How social media is destroying our ability to be bored, and why that matters

I just spent five weeks at an Ayurvedic retreat in Kerala, India. I went because an intense burnout had left me numb and exhausted. In the months leading up to it, I did what so many of us do: I got hooked on my phone. My inner critic was relentless, and so I spent 10+ hours a day scrolling, in a desperate attempt to ward off those attacks. Of course, it only left me more restless, irritable, and hopeless. But then, at the retreat, I was suddenly immersed in six hours of daily treatments, followed by long stretches of silence. No screens, no noise, just me and those thoughts I’d been avoiding. At first, it was excruciating. Minutes felt like hours, and I often felt like I was on the edge of a panic attack. But slowly, the fear began to loosen its grip. In its place came a sense of space. Old memories resurfaced, games I played as a child reappeared, and ideas began to take shape. For the first time in months, I could actually think with myself instead of against it. When I finally logged back into Instagram, the stimulation felt overwhelming and even sickening, akin to sugar after a detox. It left me wondering: what is social media doing to our ability to simply sit with ourselves?

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Firstly, we all know social media can increase anxiety, depression, loneliness, and even addiction. But there’s a deeper, paradoxical effect it has on boredom, which could very well be a driving factor in all these other conditions it creates. On one hand, social media fragments our attention, reduces focus, and floods us with dopamine-driven stimulation, all of which actually makes us more prone to boredom than ever before. But then, on the other hand, because these platforms are designed to keep us entertained, they make boredom feel almost unbearable. The result is a cycle of dependence: social media creates boredom, then makes it intolerable, much like cigarettes create cravings only to temporarily satisfy them. As a result, what used to be a natural, even useful, state now feels impossible to sit with.

For instance, we’ve grown so accustomed to thinking of boredom as wasted time that we’ve forgotten just how vital it is to human creation. Throughout history, wealth bought people the time to be bored, which enabled them to create art, ideas, industries, technologies, and more. When we’re left unstimulated, the brain drifts, makes new associations, and often solves problems we didn’t even know were there. In other words, having “time to think” really means having time to be bored. Studies even show that people who endure dull, repetitive tasks perform better on creative problem-solving afterward.

But social media has hijacked our brains. Most of us cannot sit with that discomfort long enough to get there. We immediately feel boredom as if a panic attack is coming and dodge it with our phones. Planes were once incubators of daydreams and ideas; now they are streaming zones. Waiting rooms, once silent with people processing their day and thoughts, now glow with screens clutched like oxygen tanks. Our inability to sit with ourselves and to feel the boredom that comes with that has made our natural state unbearable, fueling anxiety, burnout, and depression.

This erosion of boredom is part of a bigger problem I’ve spoken about before: the comfort crisis. For most of history, discomfort was unavoidable and trained us to endure, regulate, and reflect. Now, we’ve engineered it away, and we’re becoming less resilient and more fragile. During those treatments, I felt how sitting with ourselves can be so agonising that it triggers anxiety and even depressive episodes. Our mental health suffers not in spite of comfort, but because of it.

But to be clear: I do not think we need to renounce technology altogether. In fact, I don’t even think that’s a possibility anymore. But I do think we need to start using a lot more caution when we engage with it. For instance, switch your phone to black-and-white (grayscale) mode to make apps less visually stimulating, which will reduce dopamine-driven scrolling, and help you use your phone more intentionally. Then, let your phone die or leave it in your bag while queuing and see what your mind does when it’s forced to wander. Above all, try to see the ache of boredom not as a problem but as a signal that something deeper is stirring. Because, if nothing else, in a world drowning in stimulation, the most radical act for our mental health may be the simplest: to sit, wait, and just be.