I too have been obsessed with animal restaurant recently. And the best part about the game is that you don’t need to make mini purchases. A lot of games really incentivize making micro-purchases but you don’t need to at all to play.
honestly watching this video I was just so happy that someone else went through the experience of trying to be bored on purpose "because I could learn something from it!" only to end up miserable and find out through research later on (I read a paper about it in my case) that that's not how you do boredom :))) I just, felt really happy that somebody knows how that feels, thank you for doing and sharing this
I got to a point about a year and a half ago where I was so depressed that nothing would alleviate that crushing boredom and anything and everything, even mindless scrolling, was too much effort for me. I was so unmotivated by anything at all that even the idea of trying to not be bored made me physically exhausted.
Medication really helped and now mindless scrolling makes me bored because I wanna be more active rather than just sitting there!
That last point kinda makes me think though: is part of the issue the unpredictability of Content(TM)? Like, in an hour of mindless scrolling, you absolutely *could* come across that one video that makes you laugh harder than you ever have, or opens your eyes to a totally fresh perspective, or whatever - or you could see nothing remotely memorable in the whole hour. I wonder if we put up with the latter because we're so desperately chasing the former
But the problem with that is. That experience doesn't make it worth it. And actually isn't that rewarding. We see something that makes us laugh constantly on social media. It's becoming almost robotic.
*Scroll scroll scroll.. "OMG LMAO 🤣😂" * sends to direct message group chat. *Scroll scroll scroll scroll " lol wow that was weird 😂😂" *scroll scroll scroll.
Eventually it's just apart of the bored experience & doesn't making the experience any more valuable or worth it.
that’s a really interesting point actually
That's how I saw things, I guess me scrolling the comment section proved your point lol
I was thinking the same thing. I scroll in hopes of finding something interesting but i can't choose what I see so most of the time i don't find anything fulfilling and end up wasting my time
The ultimate gacha game
I think it's also anxiety related, things that are 'meaningful' to us have higher stakes because of that meaning and are therefore more daunting and we are scared of failing at them cause it would hurt a lot more than failing at say a video game that obviously isn't linked to any stakes or consequences in real life
Omg you explained it perfectly 😢
So true, I'll also add that doing meaninful things requiere a lot more of mental effort. So many times is just easier to keep yourself occupied with meaninless things.
Hell yeah! I literally failed out of university because of how daunting doing homework is. I've been laying there, doing absolutely nothing for months, telling myself: you have to do that thing! But not doing that thing. Why? Why can't I stand up from the bed and Do The Thing?
I have very little problem with going to work, so that's what I'm doing right now. What's wrong with me? Is that anxiety? Depression? I guess I'll never know until I buy a car and actually go figure it out with a doctor.
@@machinerin151 Interesting. I was in a similar situation. Uni gave us so much homework with similar tasks that I couldn't study although I love my major. I was later diagnosed with ADHD. 😂 It's really hard for me to do the same thing for a long time (I did like 6 sports as a kid) and now with medication it's easier to set priorities and get my mind focused on boring stuff. ADHD is when you don't have enough dopamine in your brain because your brain is just built different (it's a developmental disorder) but I know that anxiety and depression can also cause dopamine deficit. They treat these with other meds and therapy because it's not directly an attention deficit but rather caused by trauma and negativity. So yeah it's about finding meaning in your studies.
Wow...I really found this comment insightful.
Me after watching :
"Oh no."
"Anyways"
👁️_👁️📱 *scrolls mindlessly*
WOAH, someone sent me this video and you’re watching my twitch stream at the very beginning. this is so cool hahaha good stuff!!!
omg helloo!!
unexpected crossover
indeed
HIYA NICK I LOVE YOU
💕 nickkkkk
Meanwhile the Education system: It's your fault for feeling bored, here's an infinitely more amount of homework about stuffs that you'll probably never use in your profession.
American education system* remember, not all American problems apply to the rest of the world.
@@overlord3481 most people in america dont say “stuffs”
And when theirs a class you want your punished for getting it
while there's a lot of things in school that you don't use, the idea of only learning things that are useful for a job is depressing
Ugh it seems like we can never win😫
I usually don't comment on videos. Or interact with people online a lot, especially on social media. Not because I think it's bad: I'm often just scared of saying something wrong. Hurting someone. Or have my own feelings hurt, by people who get angry at me. I know that I can't do it the right way for everyone. But I still didn't want to even try jumping over my own shadow for a long time. This video made me think about that. And you know what? I'm going to try. Thank you for giving me that courage :)
as a kid I used to stare at the wall literally for hours because I couldn't do a lot of normal stuff kids get to do, I lived in the middle of nowhere, no friends nearby except at school, and I got used to it. I want to know what it means since I did that, I didn't start going into my imagination doing that until a while after
The “we live in a society” jar cracks me up
Great idea to save money
literally just got to that point of the vid when i read this
A shitty one
It made me laugh too lol
It was so unexpected
So let me get this straight…
Hours and hours of schoolwork with no tangible purpose for my future career combined with a social media fueled, dopamine dependent lifestyle makes me feel bored out of my mind after 3 homework questions?
True xD
are you in high school?
Am I looking in a mirror? OP seems awfully familiar…
Hey bud
The homework is training for your future career, it’s given to you to make you ok with being bored and doing mindless shit, for a minimum 8 hours a day
Jeez my 1st job is a low skill blue collar job and I still feel less empty than school. Both are stupid repetitive but one gives me money AND I CAN SEE WHERE MY EFFORTS ARE GOING and doesn't follow me after I'm done. Can't say the same about the other
I just had an epiphany.
I am a master procrastinatior. The "It's ruining my life"-type and I've suffered from it severely over the last few years. Studying at a demanding university, procrastination has recently received a price tag though: extra semesters I have to spend if I didn't manage to succeed in an exam.
So being interested in productivity and all that stuff, I decided that I had to quit the things I was procrastinating with: Netflix, hours of unfulfilling TH-cam and so on. Recently my uni stuff has been going a lot better but I've realised that I'm a lot less happy about it than I should be. I robbed myself from valuable ways to spend my time because I was too afraid, I wouldn't be able to stop them - only to replace them with less meaningful activities.
Listen: Self discipline in not about not doing great things in stressful times but about controling the amount.
Thank you Taha for helping me learn this lesson!
I just wanted to mention that I really like watching the videos you all make on this channel. Your videos are some of the things that feel like intentional Events or more generally, like Doing Something to me, and *not* like mindless scrolling. Thank you for that!
Boredom be like:
AYO THIS IS NOT A DRILL, GO DO SOMETHING ELSE
You know that is actually a good explanation
You know there’s an experiment that they lock a person alone in a room that’s empty except for a button that electrify them whenever they press on it. But the thing is they preferred to get pain and use it many times instead of just sitting there doing nothing.
I'd press it many times, no questions asked
@@mrpedrobraga lol 😂
I might fall asleep if i did that lol
Scary
Honestly fair. Many people hate boredom to the point where anything else is better than nothing. I personally think if hell did exist. It would just be empty. Not a barren wasteland, just a white box with nothing. No way to escape, no way to find anyone, no way to move, no way to sleep.
How crazy it is when you think about it how much of our life consists of meaningless things that obviously will bore us. The amount of entertainment that had no real purpose on the real world
I was practically an only child, my brothers were adults and in a different state when I was a kid. My mom was a math teacher so I was alone and bored a lot, and honestly thankful for that seeing how people respond to doing nothing. Thinking of random scenarios, what I’m going to do later, flushing out parts of my stories in my head combat doing nothing. Thinking is your greatest ally while you’re nodding out during class :D o7
I feel like this video didn’t get to the point of “what mindless scrolling does to you.” It was more of an informative video on the definition of boredom; realizing something you’re doing is meaningless. Sure, that relates to watching 60 second videos or looking at memes all day and how it is meaningless, it doesn’t really go into depth about the effects of doing what is essentially, nothing.
It talks about how mindless scrolling makes you more prone to boredom while providing a momentary fix which in the long run gives you existencial boredom. That’s what I got from it.
@@caradetu I agree, I was just expecting more from the video. I’d suggest a title change really. I wouldn’t go to say this video was pointless, because the interview specifically was very interesting and I think I’ve learned to reflect on unhealthy, pointless habits.
I will say the title is more engaging and eye-catching than simply asking, “What Actually is Boredom?” You feel cheated because it was a tad “clickbait-y” even though it actually taught us what mindless scrolling does to us: Give us a temporary fix while actually making us more prone to existential boredom.
If your more interested in the topic Better Ideas has a good video on it called "why over stimulation in ruining your life"
Yeah it was clickbaity
"What do you think of your job?"
"It's boring."
"What?"
"I study boredom."
study something you like
@@suduvanofficial2270 boredom
I've mindlessly scrolled past this video around 10 times or so and now I'm finally going to watch it
My grandpa be like: look what he has to do just to mimic a faction of my power.
Recently read “The Yellow Wallpaper,” & it goes over how isolation is literal torture. In the States, isolation was deemed as such by the US Supreme Court near the time of the publishing of the aforementioned short story. Though, unfortunately, about 50 years ago iso has been en vogue in the American prison system.😞
I did the 'Yellow Wallpaper' as my English exam. Bruh
I hate the prison system, it makes the people worse, not better. I wish it was therapy instead.
loved that short story...the ending gives me chills
oh god i had to do that for an english task
I think is could blow minds in the ADHD community-we're all stuck dealing with a form of chemically induced boredom. Hearing someone describe the different ways boredom is experienced validates so much of my own insecurities. I feel more hopeful now that I can see boredom as something other than a consequence of my deficiencies. Recognizing that the patterns of boredom that come with the modern, western lifestyle aren't necessarily natural blew my mind! I can't change the strengths and weaknesses of my neurons, and I can't change my culture's preoccupation with productivity. However, if I can cultivate an attitude that accepts boredom as inspiration to become curious about my needs, maybe I will feel less powerless.
I agree with this 100%!
this is exactly what i started thinking, i was born with severe ADHD and you need that constant stimulation but you keep filling it then you get chronic boredom, horrible cycle and i wish everyone out there nothing but luck with their own process
Yeah that’s pretty much it
Boredom is mental death. Using it as motivation is like pissing off a cheetah to get all your steps in. It will consume you.
@@jakegoll2604 that's more like boring yourself to death so that you will be motivated, as opposed to what they meant, which is realizing that the feeling of being bored means that you need to change something.
Most of us here found this video mindlessly scrolling. But you made me realize that what i was doing was just that: mindless. It’s definitely something I need to improve on. Thank you for this meaningful video
00:04:40
“Boredom Expert” is such a sick burn
I never would have even conceived of the idea of somebody who is an expert in boredom being a thing that exists. So thanks for that mind blow
@@ele346 rule 34: if it exists, there's an expery of it, no exceptions
And doesn't he look like he'd be a lot of fun too? I'd have a drink with him
I feel like if i had to do nothing for a day, i would just daydream the whole time. Just play a movie of scenarios id never be in with characters who aren't even real
I loveeee doing that, I do it to go to sleep too it helps lots
@@topi3609 bro thats how i fall asleep too! Like, can some people not daydream? I dont get why this dude had so much trouble lol. I can just stare at a wall and be entertained with my thoughts
i need to do that for 2 weeks, and the next 2 weeks will be me doing everything and be extra productive.
Yup! I go to bed like that every day. Sometimes, I feel stressed out or overwhelmed so I "go take a nap" but it's just enacting little scenarios in fantasy worlds for an hour.
I have an entire world in my mind. I am going to make a web comic of it and I don't think I'll ever get bored... 😅
Step one: scroll past this video multiple times
Step two: realize after a while what the title says and click the video
Step three: place the video in watch later (I'll update when I finally watch it)
*edit*
Step four: remember that this exists four months later and then watch it.
It was actually really good!
Watch it, we're still waiting
@@drakcamicazi7881 thanks for reminding me
This is honestly one of the best TH-cam videos I've seen in a long, long time. This really resonated with me. Thanks!
for the next 13:06 minutes I will promise myself to not mindlessly scroll but the second the video ends I will continue..soo take that how you will.
I scrolled down to see this comment a minute in, I'm so weak.
@@CollinOffTheCuff I and everyone who has commented, liked,replied and read in this comment section humbly invite you to the 'mindless scrolling' gala. A highly prestigious event that takes place between the hours of 9am and 4am. Please sign with a reply if you would like to grace us with your presence, Vix
I lost when I started scrolling trough the comments
@@vicdrose I humbly accept this offer, though please forgive me if I'm late, got lost scrolling.
@@CollinOffTheCuff Your lateness is forgiven. See you there!
(I am sure most guests get lost too)
Being diagnosed with ADHD was such an eye opener in how i understood boredom, and the definition he gives is so perfect. It feels like i dont have an “attention deficit,” i get *bored.* And I’m bored because i cant stay engaged in my environment. My brain doesnt produce/receive enough of the happy hormone to make me engaged (i guess? Idk), so i when i feel bored and i either need accommodation and coping skills irl or a medication to adjust internally. I sometimes try to have “nothing time” (my version of meditation) where i just try to find a base for no stimulus, and it sometimes helps normal things feel stimulating again. Or makes me realize just how much is on my mind. Doesnt work when I’m spaced out thinking about something i like, bc i could stare at a wall for hours when I’m like that lol.
it makes me so happy to see people with adhd commenting on this video sharing their experiences and me being like "wow they're just like me!" in a sense many of us have had to think of this stuff and learn how to deal with it (I do the nothing time/meditation too) and just kahdlakajsiaka
but yeah we get less of the satisfaction hormone from doing a task qmq and also nice pfp
I felt that i have ADD
I have adhd too I’m not able to stay engaged with things such as math but put a book and a video game in front of me and I can play and read for hours
This video has made me a lot more aware of how I spend my downtime, and over the summer I learned to make hobbies out of things that I find fun or worthwhile
(this video was great, made me realize some important shit about Starting things, or like, about boredom that keeps me from doing Challenging but Rewarding activities [even the ones i'm fond of, like drawing, for example]. Also, Taha you're a king. Thanks for coming back; your point-of-view adds so much to the conversation, and so do the themes you choose to research)
You would never expect someone with the name “Marius Finklestein” to be an expert on boredom, but reality likes to throw curveballs every now and again I guess.
Mariusz Finkielsztein
@@fBOMBB Gaius Marius
As an animator, that bit about the zone hit hard. It made me realize that by animating, I've almost never been bored. I used to be bored all the time but ever since I started animating I've felt so much better and almost never experience boredom (outside of school)
Now I'm even more glad I picked up that hobby.
it's one of my dreams to become an animator
@@anox886 Same (:
@@anox886 Make your dream into a reality before it's to late
Interesting fact: the flow state is the desired state in game design (Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is cited by game designers left and right). So, by playing _good_ games, you can get into the flow state and have satisfaction after too!
Obviously, if you can get paid for being in the flow state (art, programming (me), music, other content creation), it's way better
i like animating too
Glad to see you back! Always love this channel’s videos; I feel like I’m learning something and actually retaining the information
8:23 flow state also mentioned in ikigai
I learned how to draw by being bored in high school everyday …. I also taught myself how to decorate by being bored with nothing to do at home. I think social media and the internet make everything less exiting because we get to see it before we experience it which takes away some of the fun
I agree that social media can take away from some things that are meant to be experienced in person in order to fully enjoy. But I’ve also found that social media can over-hype and glamorize certain things that when you actually go out and do them, they don’t match the expectations or excitement you saw online. I felt this after watching Disneyland foodie youtubers. Sure the food is cute and decently tasty, but I don’t think it’s worth spending all the money to get there and buy such overpriced things. Oh well, live and learn.
When I'm bored, I write
I write anything and everything (e.g- My studies/homework, paragraph from books, something interesting I found on Wikipedia)
It takes my mind off negative thoughts
Reading helps as well 🙂
Does your hand ever hurt ?
IKR, just give me enough writing supplies and I'd be well-occupied😆
@@liliyapetrenko615 ehhh, a bit of stretching helps a lot. Same case with holding a phone for hours, if you listen to your body you will feel the cue to stretch and move
People always talk about benefits of reading, but never realize just how important writing can be.
1:37 "I hope I don't leave a legacy of unrealized potential"... that one got me
3:10 theres a beautiful quote. “All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”
According to Pascal, we fear the silence of existence, we dread boredom and instead choose aimless distraction, and we can't help but run from the problems of our emotions into the false comforts of the mind. In essence, we are too scared to confront the emotions bubbling beneath the surface that we have repressed to allow ourselves to become bored because then we’ll find it uncomfortable, as we are using things to distract ourselves, and modern day, we do NOT have a lack of distractions. Phones, video games, tv, internet, youtube videos, it goes on and on.
Comment from a late Gen X, Early Millennial: Doing nothing is literally my favorite thing to do. Whilst in the military, I pulled a 16 hour guard shift of the most boring tower that faced... literally nothing? Like internally facing, top of a building. It was absolutely dead silent; we did not speak. It was the greatest time I had in 20 years of the military.
That is different, you weren't "bored" you were just vibbing
Boredom is caused by feeling meaningless. But you found value, meaning in that guard post. So, it's not that you enjoyed boredom, it's that you weren't bored at all.
о_о
Yep. Something like standing in one spot staring at a wall can be so great. I can get to an out of body experience sometimes.
God, I feel that youtube was like "when is this human gonna stop scrolling" so it recommended this to you😂😂😂
I really love this video, it was nice to understand the issue without the feeling of guilt that usually comes from socal media related stuff
i love this sm bc i always feel the need to know stuff and have been depressed for so long and when my therapits told me it was boredom i thought they were making fun of me this made me feel so much better and i cant believe this doesnt have more views or likes thanks a lot this is my new favorite account
I'm glad someone has analyzed soul-crushing, mind-destroying boredom and what it does to us.
Oh stumbling upon this video at 2:30am after a night of scrolling is really - something
same happened to me at the same time
That was very helpful ! And something I've kind of been realizing about for quite some time. This vid brought some more clarity. Thanks!
Needed this. So guilty of spending hours on my phone. I know I’m addicted and never able to achieve the tasks and goals I want to get done. For me its not that I’m bored but more procrastination that leads to mindless scrolling. But I feel like this video covered all my problems. Actually come to think of it I’m probably bored doing the tasks so I turn to my phone for instant dopamine 🤦♀️ Ahhhh. I’m just going to take small steps and try get out of this hole Iv dug myself into. Will update y’all when I come out of it 🙏
As someone who has what I strongly suspect is undiagnosed ADD, that more generalized definition of boredom as "the experience of wanting to engage in a satisfying activity but being unable" at 5:10 resonated very strongly with me. Because that sentence describes a very real struggle that I often suffer from - and I use the word suffer in a very non-hyperbolic meaning.
That disconnect between what I'm currently doing and what I feel, very strongly and intently, that I wish to do more than anything else at that moment is in almost every instance the very definition of the pain I endure every day. My desire to do various things, such as play the piano, play a particular video game, read a particular book, etc., can be very strong, but rarely coincide with what I currently need to do, like working. Resisting the urge to pursue that which, in that moment, feels more grand, meaningful and fulfilling than anything else takes a lot of willpower and effort (A LOT), much like the attempt in this video to do absolutely nothing for hours. In many cases so much effort that by the time I can do whatever I like, all my energy has been completely drained, to the point where I don't have the energy to do anything fulfilling whatsoever.
I haven't thought of putting this in the framework of boredom until I watched this video, yet in the context of ADHD it makes complete and fundamental logical sense. I used to think I had a particularly obvious need to sit back and play video games after a hard day of work, being an introvert who needs time alone. But really, it's just the need to relieve my boredom. To do something, anything, that doesn't bore me out my frickin' mind. Doing chores is so ridiculously difficult for me because it's simply so boring. For me, cooking is as aggravatingly soul-draining as being forced to watch paint dry or read terms-of-use, with no opportunity to walk away, because you can't just abandon your cooking half-way through for obvious reasons.
That sense of misery that is described in the video after a few hours of doing absolutely nothing? That's the way I feel after an hour or so of cooking or cleaning. Like, completely spent. Exhausted, destroyed and in pain. Broken. Many times, I've had to sit down and cry for a minute, just to recover from the trial and ordeal. My life is a constant struggle to balance keeping my home in liveable condition and maintaining the will to live - due to, I now realize, boredom.
So I got a bit more personal in this comment than I expected. I apologize, but having just recently learned about ADD - as in learning what it actually is instead of my preconceived notions about it - I often get very excited in finally being able to put words on my experiences and being able to make sense of it. Until a couple months ago, I really could not. And this video has been very insightful for me, so I want to say huge thanks for making it! It really does mean quite a lot for me.
Can I suggest some things that helped me, also a person with adhd?
@@oxybrightdark8765 yes, please :)
I just got diagnosed with ADHD and I resonated with that too! I didn't know how to put it into words, so thank you!
Also, putting this here just in case it's helpful - I did the *dishes* this morning without feeling *dead inside* after by putting on my music. It made it way more stimulating and made the *time pass* faster. Also, I'm on *medication* so it *might not* be the same for you. And I've been really loving the ADHD TikTok compilations by *Statsu* on TH-cam so maybe check those out? They're not only funny and relatable, but have loads of *actually helpful and practical* information.
That was eloquent and beautifully put. However, there are also times when I can't switch tasks to do things that I'm actually interested in. ADD is weird but I'm with you on this wild ride.
As someone with ADHD, my biggest struggle is sitting down to try and enjoy myself.
"Let's play this video game. I feel like there's something else I need to be doing. Did I forget to do something? Man, I'm always forgetting something. Let's run through the things that need to be done. Dishes? There's not a lot and those can wait. Laundry? God, there's so much. I just want to enjoy myself for a bit. But like... do I _deserve_ to? I feel like all I do is slack. Should I even take this time to enjoy myself?"
*2 hours later*
"I just sat here doing nothing, burned my time window, and now I have to _actually_ go be productive. Fml."
lately ive noticed the difference between when im bored and not bored online and one of the best remedies is watching fulfilling content like this that i can assimilate into my thought process to help me think more critically about a subject whether its something going on in my life or an important social issue.
Thank you for this video and shedding light on boredom. That explains why I like to do certain things rather than do many other things.
That was so well edited and voiced, you did an amazing job explaining this, Thank you!
This one hit me on a very ‘chronic boredom’ day so this was super interesting for me!
When I was mindlessly scrolling TH-cam shorts - that I don’t even like - and this notification came up.
Coincidence? *I think not* 🧐
Great insight to why people get bored in the first place and information to help one make up their mind on what to do about it. This video had me thinking about how writing use to make me feel and knowing that I had been in the zone so many times but haven't done that as of late. Thank you or making this video and know that you time doing things for it was well spent.
Excellent! I tried to watch this once before and got interrupted. I'm glad I found it again. Love your channel, all of you.
When we lost power for 3 1/2 days after a storm, it was a pure delight not having the television droning in the background. We had undistracted conversation and everything we did was intentional and important. It was also the best sleep I'd had in ages.
I love a key insight you give regarding boredom: The state of being bored can help you realise what things are not good for you and that you should be doing something else instead, something more rewarding.
Wow this is wonderfully made, and way more interesting than I expected. You're a great host, Taha!
also this feels extremely relevent as someone with ADHD and depression, I feel like those things can greatly effect boredom.
This video is eye opening, I really needed to see this. It's past the time to make some changes!
Thank you so much!!
The book “How to Break Up with Your Phone” talks about dopamine addiction and brain stuff that has to do with your phone. Hope this is helpful to anyone who wants to learn/break some habits!
*receives notification while mindlessly scrolling* I feel called out
Brilliant video. And especially important for people who are using their time online/social media to build/grow and run a business.
I DO feel boered all the time, recently I have become more aware of that when I started writing a diary and I realized I do NOTHING on weekends.
I think one of the things I absolutely love about your guy's videos, is that you start out with a question and nine times out of 10 discover you were asking the wrong question. And that just proves how difficult it is to be an adult in our world. Answers are not easily found, and sometimes we’re not even looking in the right places.
It was scary enough that I was mindlessly scrolling when the notification appeared on my phone 🙀
Same!
This might be the most relevant of all your videos yet, I really needed to hear this
Cette vidéo tombe à pic. J’ai supprimé beaucoup de mes réseaux sociaux, et j’observe un changement dans mes activités quotidiennes. Je fais les choses avec intention et c’est vraiment plus encourageant et rémunérateur. Ça donne plus de sens à la vie et elle est plus joyeuse.
I have an exam,a veeery difficult exam,that needs studying for.But, whenever I look at my online classes,I zone out,think of cringy shit I've done in the past,ways I've allowed people to treat me---- I end up panicking,end up hating myself and come to youtube- where I can see random bs and not hate myself.I tried therapy,yoga, meditation--- not helping atm 😭
have u tried listening to lofi beats? i’m not sure if that goes in the same section as meditation but i listen to it while studying or really low songs that won’t distract me cuz i overthink a lot too.
@@angleslikeyou537I'll give them a try 😁 Thank you for your reply 😊.
@@dv3003 No problem😊
Maybe you're just not interested in what that exam will get you. We all feel that way about certain things at certain points in life.
@@DantesInferno96 You are the sorta person I've been warned about 😂. Seeing that I put sooo much effort into organising my mind - I definitely want it.Perhaps,there were different things in different points of time that seemed momentarily more important than the exam, but that gives you no excuse to derail someone.