Note: This article is slightly more complex than usual.
It has been exactly 1 week since the start of this programme. Time seems to have flew by as the awkward start and fear of leaving the conversation hanging soon turned into hours enjoying my elderly friend’s experiences and life stories. I would never have imagined that I would be able to enjoy my conversation with my elderly friend instead of counting down towards some arbitrary time limit.
As a pilot project, I had my own doubts that such a small act would even count towards anything and I was, and still am deeply grateful for AWWA’s support in testing it out with a few of their beneficiaries. Speaking for my elderly friend and I, I do believe it has far exceeded the aim of this programme – To provide immediate companionship to the elderly – for my elderly has consistently remarked that she does nothing but reads her book the entire day and that she is free for a call anytime. As this initiative runs to a close in a few days, a tinge of regret has crept its way into my mind for my friend will soon not even have this precious hour of human interaction. I wondered if she craved to do some meaningful work, to do something other than read during this period. While she consistently said,
“我现在走也不能走，我又能做些什么？谁要请我做？“ “I can’t even walk now, who would want to hire me?”
And while I may tease,
“我咯.”“I will.”
I do wonder if these elderly beneficiaries could be beneficial to society instead. Personally, I pondered if they could start teaching the young our forgotten dialects or if the more mentally adept amongst them could take the responsibility to check-in on their other elderly friends through a friendly phone call. Again, it may not seem like much to us, but I am sure it will mean a world to them for I believe that nobody ever wants to be regarded as useless in this world. And so, I would be more than happy to work with anybody who may find these ideas appealing. J
Anyways, while I strived to look for other ways to help these elderly more meaningfully, I realised that complaining about boredom should be prohibited. We consistently claim that we have ‘nothing to do’ right now and while I understand that ‘nothing to do’ is used loosely, the exaggeration of the phrase is far too great to ignore, especially when I have been conversing with those whose daily activities are so much more limited compared to us. More accurately, a caveat should be added: We are bored because we have nothing that we feel like doing currently, that can be done. This is not revelatory and also not entirely accurate for if we were to continually partake in the things we feel like doing, we will all be hedonists.
Instead, more specifically, we feel bored because we have nothing that we feel like doing currently, that can be done, and we have no commitments currently that needs to be done. With more time than ever on our hands, some of us are blessed to be able to complete our work / study assignments far ahead of time. For those who truly despise boredom then, they should concur that those who are consistently engaged in meaningful work and who do not experience the restless feeling that comes with boredom are even more blessed. I think for the majority of us though, we will choose boredom over an increased workload any day.
Boredom, is hence a privilege. A privilege that should inspire us to do the things we are uncomfortable of doing, instead of waiting idly for the Circuit Breaker to end. It is curious then, that we still tend to favour idling away our time in restlessness compared to overcoming that initial barrier of doing something we dislike. Dwelling on this briefly, one reason is plausibly due to our inaccurate understanding of time, as mentioned 2 articles ago. Another would perhaps be us truly enjoying the feeling of doing nothing but in such an instance, I would not consider these group of people to be bored.
More important than the reasons for such a phenomenon, is our awareness of our own inertia. I certainly felt hesitant committing to this programme and I am sure the rest of the volunteers as well. But what matters in the end is our will to try out the uncomfortable, but meaningful, activities. Hence, I challenge all of us who may be bounded by our comfort zone to give in to boredom, to try something new instead, even if it may not be what you enjoy doing. For (without being contrary to the article published yesterday[1]) how would we ever know what we dislike if we do not take the first step to experience it for ourselves?
As explained succinctly by C.K. Lewis,
“I’m bored’ is a useless thing to say. I mean, you live in a great, big, vast world that you’ve seen none percent of. Even the inside of your own mind is endless; it goes on forever, inwardly, do you understand? The fact that you’re alive is amazing, so you don’t get to say I’m bored.”
[1] The article yesterday argues for us to pursue our own lives doing the things we desire. Today, however, I urge those of us who do not yet know what that is, or may not be able to do these things momentarily, to engage in activities we think we dislike but in actual fact, may not always be the case.
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