Damian Robb

I did something today that I was really proud of. It wasn’t that I went to work, did my part to contribute to society, or that I helped advance medical science just a little bit more. No, it was that I managed to watch TV on my laptop, through the reflection of my mirror, while I shaved my head. A worthy accomplishment.

I did this because shaving my head takes around 20-25 minutes and it’s simply not that stimulating a thing to do. I do this a lot, use technology to entertain myself the moment there’s even a whiff of boredom. As I ride to and from work I listen to an audiobook. When I have a lunch break, or even just a toilet break, I read an ebook on my phone. Now when I shave my head I watch TV, as I also do if I’m doing exercises, or scanning Facebook, or completing some mundane clerical task on my laptop.

It’s so easy to do nowadays. There is literally no excuse for boredom. But being bored is important. I’ve found with screenwriting that the time I get the best ideas is usually when I’m bored. When I give myself time to be bored it allows my mind to tell me all the things it’s been trying to tell me during my constantly-stimulated-day. Then after all those thoughts have been heard, registered, and catalogued to wherever it is my brain those thoughts go; my mind delves deep down into my subconscious, searching inwards for entertainment, so that I get access to a bunch of interesting and different ideas. It’s in these times that I feel like I get struck by inspiration, or I have an epiphany, when in reality I’m just accessing the parts of my brain that I usually deny myself access to due to this unrelenting stimulation.

But I didn’t do that today. I instead set up an ingenious system of mirrors (well one) to ensure I wouldn’t be bored for even twenty minutes.

I guess it’s easier said than done.

Talk soon.

Damian.