Things My Mother Tried To Teach Me #2

“Only boring people are bored.”

Ok, ok, so this isn’t so much a lesson as a reprimand, but it still echoes through my head when I find myself staring off into space battling acedia, and sometimes the words come right out my mouth when my 5 year old looks at me and whines, “but Moooooooom, I’m so boooooored.”

And then I have to look over my shoulder to see how my mother got in the room before I realize that was ME talking.

This wasn’t meant as a put down, lest you get the wrong idea. My mother, I wager, did not actually think that any of her children were boring people, but drove home the point that we had no excuse to be bored. Just as I have no excuse today. There are always more tasks that need to be done, more projects that could be started, people to be interacted with, books to be read, ideas to think about. Ultimately my internal resources – my mind, my will, my spirit – have been so fortified with education, experience, and imagination that whatever my exterior situation there is no reason to succumb to acedia.

It only took me 20 years to figure that out. So I suppose I can look forward to 20 years of telling my own children that ‘only boring people are bored’ and helpfully volunteering to give them chores to do to relieve the tedium. 🙂