The “I’m Bored” Trap Isn’t About Your Kid’s Brain
written by Dr. Liz Nissim
We’ve all been here. You’re standing in the kitchen, dinner is half-cooked, and your child wanders in, drops his arms like lead weights, and lets out those two dreaded words: “I’m bored.”
We all know that we should encourage our children to come up with ideas about what they could do instead of reaching for an iPad, phone, computer, or video game. But, let’s be real – saying something like, “What do you think you can do?” or “I’m sure you’ll come up with a great idea,” means that you’re going to have a child or teen or even a young adult who is going to look at you and repeat, “I’m bored.”
When our kids say those two dreaded words, “I’m bored,” a tiny, panic-driven alarm goes off in your brain. As a parent, you may feel the urge to fix that boredom and to offer a project or set up a play date or take them somewhere “fun.” Most of the time, our ideas are shot down with a dramatic groan or grumble. We all want to grow creative, self-sufficient kids, but we also feel the need to scramble and “fix” our child’s boredom. What if that boredom is not about their development at all, but is rather about our own low tolerance for their temporary distress or boredom??
Is this about our own discomfort?
Here is the uncomfortable truth: We are asking our children to master a skill that we, as adults, may not have figured out ourselves.
Consider this famous 2014 study published in Science: Researchers placed participants in a room alone for 15 minutes with nothing to do. They were given a choice: sit quietly with their thoughts or press a button to give themselves a mild electric shock. The result? A significant portion of participants chose to shock themselves rather than sit in silence with their own minds.
Ask yourself this question: When was the last time you stood in a grocery store line for two minutes without pulling out your phone? When was the last time you sat at a red light, rode an elevator, or waited for a doctor’s appointment without scrolling through social media or checking your email? Most of us can’t survive thirty seconds of unstructured downtime without seeking some sort of entertainment or information seeking.
So it should be no surprise to us when our child or teenager struggles to sit in the back of the car for twenty minutes without a screen. It’s not a failure of imagination for our children; we don’t access our own silence or thoughts with ease either.
Why do we panic when we hear the words, “I’m Bored?”
When a child whines about being bored, it hits a cluster of deeply ingrained parental triggers, such as our worry about not being a “good parent” by filling our child’s every moment with enrichment, activity, learning, and bonding. We also may be trying to avoid conflict by keeping our kids occupied and “happy.” Bored kids are not happy or quiet kids. Bored kids tend to whine, pick fights with siblings, or create chaos. Perhaps we feel that by fixing the boredom we’re preventing the chaos that comes with bored children. Another reason could be that seeing our kids squirm in their unstructured time reflects our own deep discomfort with slowing down. Their agitation may be shining light on our own restlessness. When we rush to fix their boredom, we aren’t just rescuing them from discomfort. Perhaps we are also rescuing ourselves from the discomfort of watching them struggle.
Regulate yourself first
If we want our kids to build emotional resilience and learn how to navigate unstructured time, the work doesn’t start with teaching them how to play quietly or find creative ways to keep them occupied without screens. Rather, it starts with training ourselves to tolerate their boredom and the “noise” they make when they are feeling bored.
The next time your child hits you with “I’m bored,” try shifting your focus inward. That is, pause and take note of your own discomfort. Notice the tightening in your chest or the urge to hand them a device or come up with some great idea just to keep the peace. Acknowledge that their boredom is not an emergency, nor is it a sign that you are failing as a parent.
Try to validate without fixing your child or teen’s boredom. Instead of offering ideas or quickly planning an activity, keep it simple and grounded. Say something like, “I wonder what you can find as something fun to do. I know you’re bored, but it’s also okay to be bored.” Set that boundary, step back, and wait. Let them know that finding an activity is their job, not yours. Then, let them sit with that discomfort as you sit with yours. Let them groan, wander around the room, or sit on the floor looking miserable.
Boredom isn’t a deficiency you need to cure. Instead, it’s more of that struggle of having to transition from finishing something and finding something else without a parent stepping in to tell them what that next thing is. It’s turning inward to problem-solve or come up with something without adult intervention.
If you can stay calm through this process, without rushing in to “fix it,” you give your child the ultimate gift: space to figure out who they are when no one is orchestrating the show. This will also help you to manage your own discomfort, especially as you watch your children “figure it out.”