Claire Kelly, Director of Teaching and Training at Oxford Mindfulness, unpacks boredom in meditation and invites us to see it not as a problem but as a natural, meaningful experience to be noticed and explored.

“It’s boring“

One of the most common complaints about mindfulness is simple and blunt: “It’s boring.”

People usually say this honestly, sometimes with a hint of guilt. What’s striking is that we don’t normally treat boredom as reliable evidence that something has no value. Many of the things we most admire – and many of the discoveries we most benefit from – begin with long stretches of boredom.

Learning to play a musical instrument can be very boring. Before there is music, there are scales, repetition, sore fingers, and the slow, unglamorous work of creating muscle memory. The same is true of learning to skateboard, which often involves tedious repetition before it turns into exhilaration. Going to the gym can also be boring in much the same way.

Many skills are built on activities that look profoundly dull from the outside. In Outliers (2008), Malcolm Gladwell (drawing on the work of psychologist K. Anders Ericsson), and his “10,000-Hour Rule” popularised the idea that world-class expertise tends to emerge after thousands of hours of practice. The precise number matters less than the underlying point: skill is built through sustained, repetitive effort that is rarely exciting.

Why mindfulness gets the blame

We accept this kind of outcome-focused boredom almost without question when the goal is clear. We assume boredom is part of learning, skill-building, and discovery. But when it comes to mindfulness, boredom is often treated as proof that something has gone wrong.

Modern life offers endless opportunities to avoid boredom. Any pause can be instantly filled. In that context, anything that doesn’t stimulate us immediately can feel vaguely intolerable.

Mindfulness removes these escape routes. It asks us to sit still, pay attention, and not reach for stimulation when experience feels flat. For a mind trained on constant input, this can feel unreasonable. Traditional contemplative traditions would find this reaction entirely predictable.

What is boredom?

Boredom is not simply “having nothing to do.” It is a state of understimulation paired with a desire for engagement – resistance to simplicity, if you will.

Zen teachers noticed this centuries ago. When a monk complained that meditation was unbearably boring, his teacher might have replied, “Then be bored completely.” When the monk protested that nothing was happening, the teacher said, “Then notice nothing happening.” The key point here is that boredom arises when we demand that experience entertain us.

From an evolutionary perspective, boredom has a function. It nudges us away from low-yield situations and toward exploration and change. Contemplative traditions recognise this, while also teaching that not every moment of boredom requires immediate action..

Vedana: The feeling tone beneath boredom

In early Buddhist psychology, every experience carries a vedanā – a basic feeling tone of pleasant, unpleasant, or neither. Boredom often masquerades as neutral, but is usually subtly unpleasant. The mind reacts to this feeling tone by adding commentary: “this is pointless,” “this shouldn’t be happening.” Mindfulness invites us to feel the vedanā directly.

Neuroscience helps explain why this feels so compelling. Boredom is not a passive state in the brain. When stimulation is lower than expected, dopamine signalling drops, creating restlessness and dissatisfaction. At the same time, the brain’s default mode network becomes more active, generating planning, memory, comparison, and narrative. The body often joins in through subtle stress responses. Boredom feels intolerable because it evolved to be motivating.

Why this feels personal (but isn’t)

Mindfulness practice interrupts this cycle. Instead of obeying boredom’s impulse to seek stimulation, we pause and observe it. Over time, the nervous system learns that boredom is not dangerous. This helps explain why boredom often feels personal. “I’m bad at this.” But boredom isn’t personal. It’s a predictable response of a mind no longer being entertained.

Still, boredom is not always something to push through. Traditions emphasise discernment. If boredom is mild and workable, staying can be fruitful. If it is paired with distress, numbness, or destabilisation, it may be wise to pause, adjust, or seek guidance.

Working with boredom (without declaring war on it)

So how might we work with boredom in practice? Stop treating boredom as a problem. Get curious about its texture. Notice the urge to escape. Allow the moment to be ordinary.

New to Mindfulness? If you’re new to mindfulness and you find it boring, this is not a sign you’re doing it wrong. It’s a sign you’re encountering the practice honestly.

Early on, boredom often comes from unfamiliarity. Sitting still and paying attention can feel flat, pointless, or even irritating. At this stage, working with boredom is less about insight and more about gentleness.

Short practices help. Five minutes really is enough. Curiosity helps more than discipline: What does boredom feel like right now? Where do I notice it? What happens if I stay for one more breath? You’re not trying to transcend boredom. You’re just getting to know it.

It can also help to remember that boredom doesn’t mean nothing is happening. It often means something subtle is happening: attention is being trained, habits are being interrupted, and the nervous system is encountering stillness without its usual props.

More experienced in mindfulness? For more experienced practitioners, boredom tends to change character. It may become quieter, more diffuse, or oddly familiar. It may show up less as complaint and more as a kind of flatness or neutrality. Or it may reappear in cycles – especially on retreat – reminding us that practice is not a linear ascent but a spiral we revisit from different angles.

At this stage, boredom can become a particularly precise teacher. It reveals subtle aversion, expectations about what practice should feel like, or a lingering wish for experience to justify itself. Working with boredom here often means allowing it to be very ordinary, very unremarkable, and not especially interesting. Which, paradoxically, is often when something softens.

Across all stages of practice. One thing remains consistent: boredom does not need to be defeated. It needs to be understood. Sometimes that means staying. Sometimes it means adjusting. Sometimes it means stopping for the day and coming back tomorrow.

Mindfulness is not about heroic endurance or perfect attention. It’s about learning how to relate wisely to whatever shows up, including the moments that don’t ‘sparkle’. So, if boredom arises when you practise, you don’t need to get rid of it, explain it, or take it personally.

You can simply notice it. Give it some space. And, if it feels OK, quietly stay with it for a while.

Listen to Claire Kelly and mindfulness teacher Victoria Fontana explore boredom in meditation on episode 4 of our podcast series, Getting Real with Mindfulness, “Mindfulness Is Boring.”