Sitting on the terrace, sun beating down, no email, no meeting. Just be. And feeling bored.
It is in boredom that new ideas are born. We don’t read emails, we … wood magazines. We don’t plan projects, we notice clouds. And suddenly… an idea comes. A feeling. A new view of ourselves, a new perspective on problems.
If we were more bored… the world would be a more creative place. And more peaceful. And healthier. Maybe if leaders were more bored, we’d live in a better world. That’s exactly what Joan Corbalan said in one of his Systemic Leadership trainings. I very much agree with him! Acting for the sake of acting creates tension, anger and anxiety.
🎨 Children know that boredom is the door to creativity. In our adult brains, that door is stuck behind scrolling and a full calendar. But if you let yourself really do nothing again, that inner life comes back, not over-seeded with someone else’s expectations and full of a sense of not being good enough…
💡 But it’s not just about creativity. Systemic management says: every system needs a void to retune. If we keep filling all the gaps with the pressure of activities and results, there is no space for the new to come in. This is a realisation that many of my clients reach at some point when they start looking for a new one, after a constant struggle.
🧩 Boredom is a “stopover” in the system, where the old meaning is fading but the new has not yet arrived. It is there that vulnerability arises … and also potential. When a leader has no room for boredom, he or she is usually leading his or her subconscious patterns, not people, and it is no longer leadership but unleadership.
💬 Questions for the summer as a leader:
Am I managing people or just keeping the machine running?
Can I create a space where ideas are born… or just results?
Can I tolerate boredom – within myself and my team?
📴 This summer – take a break. But more than that, don’t fill every moment with escaping from yourself with all sorts of summer activities. Let yourself get bored. Because boredom isn’t emptiness – it’s a space where something new starts to come.
Have a boring summer everyone!
