Boredom Quotes

Most popular boredom quotes

Is not life a hundred times too short for us to bore ourselves? - Friedrich Nietzsche quote.
Is not life a hundred times too short for us to bore ourselves?
I never allow myself to be bored, because boredom is aging. If you live in the past, you grow old, and dull, and dusty. It's very nice, of course, to be young and beautiful; but there are other qualities, thank God.
The basic fact about human existence is not that it is a tragedy, but that it is a bore. It is not so much a war as an endless standing in line. - H. L. Mencken quote.
The basic fact about human existence is not that it is a tragedy, but that it is a bore. It is not so much a war as an endless standing in line.

the human condition

The man who lets himself be bored is even more contemptible than the bore. - Samuel Butler quote.
The man who lets himself be bored is even more contemptible than the bore.

boring people

Ennui, felt on the proper occasions, is a sign of intelligence. - Clifton Fadiman quote.
Ennui, felt on the proper occasions, is a sign of intelligence.
Bored people, unless they sleep a lot, are cruel.
Somebody's boring me. I think it's me. - Dylan Thomas quote.
Somebody's boring me. I think it's me.
Boredom: the desire for desires. - Leo Tolstoy quote.
Boredom: the desire for desires.
Work is the easiest activity man has invented to escape boredom.

work

If something is boring after two minutes, try it for four. If still boring, then eight. Then sixteen. Then thirty-two. Eventually one discovers that it is not boring at all.
— Zen saying

proverbs

We pay for security with boredom, for adventure with bother. - Peter De Vries quote.
We pay for security with boredom, for adventure with bother.

security adventure

Boredom is like a pitiless zooming in on the epidermis of time. Every instant is dilated and magnified like the pores of the face. - Jean Baudrillard quote.
Boredom is like a pitiless zooming in on the epidermis of time. Every instant is dilated and magnified like the pores of the face.
Boredom...is also the shriek of unused capacities, the doom of serving no great end or design, or contributing to no master force. - Saul Bellow quote.
Boredom...is also the shriek of unused capacities, the doom of serving no great end or design, or contributing to no master force.
Is boredom anything less than the sense of one's faculties slowly dying? - John Berger quote.
Is boredom anything less than the sense of one's faculties slowly dying?
The world is eaten up by boredom.  To perceive this needs a little preliminary thought: you can't see it all at once.  It is like dust. You go about and never notice, you breathe it in, you eat and drink it. It is sifted so fine, it doesn't even grit on your teeth.  But stand still for an instant and there it is, coating your face and hands. To shake off this drizzle of ashes you must be forever on the go. - Georges Bernanos quote.
The world is eaten up by boredom.  To perceive this needs a little preliminary thought: you can't see it all at once.  It is like dust. You go about and never notice, you breathe it in, you eat and drink it. It is sifted so fine, it doesn't even grit on your teeth.  But stand still for an instant and there it is, coating your face and hands. To shake off this drizzle of ashes you must be forever on the go.
The life of pleasure breeds boredom.

pleasure

Boredom is the fear of self.
Man is the only animal that can be bored. - Erich Fromm quote.
Man is the only animal that can be bored.

mankind man the animal

Boredom is nothing but the experience of a paralysis of our productive powers and the sense of unaliveness. - Erich Fromm quote.
Boredom is nothing but the experience of a paralysis of our productive powers and the sense of unaliveness.
I am convinced that boredom is one of the greatest tortures. If I were to imagine Hell, it would be the place where you were continually bored. - Erich Fromm quote.
I am convinced that boredom is one of the greatest tortures. If I were to imagine Hell, it would be the place where you were continually bored.
Erich Fromm The Dogma of Christ: and Other Essays
Politeness is the art of bearing boredom without being bored. - Joseph Joubert quote.
Politeness is the art of bearing boredom without being bored.

boring people

Against boredom even the gods themselves struggle in vain. - Friedrich Nietzsche quote.
Against boredom even the gods themselves struggle in vain.
Boredom is the self being stuffed with itself. - Walker Percy quote.
Boredom is the self being stuffed with itself.
Walker Percy Lost in the Cosmos: The Last Self-Help Book
Boredom or discontent is useful to me when I acknowledge it and see clearly my assumption that there's something else I would rather be doing.  In this way, boredom can act as an invitation to freedom by opening me to new options and thoughts.
Hugh Prather Notes to Myself: My Struggle to Become a Person

discontent

I am never bored anywhere; being bored is an insult to oneself. - Jules Renard quote.
I am never bored anywhere; being bored is an insult to oneself.
Boredom is therefore a vital problem for the moralist, since at least half the sins of mankind are caused by the fear of it. - Bertrand Russell quote.
Boredom is therefore a vital problem for the moralist, since at least half the sins of mankind are caused by the fear of it.
One can be bored until boredom becomes a mystical experience. - Logan Pearsall Smith quote.
One can be bored until boredom becomes a mystical experience.
Your true traveller finds boredom rather agreeable than painful. It is the symbol of his liberty—his excessive freedom. He accepts his boredom, when it comes, not merely philosophically, but almost with pleasure. - Aldous Huxley quote.
Your true traveller finds boredom rather agreeable than painful. It is the symbol of his liberty—his excessive freedom. He accepts his boredom, when it comes, not merely philosophically, but almost with pleasure.

Travel

If you get easily bored, it means that your BS detector is functioning properly; if you forget (some) things, it means that your mind knows how to filter; and if you feel sadness, it means that you are human. - Nassim Nicholas Taleb quote.
If you get easily bored, it means that your BS detector is functioning properly; if you forget (some) things, it means that your mind knows how to filter; and if you feel sadness, it means that you are human.

sadness

The best skill for a clear mind is the ability to be bored early.