Ever heard this from kids – "I'm sooo booored!" Ever said it yourself? Why do we get bored?
What ever happened to ‘spontaneity’ where you just do something for fun on the spur of the moment because you feel like it? The famous Oprah Winfrey set some challenges for families a while back on her very popular TV show.
The challenge was to see who can go a week without the TV, iPads, Facebook, computer games etc.
It was fascinating to watch – especially the kids of course but interestingly enough, some parents realised they used the TV or computer games etc as ‘babysitting devices’ for their kids!
Imagine that – You turn the TV on (or the kids do!) at 6am to ‘keep them quiet’ – you let them watch it again after school to ‘keep them quiet’ and then after dinner they can play on their devices until they fall asleep…
What kind of life is that!?? Is that what ‘being a family’ is all about?
Oprah’s show was great because it revealed to everyone how much we have become dependent on television & online devices to ‘fill in time’.
Whatever happened to bed-time stories? Where has dinner table conversation gone?
Do you watch TV while eating AND watch it in bed too?
Ok – so at the end of the day there is nothing fundamentally wrong with doing that except if that is ALL you ever do day in and day out, then it’s no wonder you get bored and can’t think of anything else to do!
It becomes a habit. Home from work. TV on… Up in the morning TV on.
So here’s a challenge for you, with apologies to Oprah for pinching the idea!
Whether you are a singleton or a family person, nominate one day/night a week (as a starting point) to NOT turn on the TV at all. Not even the news!
By all means put a radio on quietly in the background or a favourite CD if the quietness is too hard to deal with initially. But I like the quiet – Actually I love it and it drives my very ‘noisy’ wife crazy sometimes!!
If you’re a couple or a family, after you’ve all had a giggle and felt a bit awkward, see if you can start a conversation – remember those?
Anything will do but why not start with ‘where do we want to go on holidays this year?’ – start throwing around some crazy ideas INCLUDING things like “what if we had no money – where would we go on holiday?”
You see, if you talk about stuff ‘collectively’ that is fun and talk about things you might want to do together, rather than ‘my job sucks – did I tell you what happened at work today?…’ then the conversation is light tight bright and happy – and NOT just about you.
(c) 2021 - Brian Pickering
