What Boredom Means: Cultivating Attention & Leisure for a Life Connected to Time & Place / Kevin Gary & Drew Collins

What Boredom Means: Cultivating Attention & Leisure for a Life Connected to Time & Place / Kevin Gary & Drew Collins

Author: Matthew Croasmun, Ryan McAnnally-Linz, Drew Collins, Miroslav Volf, Evan Rosa, Macie Bridge August 1, 2023 Duration: 35:35
Where does boredom come from? Have humans always experienced boredom, or has it only come on in the entertainment age, having more time than we know what to do with? Kevin Gary (Valparaiso University) is author of Why Boredom Matters: Education, Leisure, and the Quest for a Meaningful Life. He joins Drew Collins & Evan Rosa to reflect on the discontent and disconnection that boredom constantly threatens. They discuss the phenomena of boredom, the childhood experience of it, whether its good or bad, the definition of boredom, its connection to entertainment and education, and finally the role of attention and leisure in cultivating a healthy understanding and response to being totally bored out of our minds. This episode was made possible in part by the generous support of the Tyndale House Foundation. For more information, visit tyndale.foundation.

What does it mean to live well, not just for ourselves but for the world around us? For the Life of the World / Yale Center for Faith & Culture explores this profound question through conversations that blend deep theological insight with sharp cultural analysis. Hosted by scholars and thinkers like Matthew Croasmun, Ryan McAnnally-Linz, Drew Collins, Miroslav Volf, Evan Rosa, and Macie Bridge, each episode delves into the complexities of faith, philosophy, and everyday practice. You’ll hear discussions that move from abstract ideas to tangible guidance, examining how ancient wisdom intersects with modern challenges in society, education, and personal spirituality. This isn’t about easy answers, but about the harder, more rewarding work of discerning what constitutes a flourishing life-for individuals and communities alike. The podcast serves as an audio extension of the Yale Center for Faith & Culture’s mission, offering thoughtful content for anyone curious about how belief shapes and is shaped by culture. Tune in for a consistently engaging exploration of what it means to seek a life truly worthy of our shared humanity.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

For the Life of the World / Yale Center for Faith & Culture
Podcast Episodes
How to Read Simone Weil, Part 3: The Existentialist / Deborah Casewell [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:05:43
“All the natural movements of the soul are controlled by laws analogous to those of physical gravity. Grace is the only exception.” … “It is necessary to uproot oneself. To cut down the tree and make of it a cross, and t…
How to Read Simone Weil, Part 2: The Activist / Cynthia Wallace [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:11:26
“What are you going through?” This was one of the central animating questions in Simone Weil’s thought that pushed her beyond philosophy into action. Weil believed that genuinely asking this question of the other, partic…
How to Read Simone Weil, Part 1: The Mystic / Eric O. Springsted [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 59:24
This episode is the first of a short series exploring How to Read Simone Weil. The author of *Gravity and Grace*, *The Need for Roots*, and *Waiting for God*—among many other essays, letters, and notes, Weil has been an…
Open the Gates: Immigration & the Book of Revelation / Yii-Jan Lin [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 43:08
Why do we have countries? Why do we mark this land and these people as distinct from that land and those people? What are countries for? Yii-Jan Lin (Associate Professor of New Testament, Yale Divinity School) joins Matt…
Letters to a Future Saint / Brad East & Drew Collins [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 54:00
“For those of us who are drawn into church history and church tradition and to reading theology, there is very little as transformative as realizing that history is populated by women and men like us who tried to follow…
How to Read Henry David Thoreau / Lawrence Buell [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:00:19
"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did…
How to Read Teresa of Ávila / Carlos Eire [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 52:53
St. Teresa of Ávila (1515-1582) was a sixteenth-century Spanish nun and one of the most influential mystics in all of Church history, writing two spiritual classics still read today: The Way of Perfection and The Interio…
History Speaks the Spirit of Justice / Jemar Tisby [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 46:20
History reveals a lot of things about human nature: our innate drive towards progress, discovery, relationship, community. Often motivated by a drive to feel safe and flourish. But despite this instinct, history also sho…
Unity in Diversity, Empathic Wisdom / Christy Vines [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 56:20
In our American quest for a more perfect union, we often mistake unity for sameness. We mistake unity for conformity. But the functional unity of a system—seems to actually *require* diversity, distinction, and differenc…