Dear Stoics,

Here we go with another Monday. Some of you are commuting or stuck in a meeting that could’ve been an email. Some of you, the lucky bunch, are on holiday right now, maybe lying on a beach somewhere. The good thing is, today’s subject can be appealing to both groups, because today we talk about boredom!

Why is boredom such a bad thing exactly?

Most of us have the idea that boredom is a sign of something being wrong with us or with our lives. You’ve probably heard some version of the “intelligent people don’t get bored” quote at some point, which is a terrible thing to say, and also not true.

With social media in the picture, it feels even heavier. Everyone seems to be living a life filled with 24h routines, workouts, trips, and grand projects. Our real daily lives aren’t better with all the work and errands we have to do. Boredom feels like a failure or an unwanted gap between the chores.

There might also be a deeper reason why we avoid it: when we’re bored, we’re alone with our own thoughts. That can be uncomfortable, so we reach for the phone or look for something to kill the silence quickly. But that silence, for most of us, is worth the trouble.

Bored out of my mind? I don’t think so!

Here are the “scientifics”: when your brain isn’t focused on a task, it activates what neuroscientists call the default mode network: a set of brain regions involved in daydreaming, memory consolidation, and creative thinking. The brain shifts from processing the outside world to making sense of your inner one.

Research shows that people often come up with more original ideas after performing boring or repetitive tasks. When there’s less external stimulation, the brain starts generating its own ideas, forming new connections between memories, experiences, and thoughts that don’t interact when we’re busy. That’s why some of our best ideas show up in the shower or while doing the dishes. By filling every second to avoid boredom, we might actually be missing out on opportunities for our brains to think more freely.

There’s also an emotional angle here. Learning to tolerate boredom helps strengthen the brain systems involved in self-control and emotional regulation. Instead of immediately escaping discomfort, the brain practices managing it, and over time, this builds resilience and patience.

I’m not bored, I’m just resting!

Think about how much your brain processes in a single day. Notifications, news, conversations, decisions, background noise, screens. It’s a lot. So when you do nothing and let yourself be bored, your mind finally gets a chance to breathe. It’s not that different from meditation! When you’re meditating, you’re giving your mind permission to stop performing and just be present in your body for a moment. Boredom does something similar, it’s just less intentional.

It’s in exactly the state of boredom that some of the most unexpected thoughts tend to surface, precisely because you’re not trying to be productive. When the constant stream of external input quiets down, there’s more room for things you haven’t processed yet, thoughts that were waiting for a gap to appear.

Of course, we wouldn’t be ourselves without a small philosophy trivia. Two famous thinkers, Wittgenstein and Heidegger, saw boredom as the very source of philosophical thought, a space without direction or will, where something genuine has room to surface. Walter Benjamin put it nicely: “Boredom is the dream bird that hatches the egg of experience.” So, when you stop rushing to fill the silence, everything inside gets a bit more space.

But how can I practice boredom?

Well, it’s harder than it sounds, because we’re not used to doing it on purpose. A few simple ways to get there: leave your phone in another room for a bit, and when the urge to grab it kicks in, try to wait it out. Go for a walk without a podcast or music, and notice what your mind does when it’s not being directed anywhere. And finally, do something repetitive like ironing or another household chore. These are some of the best conditions for the mind to slow down and wander. And even if you decide it’s not for you, at least your house will be clean! Isn’t it a perfect win-win situation?

To end this letter, let’s just keep in mind that boredom is a kind of mental rest we all need and should allow ourselves. Nobody said you have to be doing something every minute of every day! And if someone did, just ignore them!

Yours truly,
The Stoic App Team

You know how sometimes you look back at your life and realize that one completely random or insignificant moment changed everything? Like a decision you made on a whim, something you said offhand that turned out to matter a lot more than you knew. That’s what we’re exploring in Stoic this week.

This week’s prompts will invite you to look back at some of the moments that rippled further than expected, the chaos you accidentally started, the small nudge that set something much bigger in motion. So, open the app today and start the chain of reflections!