I want to recommend Darby Saxbe’s recent piece in the Washington Post about the benefits of boredom for children.

She argues that we are over-parenting our children with costs to both ourselves and to them.

And she has some really good advice on cultivating boredom:

An excellent way to bore children is to take them to an older relative’s house and force them to listen to a long adult conversation about family members they don’t know. Quotidian excursions to the post office or the bank can create valuable opportunities for boredom, too.

Sounds like my childhood.

Neuroscientists have shown that a bored mind is a busy mind. Think about yourself. When hanging in a waiting room without a phone (do you even remember hanging out in a waiting room without your phone?), first we let our eyes wander. We pick up random literature and maybe learn something about vaccine schedules or dental care or colon cancer.

Then, our eyes start wandering over our fellows. We notice what they’re wearing. We wonder about their relationships. We silently criticize or admire their parenting.

Often we think about our own relationships and the interactions we’ve had with others.

All of these things consolidate connections in our mind, increase social........

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