Boredom is good

Leah Rowe

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Article published by: Leah Rowe

Date of publication: 31 August 2025

I am fundamentally sane. I have a deep understanding of my own thoughts, and an awareness of who I am. I have an understanding of others; indeed, I have an entirely intact theory of mind. I’m able to know what a person is thinking or feeling, based on what I observe. All of this is to say I am aware of my identity; I know that billions of other human beings live on this planet, who are not me. However, there is a catch.

I am always bored. Always have been. Even when I’m happy, I’m bored. When I literally invented the profession that I’m in (namely, coreboot distros) and created Libreboot, I was bored. When I was given an award from my local rotary club for artistic excellence at my local school hall when I was 16, and a work I’d made was to be displayed in their gallery, I was bored, though the cheque for £300 that they gave me was great (I used it to buy a PlayStation 3 with Metal Gear Solid 4 and Grand Theft Auto 4).

I have emotions. Strong ones, at times. Readers who are familiar with certain mental health disorders will now have an idea where I’m going with this; I should stress that I don’t consider myself to be mentally ill. I also don’t really agree with any of the words or labels that people use to describe someone like me, especially since I am probably quite rare even amongst this rarity of gems.

I occasionally feel fleeting hits of dopamine when I do something nice for myself, that feeling of self-accomplishment, but I otherwise take almost everything in stride, both the good and the bad. I’m not depressed either.

I’m not a robot. I can feel joy at times - and I can feel dread. For myself. Like when I’m overworked, or feel that I’m going nowhere. I feel relief after a day of productive labour. I appreciate humour; and I can even make people laugh, when I want to.

Ostensibly, I am a completely normal human being, but I generally feel neutral about everyone and everything around me, at all times.

There is one feeling that I can feel though, intensely: anger. However, I learned how to avoid that, as I’ve matured. Earlier in my life, I used to get angry a lot, and in retrospect now as a mature person, I know it was when I felt like I wasn’t in control of my mind or my surroundings; I am a control freak at heart, but even this tendency is controlled, nowadays.

I used to get into trouble all the time, because I would do a lot of really insane shit to alleviate said boredom; that same shit would just as quickly vanish from my mind, and I’d feel bored again.

I felt an overwhelming need to control others, even over seemingly petty issues, and I could be triggered violently. Although I’ve never been physically violent, I’ve engaged in what many consider to be highly coercive behaviour. I have at times been manipulative. I’ve sometimes cheated, and taken shortcuts to get what I want.

I’m also extremely egocentric. I do things that are beneficial to me, and I generally think only of myself; if I happen to benefit other people in the process, then that is a coincidence. I also try not to hurt people, because I was taught not to - and I know that as a matter of survival, it’s better to make friends rather than enemies.

I’ve made enemies in the past. I don’t naturally feel empathy for people, so I’ve been able to figuratively tread on people before - but I’m also highly rational and use intellect to tell myself how pointless this is, for the most part. Even when someone actually wrongs you, it’s normally better just to walk away from things.

I still don’t feel empathy. I never have. But this too, has been trained: using intellect, I’m able to direct myself to physically and verbally act in a manner congruent to what is expected of a Good Person.

I am functionally a good person. Even if you really piss me off, or I feel like I could take liberties with your quality of life, and drive you mad, I won’t - because I’ve done so in the past, and it always comes back to bite me in the ass.

I’ve seen things that most people wouldn’t believe, and I’ve gone to lengths in my life to achieve a level of personal freedom that most people never have. But what I’ve seen need not be physically manifest; I can go places, in my mind, that most people would never consider. I sometimes like to entertain what my life would be like in parallel universes (string theory strongly suggests the presence of multiple, indeed infinite, realities).

I work on projects that many people find interesting - but I find them boring. I do them because they keep me busy - one must always keep oneself busy. And they happen to mostly make me money. Though money itself does not interest me; as I wrote in the class is bullshit article, I only value my:

So money is a great way to achieve that - not getting killed or put in prison is also a requirement for this, so I generally stay out of trouble and try to be nice to everyone.

And I am nice to everyone. When we meet, I will smile at you and shake your hand, or perhaps fistbump - whatever is the cultural norm in the place we meet.

When I smile at you and when I talk to you, I will listen to everything you have to say. I’ll remember everything you tell me, and I’ll make you feel good about yourself. I’ve often been told that I’m a good listener - and this is a learned behaviour. It wasn’t always that way. Someone I had a falling out with a few years ago, saw my true personality, and they commented to me that I never ask people how they are, or show an interest in them. So I learned to do it, consciously.

I’m good at making you feel good, but I feel nothing at all. Making you feel good is better than making you feel bad; and not talking to you means I don’t get to know you. Knowing people and making them feel good is good, because then they feel good about you. Having friends is good. Even if I feel nothing one way or the other about them. My closest friends tend to be those of high intellect, who are interesting in some way; I’ve befriended artists, various scientists (physics, computing, you name it), musicians, all kinds of people. My long-term relationships are not on an emotional level, because I don’t actually care how you feel, and pretending to is tiresome - so I make the people I casually associate with feel good.

Ever since my late 20s, I’ve known to accept boredom. I made boredom my best friend. I am married to my boredom, until the day I die. I’m bored when I seduce you, and I will seduce you.

I’m extremely impulsive and reckless, when I don’t check myself. I can easily get distracted by any number of things, but I use intellectual discipline to force myself into a daily routine, so that I keep up with responsibilities and pay the bills.

But I’m absolutely, mind numbingly bored. Even my boredom is boring. I sometimes say instead that I feel neutral - and that I feel neutral about being neutral. This very article is being written on a whim, and my emotional state is completely neutral as I’m writing it.

I’m also completely self-aware about the reason why I am this way. The reason I’m writing this article is because I’ve recently read a book about someone who is very similar to me. Their autobiography, describing their life.

I had a lot of early behavioural problems as a child, and I was regarded as possibly existing on the autistic spectrum, and indeed I am diagnosed as an autistic, but I believe I was deceiving both myself and the therapist. One of the features of my psychological makeup is that I’m able to lie, very easily.

Anyway.

Where am I going with this?

I had a pretty normal childhood. Loving parents. Went to good schools. I wasn’t abused physically or mentally as a child. I grew up in an ostensibly middle class family, in a middle class town. I never experienced poverty, growing up. I never mixed with bad people. I was taught many good practises of how to be a Good Person. I had excellent parents, teachers and guardians in general, and no shortage of excellent role models.

And yet I consistently score at least 30-35 out of 45 on the PCL-R checklist. Despite never having engaged in criminal behaviour, indeed having never gotten into trouble with the law. I’ve never been sexually promiscuous; and I generally lead a good life.

As a child, I was alright. As a teenager, I became angry a lot - I was abusive to everyone, even at the slightest wrongdoing toward me, real or imagined. I was never challenged, until I reached my 20s. The short version of the story is this:

In my 20s, I had a high income (and I still live well today), was able to move away from parents, and live my life the way I saw fit. But I fundamentally didn’t know how to live a life, and I had lots of untreated problems; my gender dysphoria was one of them, and coming out as trans and transitioning was very painful for me in the early days.

Long story short, I got completely insane in my 20s (I’m in my 30s now as I write this), to the point where I was just completely impossible to be around, completely alienating everyone around me. My psychologically abusive and controlling behaviour was unchecked. I lost everyone around me, and realised I was going to probably lose my life or freedom at some point. I was also abusing drugs and alcohol for a while.

The overarching theme is this: I always sought stimulation, because I was always bored, and I felt the need to control everyone and everything around me. But I would never stop being bored. Nothing worked, and I just got more angry and more insane.

So one day, when I was about 25, I came to the conclusion: if my boredom is constant, and I will always basically feel completely numb at all times, why not just accept it?

So I basically developed the following set of assumptions, and modified my behaviour accordingly:

Basically jedi/vulkan philosophy, like in starwars/startrek respectively. Though those fictional characters are just boring and stupid, and I’d loathe them too, if they existed in real life.

Fundamentally, I just want to do my things and not be disturbed.

I don’t care about you. But I may still care for you.

I’ve done things in the past that are deeply immoral and possibly even illegal; and at the time, I didn’t even register this. Often times, I’ve only caught myself years later in retrospect, when I analyse my past. When you have nobody telling you what you’re doing is wrong, then you just do it, unless you have neurotypical empathy and morality.

TL;DR I designed for myself a human being emulator. I emulate a normal human being, at all times.

It initially felt forced/fake when I started doing this. But now it’s just routine.

My boredom is constant, so rather than being insane and “evil” as a result of trying to constantly cure said boredom, I just be bored. There is a void inside me. And I like my void. When you teach yourself to be calm, you learn to appreciate silence.

When I silence my mind, I hear nothing. I see nothing. I am what I do.

Boredom rules.

And I don’t really want to expand this into a full series. I could probably write a book, but I can’t be assed. I wrote this article on a whim, inspired by a book I recently read by an author named Jessica Kelly. She penned a book about her own life, that is fundamentally very similar to my own. That book, called “Tale of Two Masks”, describes her life growing up. Her actual lived experiences are different than mine, but our psychology is almost exactly the same. I used to read her blog, psychogendered.com, when it was online. You can still find it on the wayback machine if you’re interested.

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