允许孩子们感到无聊

允许孩子们感到无聊

When I was a kid, there was one phrase I wasn't allowed to utter: "I'm bored." It was forbidden because, as my parents explained, it meant that I wasn't doing anything about something that was clearly my own problem.

当我还是个孩子的时候，有一句话不允许我说:“我很无聊。”我父母解释说，这是因为，这意味着我没有做任何事，明显是我自己的问题。

Now, as a parent myself, I marvel at the lack of responsibility that my parents took for my entertainment. They weren't hands-off in other ways, taking a very active approach to my schooling and music practice, but when it came to unscheduled time – and there was plenty of it in our rural, TV-free home – they were completely indifferent as to what I did.

现在，我自己也当了父母，我为父母对我的娱乐缺乏责任感而感到惊讶。在其他方面，他们并没有放手不管，对我的学习和音乐练习采取一种非常积极的方式，但是当涉及到不定时的时间时——在我们乡下没有电视的家里有很多时间——他们对我所做的事情完全漠不关心。

CC BY 2.0. bsrdn

Thinking back on it, there was plenty that I did. I explored the forest around our home, building forts and blazing trails with a hatchet. I dug out snowbanks and built extravagant networks of tunnels. I played house in a variety of blanket forts, napped in the hammock, and fought with my sister over Monopoly.

回想起来，我做了很多事。我在我们家周围的森林里探险，建造堡垒，用斧头砍断小径。我挖了雪堤，建造了庞大的隧道网络。我在各种各样的毯子碉堡上玩过家家，在吊床上打盹，还和妹妹为“大富翁”而打架。

There were many hours of nothing, too. I'd lie on my bed, reading books voraciously and writing in my journal. In a way, that was the start of my writing career. I filled dozens of notebooks with detailed observations about the world and all the passions, dreams, and indignities of a young life.

也有好几个小时是无所事事的。我会躺在床上，贪婪地看书，写日记。在某种程度上，那就是我写作生涯的开始。我写了几十本笔记本，详细记录了我对这个世界的观察，以及我年轻时的激情、梦想和屈辱。

While boredom seemed irritating at the time, I now look back on it as a blessing. This is exactly what New York Times editor Pamela Paul believes more parents should be striving to give their kids.

虽然无聊在当时看起来很恼人，但现在我把它看作是一种祝福。这正是《纽约时报》编辑帕梅拉·保罗认为更多的父母应该努力教给孩子的。

In an excellent article called "Let Children Get Bored Again," Paul argues that boredom allows space for creativity: "When you’re held captive to a mundane activity... you let your mind wander and follow it where it goes."

在一篇名为《让孩子再无聊一次》的优秀文章中，保罗认为无聊为创造力提供了空间:“当你被禁锢在一项世俗的活动中……你让你的思想四处游荡，跟着它走。”

Boredom also fosters self-sufficiency, forcing a kid to learn how to cope without relying on a parent or handheld device. Paul writes,

无聊还会培养自立能力，迫使孩子学会如何在不依赖父母或手持设备的情况下处理问题。保罗写道,

"It’s not really the boredom itself that’s important; it’s what we do with it. When you reach your breaking point, boredom teaches you to respond constructively, to make something happen for yourself. But unless we are faced with a steady diet of stultifying boredom, we never learn how."

“无聊本身并不重要;这是我们用它来做的。当你达到极限时，无聊会教你如何做出建设性的回应，让事情发生在你自己身上。但是，除非我们不断地面对无聊乏味的生活，否则我们永远不会学会如何去做。”

And that is one of the most valuable things a kid can learn before reaching adulthood, because – let's face it – the real world is full of boring tasks. There's no point in setting kids up for failure by making them think everything's a fun game, as schools are wont to do these days. In Paul's words,

这是一个孩子在成年之前可以学到的最有价值的东西之一，因为——让我们面对现实吧——现实世界充满了无聊的任务。让孩子们认为每件事都是有趣的游戏，这是没有意义的，就像现在的学校习惯做的那样。用保罗的话说,

"Surely teaching children to endure boredom rather than ratcheting up the entertainment will prepare them for a more realistic future, one that doesn’t raise false expectations of what work or life itself actually entails. One day, even in a job they otherwise love, our kids may have to spend an entire day answering Friday’s leftover email."

当然，教育孩子们去忍受无聊，而不是不断增加娱乐活动，会让他们为一个更现实的未来做好准备，一个不会对工作或生活本身的实际需要产生错误期望的未来。有一天，即使是他们本来喜欢的工作，我们的孩子也可能不得不花一整天的时间回复周五剩下的电子邮件。”

In order to do this, however, parents need to back off. They need to become more comfortable with letting kids discover their own fun – and that process happens faster if kids are not directly supervised. Parents need to toughen up, answer "Go outside" when asked what to do, or send kids to clean their rooms if they mention the "bored" word. They have to understand that keeping kids entertained is not their job.

然而，为了做到这一点，父母需要退让。他们需要更舒适地让孩子发现自己的乐趣——如果孩子没有被直接监督，这个过程会更快。父母需要坚强起来，当被问到该做什么的时候回答“出去”，或者如果他们提到了“无聊”这个词，就让孩子去打扫他们的房间。他们必须明白，让孩子开心不是他们的工作。

It's all for the greater good – raising resilient, creative, self-sufficient children who are prepared for the world when the time comes for them to leave the nest. So, let them be bored. You will be amazed at what they come up with – and you may gain some free time for yourself in the process.

这一切都是为了更大的利益——抚养有适应力、有创造力、自给自足的孩子，让他们在离开家的时候为这个世界做好准备。所以，让他们感到无聊吧。你会惊讶于他们给出的答案——在这个过程中你可能会为自己赢得一些自由时间。