How does "Decode what boredom is signaling" work?

Mann describes boredom as an emotion rather than just a state — it carries information. Chronic boredom in a specific domain (work, relationship, routine) signals that the engagement between your capacity and the challenge is badly mismatched. Attending to the signal rather than suppressing it is more useful for course correction than numbing it.

How does "Take low-stimulation breaks instead of high-stimulation ones" work?

High-stimulation breaks (social media, news) compete with the attentional networks that need to recover — they are cognitively active and often emotionally arousing, prolonging the demand on the same systems that need rest. Low-stimulation breaks allow the directed-attention network to genuinely quiet while the default mode network replenishes.

How does "Journal during boring tasks" work?

Boredom activates the default mode network, producing loosely associated, internally generated thought. Left uncaptured, these thoughts dissipate. Journaling during or immediately after a boring activity creates a record of what the wandering mind produced — ideas, memories, and connections that focused attention typically suppresses.

How does "Use monotonous tasks as attentional training" work?

Monotonous tasks produce mind wandering, which gives repeated opportunities to notice drift and return — exactly the training loop that strengthens meta-awareness. Used intentionally, doing the dishes or folding laundry without distraction is a form of informal mindfulness training that builds the noticing muscle applicable to focused work.

How does "Audit and reduce your stimulation diet" work?

Constant high-stimulation input raises the threshold at which the brain feels adequately engaged — a tolerance effect similar to other appetitive systems. When even mild quiet feels unbearable, the ability to sustain attention on less-stimulating tasks degrades. Reducing baseline stimulation recalibrates the threshold, making focus on demanding-but-calm tasks easier and boredom less aversive.

How does "Wait in queues without your phone" work?

Queues and waiting rooms are the most common encounter with mild boredom in modern life. Reflexively escaping them with a device reinforces the neural association between any low-stimulation moment and immediate relief-seeking. Not reaching for the phone trains the tolerance response in low-stakes contexts, building the capacity that transfers to higher-stakes focus situations.

Sandi Mann — Science of Boredom

Is boredom bad for you, and how do you tolerate or use it well?

Why tolerating boredom sharpens attention and fuels creativity

Short answer

Sandi Mann's research challenges the assumption that boredom should always be eliminated. Boredom signals a mismatch between stimulation and need, and tolerating it rather than immediately escaping it is associated with increased daydreaming, creativity, and self-insight. The evidence is mostly lab-based; translating it to chronic boredom contexts requires nuance.

We treat boredom as a problem to be solved with stimulation — phone, podcast, scroll. Sandi Mann's psychology research suggests that this impulse, while understandable, prevents boredom from doing the job it evolved to do: signal that it is time for deeper engagement, and create the idle mental space where creativity, daydreaming, and self-reflection flourish. Learning to sit with boredom is increasingly a competitive advantage.

The practices (7)

Why it works

Escaping boredom immediately trains the attention system to demand constant novelty. Tolerating the discomfort without relief allows the brain's default mode network to activate — which is associated with mind-wandering, imaginative thought, and the loose associations that underpin creative insight.

How to do it

1Choose a genuinely boring task — waiting in line, a repetitive household task, a slow commute without a device.
2Leave your phone pocketed or out of reach for the duration.
3Notice the discomfort without fighting it; observe the thoughts that arise.

Evidence

RCT / meta-analysis

Mann and Cadman found that participants who completed a boring task (copying numbers from a phone book) before a creative task produced more creative ideas than controls who did not. Reading from the phone book was even more boring and produced the most creative output.

Honest caveat: Lab study using a specific creative divergent-thinking measure; how well this generalizes to complex real-world creative work is an open question.

— Mann & Cadman (2014), "Does Being Bored Make Us More Creative?", Creativity Research Journal

Common mistake: Pulling out a phone at the first hint of boredom, which means you never actually experience the boredom-to-daydream transition that precedes creative insight.

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