The Art of Waiting: How eBooks Can Turn Boring Moments into Productive Ones

My smartphone follows me wherever I go. It's always in my back-pocket, ready to be whipped out at a moment's notice.

If I'm getting bored... or waiting in line... or sitting in a waiting room... or slouching in the car waiting for the store to open... I'll mindlessly pull out my phone and start scrolling the news sites or through my social media feeds.

It's monstrously annoying to me and not all that good for my mental health.

The news cycle doesn't change all that much from hour to hour... nor does my social media feed.

So all I'm really doing is scrolling old news and just looking for that next hit of dopamine... "ooohh look... a new post... a new news article!" No one needs to stay that connected to the news! And the news really isn't good news... which just contributes to a low level of stress for me.

But what else to do while waiting? Bringing a book or a journal is an option for some things... like waiting in the doctor's office where you know it might be a long wait. But sitting in the car in the dark... waiting for Starbucks to open... reading isn't really an option. Nor journaling.

The Solution to Mindless Scrolling

And then... I had a bright light-bulb idea... I read a lot of ebooks. Some of them are through the library, some of them are on Kobo and some of them are on Kindle.

I have the library ebook app on my phone (Libby) but I'm not in the middle of a good library book right now. I'm actually in the middle of a good book on my Kindle.

Why don't I... just... download the Kindle app onto my phone??

So I did. And it was super easy. I logged into my Kindle acct and all of my Kindle books showed up in the app, including the latest one that I am reading. I opened the book and it picked up right where I had left off earlier on my ebook reader.

Oooohhh... I like this!!!

So now... instead of mindlessly scrolling through the news, or Facebook or Feedly... looking for something new, something exciting... and not really finding anything... I can read my book.

Even if it's only for 5 minutes... it's something... and I get some stimulation for my mind... plus I'm thinking I might actually read more books this way! Because my ebook reader isn't always with me... but my phone is always there. And it's soooo easy to just open the app and start reading. Love it!!! Small steps... always the small steps. Five minutes here... 10 minutes there and... more books read and more good stuff feeding into my mind!