October 2026 "Get Bored: Gain Creativity" by Will Williams

When I was quite young, I thought the clouds were created by the billowing smoke drifting out of factories, supplying the world with all sorts of things. These plumes looked like clouds and acted like clouds, so why would they not be clouds? A similarly misinformed conclusion, I was confident for some time that the world existed in black and white up to about 1960, informed by my only insight of the period being through black and white movies. One more: before I knew that facial hair was a thing, I saw a very mustachioed man and obviously assumed the only place this hair could have grown was from his nose. I swear I was super young at the time, though. I promise I am not stupid. Like, definitely in the single digit of ages.

These conclusions I once drew are obviously false, and I have since learned enough information about the world as to understand to the fullest extent the realities of these situations. Thinking back on these moments in my early life, though, I can not help but be intrigued by the innate problem-solving process, the desire for understanding of the world that was present in my relatively untainted child brain. Before I was able to comprehend how I perceived the world, it seems evident that I craved learning about it. I believe in some ways this thought gives me comfort, because it implies, based on a sample size of one, that humans have a hunger for knowledge, to the same degree as food, that exists beyond the bounds of the environment in which they live, and at any moment this could be regained if ever it were lost.

I bring this up because there are likely a million ways that curiosity may be “lost,” and thus the important conversation of recovering this becomes relevant. For me, it has become almost an inevitable struggle. In youth, that being before 25 years of age or so, the regular progression of education that takes place so often seems antithetical to the natural drive for knowledge. For many reasons standardized education could be blamed for this culling of curiosity, as much of grade school post No Child Left Behind is spent learning how to recite a set of facts, yet very rarely considering why they are significant. Thinking back on my own elementary and high school education, I struggle to think of a single significant thought I had. I would even argue that my questioning of the origin of clouds was a more significant moment in the growth of my own knowledge than most of my formal education, because I gained something invaluable in coming to this topic on my own, rather than it being fed to me with neatly packaged facts that involved no questioning whatsoever.

Formal education is only one type of formative education that takes place for young people in the 21st century, most prominently supplemented by the information overload that has come with the digital age. Every child with internet access has in one way or another used social media, and in the era of short form video content, attention is the hottest commodity for platforms with ad revenue to earn. Doomscrolling, as the kids call it, has become the latest detractor of curiosity. More importantly than the specific content consumed in these short form videos, which most often is in no way substantive, is the very fact that not for a moment in the process of this mass information consumption is their allowance for a single thought by the consumer. When we do not think, we do not truly learn, and thus information obtained in the manner described is, in ways, useless.

There is something powerful to be gained from boredom. When the noise is cut out, one’s own mind will inevitably fill the silence. This is the moment that has been lost, waiting to be regained. As the universe gears towards entropy, the human mind gears towards asking questions, if allowed. Sit in a field somewhere, if you can. Inventory the world around you, embrace it with the wonder of a child. Look at the clouds. Do you know what they are made of?