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Dr. Sanjay Gupta: Boredom as a Motivational State

boredom as a motivational state
January 24, 2025

From WWSG exclusive speaker, Dr. Sanjay Gupta:

I have always thought of boredom as an emotion — a painful one I think most of us actively try to avoid.

And now, thanks to smart phones and social media, there’s an easy distraction at our fingertips.

But if you’re trying to turn away more from distractions like social media in the new year, boredom may be something we have to face head on.

And you can start by thinking of boredom not as an emotion, but a motivational state, cognitive neuroscientist James Danckert told me on a recent episode of Chasing Life.

“I like, when I give a definition of boredom, to resort to this quote from Leo Tolstoy, from [his novel] ‘Anna Karenina,’ where he talks about ennui, or boredom, as ‘the desire for desires,’ ” he said. “Boredom is a motivational state. You want to be doing something that matters to you, but you just don’t want anything that’s currently available to you.

So how should you deal with boredom?

So the next time you’re bored, don’t get frustrated, get motivated.

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