During the summer, kids have the opportunity for more leisure time, free play and creativity. But as a parent, you might not like the way your kid acts when they’re bored. 

In this episode, you’ll learn why encouraging boredom is a good thing and how you can feel more at peace when your kids are bored, dysregulated and frustrated this summer. 

You’ll learn:

• Why kids act out when they’re bored
• How to handle your kid’s boredom
• Why encouraging boredom is great for the whole family
• How to create opportunities for your kids to practice being bored and working through it

When we give our kids opportunities to be imaginative, creative and overcome boredom, they also develop resilience, grit and confidence. It is powerful for your child to realize that they can deal with discomfort and figure out a solution.

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The Boredom Gap

It can help to think about boredom as the time between activities. I call this the “boredom gap”. 

Kids are used to having most of their day filled with structure and adult-directed activities. But the way they act when they’re bored is often an obstacle to giving them more of that free unstructured time that kids need.

When kids are bored, they get dysregulated. Basically, they feel out of balance and uncomfortable. They don't know what to do with that discomfort, so they start acting out. They start bugging their sibling, complaining, being grumpy, having a big feeling cycle, or doing something naughty.

Your tendency might be to jump in and give a bunch of suggestions of things your kid can do. I love having some ideas for boredom busters handy, but you have to offer them up at the right time.

Often, we jump in with suggestions before our kids are ready. There’s a cycle that your child’s brain needs to go through when it is dysregulated, and they might not be ready yet for solutions. 

When your kid is bored and dysregulated, their brain is uncomfortable. It is looking for the easiest way to soothe that discomfort. 

Screens are a really common request when kids are bored because it’s an easy dopamine hit. It’s the quick fix that makes them feel better in the short term, but it isn’t going to truly satisfy them. Think of it as being hungry and choosing a brownie over broccoli. Plus, the more time kids spend on devices, the more their brains crave that fast, easy stimulation. 

How To Handle Boredom

Wait. You have to get comfortable with your kid’s discomfort. Be compassionate and acknowledge what is happening. Look at your child and think, “Oh, they don't know what to do with themselves. They're bored, and they haven't figured out something to do with their brain yet.” 

If you need to calm yourself during this time, try thoughts like, “I can handle this,” or “I know they’re going to find a solution.”

Connect. If your child is acting dysregulated, you can use the Connection Tool to ask them if they’re having a rough time or feeling frustrated. Instead of trying to shut down their complaining, recognize that they are struggling and give them space to release some of that stress juice. 

It’s important to soothe before you solve. Narrate what you’re seeing. Help them name what they’re feeling. The mental discomfort of boredom can also bring up feelings of loneliness, frustration or annoyance. Offer strategies for them to soothe themself. 

Encourage problem solving. Once they are a bit calmer, say, “It’s normal to feel bored. That makes sense. I’m sure you’ll figure out a solution.” You can ask about their ideas or if they want suggestions from you. Invite them to think about what comes next and allow your kid’s brain to find its own solution. . 

Encouraging Boredom

How long the boredom gap lasts depends on how often your child has experienced boredom. 

The more your kids are bored, the better they get at overcoming and moving quickly through the boredom gap. With practice, their brain gets trained to solve the boredom problem.

Decreasing reliance on screens is one part of this. The brain is naturally going to crave screens, sweets and other easy solutions. When you take these options off the table (at least sometimes), the brain has to work harder, but it’s better for it. 

Essentially, the more screen breaks you create, the easier it will be for your kids to shift from restless protest to creative exploration. There will be resistance. Allow for some of that, be compassionate and trust that your child will figure it out. 

Allow longer blocks of unscheduled time. In the summer (and even during the school year), many families have gaps of 30-45 minutes between planned activities. This isn’t really enough time for kids to figure out an activity and really get into it and enjoy it. When you have these smaller gaps, it can help to have a plan in mind, like quiet reading time, coloring or some chores.

When you can, block out longer periods of time for your kid to practice working through boredom. 

When we give our kids opportunities to be imaginative, creative and overcome boredom, they also develop resilience, grit and confidence. It is powerful for your child to realize that they can deal with discomfort and figure out a solution. 

Free Resources:

• Summer Toolkit
• Episode 127: Create A Play-Based Childhood
• Episode 15: When Kids Are Bored
• Episode 4: Setting Limits that Work

Get your copy of the Stop Yelling Cheat Sheet!

In this free guide you’ll discover:

✨ A simple tool to stop yelling once you’ve started (This one thing will get you calm.)

✨ 40 things to do instead of yelling. (You only need to pick one!)

✨ Exactly why you yell. (And how to stop yourself from starting.)

✨A script to say to your kids when you yell. (So they don't follow you around!)

Download the Stop Yelling Cheat Sheet here

Connect With Darlynn: 

• Book a complimentary session with Darlynn
• Learn about the different parenting programs at www.calmmamacoaching.com
• Follow me on Instagram @darlynnchildress for daily tips 
• Rate and review the podcast on Itunes

Welcome back to Become a Calm Mama. I'm your host. I'm Darlynn

Childress. And today, I'm gonna talk about

encouraging boredom. So what I hope is that

by the end of this episode, you feel

more at peace when you see your kids being

bored and dysregulated and frustrated,

especially in the summer. The summer is a

time where there ought to be less structure

and more unsuper less loosely supervised free

play. That's the idea. Right? Long summer days

where kids have leisure time, creative time in

order to play. And what

happens though a a parent during the summer is we

don't like the way our kids act when they

are bored. Because what happens when a kid is bored is

they are what we call dysregulated, which means they're out of balance,

and they don't know what to do with that discomfort.

So I think of boredom really as

this period of time between activity.

And the better your kid is at managing the

discomfort that happens between one thing

and the next from getting up and getting dressed and getting their socks and

shoes on to going to calm, and they have an extra hour in the

morning, well, isn't that amazing? But if your kids aren't used

to having an extra hour in the morning

or unstructured time in the afternoon,

they aren't gonna know what to do with that time, and they're gonna start acting

out. They're gonna start bugging their sibling, complaining,

being grumpy, having a big feeling cycle,

being naughty. You find them doing something naughty. You know, like, they're all of a

sudden, you know, coloring on the walls or jumping on the bed or doing stuff

where you're like, what are you doing? You know you're not supposed to be doing

that. So the problem is

that your kids are used to having

most of their day filled with

structure and with adult directed activities. So in

the last week's episode, I talked about how important it is for our kids to

have time to be in

free play a be in unstructured play

a have time outdoors and have the pacing of life

kinda change, and all of that. And this

is this ideal, right, this value that we have that we wanna create more

free time and more open, unstructured

time. But the obstacle to doing that

is your kid's dysregulation in the gap

between the thing they were doing and the next thing.

So I want you to think about this boredom that

you're experiencing with your kids as what I wanna call a boredom

gap. I want you to be able to think about,

okay. My child is in a period of time where they

don't know what to do with themselves. Now you, as a parent,

you're super smart. You're super bright. I know a. And you probably go,

oh, you're bored? Let me give you some ideas.

Right? And that sounds like such a wonderful

mom thing to do. I was just reading an article in the New York Times,

which was it's a really great article, and it's all about, you

know, handling boredom and that kind of thing. And

what they said in there is you wanna have these, like, boredom busters.

Right? Have a list of things that your kids can do that that, you

know, are the boredom busters. And I love that. I have a list in the

summer toolkit, which you can get on my website, a.

Under free resources, there's a summer one. You get a whole

summer toolkit in there, 80 plus ideas of things to do when you're bored.

Now what happens though is I've seen this is that

parents will offer a boredom

buster or some sort of activity

too early Become the brain has

gone through its whole feeling cycle and

gets to problem solving. So the brain

doesn't like to be dysregulated. It doesn't like to be a,

and it, you know, is going to solve its

a, but it has to feel uncomfortable

before it craves something to make it

more likely to do that next thing. Let me explain what I mean.

Say you're hungry. Okay? And your body, of course, wants

to satisfy its hunger needs. And you're really

hungry, and someone says to you, do you want a

bowl of broccoli? Now some of you are

listening. I know you're, like, super healthy, and you're like, oh, I would be like,

yeah. Yum. But most people and some most

kids would be like, ew. Now if

I am sitting there a I'm really hungry, and I have a plate

of brownies and I have a plate of broccoli, I am

probably going to pick the brownies. Right? I'm gonna pick the easy

thing my brain is craving, that fast carb, that

instant sugar, that big dopamine surge,

and it's not thinking about what I can do to take care

of myself long term. I just wanna relieve the

discomfort, and that is true of

boredom. So you think you're

offering so many wonderful ideas, and you are.

But your kid is thinking about what you're offering

as broccoli. You're like, why don't we play cards? Why don't we build

a tower? Why don't we go outside? Why don't you go look for

bugs? Why don't you, you know, get out the twister

game? Why don't you play tic tac toe with your brother? Why don't

you you have so many good ideas. You're amazing.

But your child, all there is like, eat broccoli, eat

broccoli, eat broccoli, eat broccoli. And they're like,

no. I don't wanna eat broccoli. So you have to wait until

your child starts to crave the next

thing, and it's a strong enough craving. Like,

they wanna satisfy their need, and they're

willing to work at it, which is what eating broccoli is like

working at it. Creativity is working at it. What do you think

your children normally want when they

are acting dysregulated because they

are in a boredom gap. They

want screens. Right? They want you to turn on a

show or hand them the iPad or give them your

phone, and they might have really good, like, strategies. They're

like, let me look something up on Amazon, or I

wanna play my favorite song, or I wanna see what time it time it

is in New York City, or I wanna see the weather in New Delhi. Right?

They're may be coming up with a really cool, that's

educational here. I'll hand you my phone or, yeah, okay. I'll hand you the iPad.

But, really, that's a quick fix. That's a

brownie. That's a very fast little, you

know, pop in to just relieve that discomfort, but it's short

term. It's not gonna leave them satisfied. And then they're gonna be on their phone.

You're gonna have to get it back or stop them a then

transition again and go through boredom gap again.

So the more time that you give your kids

devices and the more time they spend

on devices, the more their brain will crave

that fast and easy stimulation.

It's not gonna crave the long term work

of free play. So what are you

supposed to do? Right?

When your kid is in a boredom gap, I

want you to wait to be

comfortable with your child's discomfort. Now if their kid is

being, like, bugging their sibling

or bugging you know, being disruptive or or, you know,

creating kind of a problem for everybody, you can set a

limit around that. You can say, oh, you're welcome to, you know,

talk to me, and I'll help you with your big feelings as long as you're

not hitting your brother. Right? So you can

set some boundaries and use some limits. There's tons of episodes on this

podcast about limit settings, so go back and read some of those.

But how to handle the boredom gap

in general is we want to

wait and be acknowledging what is happening.

So that's really what compassion is all about. It's being able

to look at your child and think, oh, they don't know what to do with

themselves. They're bored. They're dysregulated because they

haven't sought they haven't figured out something to do with their brain yet.

And I'm not gonna suggest anything yet. I'm just gonna wait, but I'm gonna be

compassionate in that waiting. You guys know I love

doctor Dan Siegel, and he coined the phrase name it to tame

it. And, really, it is about naming what is

happening. Sometimes we name that a to our kids.

Sometimes we just name it for ourselves so that we can get compassionate.

So when your kid is just, you know, bugging their brother or

complaining or bugging their sister or throwing throwing, like,

randomly, like, just picking up a pen and throwing it over and over again or

whatever. It's like, you can say, oh, I I

think I know what's happening right now. Is this a a gap? It

feels like you're in a board a gap.

So you can say that out loud, but most kids will get really mad. So

I really want you to be just sort of thinking it. Like, oh,

they're in a boredom gap. Oh my gosh. Okay. I can

handle this. They're gonna find something. They're gonna find a solution. Let

me redirect. Let me connect. Let me see how I can

help them. So when your kids are saying,

I'm bored or they're acting dysregulated, you can connect with

them and give them some eye contact a maybe name sort

of, are you having a rough time? Is it frustrating right now?

You don't know what to do with your big body. You're bugging your sister. You're

throwing things. You're, you know, having some trouble.

I get it. That's normal. This is called boredom.

It's okay. You're gonna get through it. So we

want to be calm in that

dysregulation, be the leader, and really kind of own what is

happening and recognize, okay. They're in a

dysregulated state. They're in a a a of gap. They're in a place where

they don't know what to do, but don't go into solution yet.

We need to soothe before we solve.

We need to name before we go to now what.

So really being a, being like instead of going, stop it. Stop it.

Stop it. You're being so annoying or and trying to shut down that

behavior or complaining or arguing with

them or punishing them. We want

them to see, like, okay. You're in a period of struggle, and I

can help you with that. So once

they release some of that stress juice, you can offer now what strategy

do you need to move some big you know, move your body? Do you you

know, why don't you come with me? Let me help you. Like or why don't

you help me? They love to be little helpers or,

you know, just connecting back with them

and giving them some attention. Sometimes lonely

sometimes boredom is a bit to connect. It's a

feeling of loneliness. It's a feeling of,

frustration. It's a feeling of annoyance. And so your kids, they

need a little bit of support, and they need you to give them some words

to describe that discomfort. So that's what

connection really is. It's helping your child connect

what they're feeling to how they're acting, giving them words

to talk about what they're feeling. I always think of it as connecting them to

them. Not connecting you to them, but connecting themselves to themselves.

So you're naming it, and you're being

compassionate. And then you kinda wait, and then you can

say, hey. It's normal to feel bored. That makes

sense. I'm sure you'll figure out a solution. So let me know what

your ideas are. Or you can say to your

kids, hey. It looks like you're looking for something to do. Let me know

if you want any suggestions. So what you're doing

there is you're inviting your child into some thinking.

When they're bored, they're in their limbic Become. They're in their emotional center, and they

just don't feel good, and they don't quite know how to solve for that.

And so we're gonna access some thinking, getting them

towards that prefrontal cortex, giving them some

access to doing some problem solving by inviting them in.

So don't go right into the solutions. Just say,

let me know what you've come up with. Let me know what you have what

what you think you calm do to solve your problem, or let me know if

you want any ideas. So you're the guide

in that moment. You're comfortable.

You're allowing your kid's brain to find its own solution. You're trusting

that your kid is going to figure it out.

Now how long is a boredom gap? How long should you wait?

What what what to expect? It really depends on how

often your child has experienced

boredom. The more your kids are bored, the

more things, unstructured time, or

unstructured activities that they experience, the better

they get at overcoming and moving quickly through the

boredom gap. When their brain is trained

in that like, last week, I talked about discover mode versus defend

mode. Discover mode is about going, what can

I do to make this more interesting for me?

That's the kind of problem solver we want. That's the kind of thinker we

want. That's the kind of kid we wanna be raising. Right? A that's

like, I can solve my problems. I don't

have to feel a and bored. I don't have to wait for

my parent to solve it for me. I don't have to wait for my parent

to become a clown and entertain me. Like, I can entertain

myself. That's so much more powerful and so much there's so much more

self agency in that process if your child

is comfortable with their own discomfort and can trust that they can figure out

a solution. So

it's like every time that you have not every

time. I don't wanna be super extreme and hyperbolic. But, like, the more that

your kids are on screens in gaps,

the more they rely on technology to fulfill their

creative and, need for free play.

The more that you take the screen off of the table as an

option, the better your kids get at finding in real

world embodied big body movement at

creative activities, things like that to solve for their own

discomfort. The brain hates

to be bored, and it hates to,

find solutions. It wants the easiest and fastest

way to do it. And so your brain is going to

crave technology. Your brain is gonna crave

sweets. Right? It wants the most efficient and effective way to get

its needs met. And when you

take some of those options off the table, the brain has to

work harder, but it's better for it.

Isn't that kind of cool? So, like, the more

screen free breaks you create, the easier it will be for your kids

to shift from this restless protest to creative exploration.

There is going to be resistance. There's going to be protests. I want you to

allow for some of that discomfort. Be compassionate

and trust that your child is their natural

inborn need for fun and for play and

for learning and for exploring and discovering and creativity,

it will come out if you allow it, if you trust it,

if you wait. Now

that initial boredom, once your kids get

over that feeling, right, they can learn to

prevent it by finding activities that are meaningful to

them. So once they kind of learn

how to walk through that boredom, they're like, I don't wanna feel that again. I'm

just gonna keep finding fun stuff for myself to a. And they can learn to

keep themselves busy. We want

our kids to become resilient. Right? We want them to have grit. We want

them to be able to overcome difficult emotions. We

want them to be imaginative. We want them to be creative. Right? We wanna be

problem solvers. We want them to have confidence. Right? We

want all of these things, and that is

the way we get that is by letting them find

their own solutions a not giving

them so much structure and so many activities and so

much going on that they don't get

to practice this boredom and this discomfort.

Let me think I asked the I answered the question a few minutes ago about,

like, how much time should you a. And the truth is, like, what I've

noticed about parents, particularly in the summer,

but even in the school year, is that the activities are

not stacked back to back, but there's, like, these

weird gap periods of time. Like, you have, you know,

30 minutes or 45 minutes between one thing before you have to get

ready and leave for the next thing, and your

kids are not in the relaxed,

open exploration, discover mode.

They're in, like, a transition. Like, I only have, you

know, a little bit of time between now and the next thing. And they

may not want to get involved in something Become there is this

idea that they know they have to leave soon. And

so if your kids aren't gonna be allowed

enough time to get into an activity

and then stay in that activity and then enjoy it, they may

not be committed to trying. So that's if that's the case and you've

already got your schedule going, then that means that you need to have a

little plan of what they're going to do during

that period of time so they don't get dysregulated and ask for

screens or sweets or bug their sibling. That's a

bid for connection. So instead, you would need to be thinking

like, okay. When we get back from camp, they they have, you

know, karate or jujitsu at, you know, at 4. We

get home at 3. We need to leave at 3:45. So I think

I'll have, like, quiet reading time, or I'm gonna

put out, you know, coloring books. I'm gonna have them do some

chores. Like, have a little plan in place, and then

you will just tell them, nope. We're not doing screens. This is what we're doing,

and, you know, take it or leave it, especially if it's not chores.

You know, you can do these chores now, or you can do it when we

get back, you know, that kind of, limit setting.

But knowing that you might need to create an adult

led activity if you don't have enough time for them to

get into something. Think about yourself. Like,

imagine like, this always happened to me is that I would

have my morning. I drop the kids off, do my morning stuff, dah dah dah

dah, run errands, whatever, work, and all that. And then I would get to, like,

1:30 or 2, and I would know I needed to go

leave soon for pickup. And I would then decide, oh, I

can't really get into anything right now. And I would feel a little

restless, and I might even waste that time on my phone.

And for me, one of my ways of entertaining myself is with

reading reading novels. And so I just kind of created a little lifestyle

for myself that the 30 minutes before I left to go do pickup, I

had this luxury is that I would read my book, whatever fiction book

I was reading. Sometimes I would drive drive school to school early, and

I would sit if it was not too hot, or I would just sit in

my house. I literally sat and

read my book. Or sometimes I would watch a show because I would be like,

well, I'm not gonna be able to a show tonight until, like, 9, and I

wanna relax, and I wanna have a good time. So I'm gonna sit here and

watch a show, which is not

you know, I'm gonna talk more about screens next week, but, obviously, I'm not a

little kid where I'm getting my dopamine and all that all the time from

screens. Right? Because I have a big life. So

it can be a television show if you want it to be, but I would

encourage that if you do use screens that they are in a

communal environment and everyone is watching the same

thing on the big TV, not individual

devices where everyone is separated. So that way there's still

some community aspect and some problem solving of what we're gonna watch

and and all of that together. So there's some

benefits. If you are gonna do screen, there's a lot of benefits to doing it

as a community. So, but I just wanted you to notice

for yourself. Like, sometimes you're bored. Sometimes you're restless. You don't know what to do

with yourself, and you might find yourself scrolling on

Instagram or something like that or reading the news or Twitter or whatever you

do. And that might be your sugar,

like your quick fix. And maybe there's something more enriching that

you could do if you didn't have access to screens. What would you

do? Maybe you would, you know, look a,

everything I think about is, like, looking up stuff. But, maybe you would pet

your dog or go for a walk or do some stretching or, you

know, I don't know. Whatever task you might do or or

activity that you might do, think about how you struggle in that moment.

That's what I want you to a with. It's like that restless feeling you have

when you're not sure what to do and you don't wanna get into something because

you don't have a lot of time. That's kinda how your kids feel sometimes.

So when they're in that dysregulated state a you can tell

it's because they are bored, I want you to really be

thinking, okay, they're bored. They're in a boredom gap. This is not

a problem. You can offer them some compassion for

their feelings. You know, you can be like, I get it. It's hard.

You don't know what to do with yourself. That's that's normal. And you wanna,

like, bug your brother, or you wanna bug your sister, or you wanna bug me,

or you wanna bug the dog. That makes sense. That doesn't

work. So you either need to figure out what you're gonna do, or I can

help you. So what do you wanna do? Do you want some help? Do you

want some ideas? And then you wait and

see if they're ready for some ideas, and then you say, well, why don't you,

you know, play a a, whatever the ideas are that you have. So

like I said, I have a toolkit

in the on my website, the summer toolkit, and has 80 plus

boredom busters, and it kinda describes this boredom gap and the

step by step directions of how to handle a boredom gap. So I

highly encourage you you get your toolkit. Go to my website, calm on the

coaching.com, and get that link and, you know,

download that, toolkit. If you already have it,

go back and remember this section and read through those boredom

gap busters and get some ideas, and then follow the

steps of naming it, being compassionate, and then

asking if they want some support. Alright.

I want you to remember

that with once your child moves through the boredom

gap, on the other side of that is

fun. It's play. It's

creativity. It's learning with their bodies.

It's practicing gross motor movement. It's practicing fine

motor. It's sitting and learning something.

It's actually very enjoyable on the

other side. So if you're if you as the

parent, if you don't allow for that

boredom, you don't allow for that discomfort,

your kids, they don't get the experience of free

and imaginative play. They don't

learn that they have an innate love of nature or sports or

art or just that pleasure they have of relaxing

and reading a book or petting the dog or staring out the

window and looking at how the wind and the birds come through.

There's so much value to boredom. Think

about your own childhood. Think about thinking about car

rides before we had any devices and how, like,

you sit in the car and you watch the trees go by, and it feels

like the trees are moving and you're staying still.

You know, that that feeling when you're just staring, the trees are like,

a you're like, oh, am I moving or the tree's moving? Like,

that's such a beautiful reflection. It's, like, so little

kid like. Right? Just staring and going, That

color green is different than that color green. Oh, look. There's a

bird. Oh, is it windy outside? And

then getting into that discover mode and going outside

and feeling, oh, it's so hot. Oh, look. There's a bug. And

then looking at the bug and then picking up the bug a then wondering if

ladybugs have babies and having a whole conversation with yourself about

ladybugs. That is Childress, And it

does not happen on an iPad. It does

not happen in an episode of Bluey. You might watch Bluey

having those experiences, but that's not the

same as you going in your own yard and finding your own friend to

play with and figuring it out for yourself.

So I hope that you see that

there will be a gap between where

the brain knows what it's supposed to be doing or is engaged

to the next thing. That's a boredom gap. It's

normal. Allow for it. Be okay with that

uncomfortableness. Don't go to a solution

yet. Be compassionate and wait. Wait for your kid's

brain to crave it. They will Become

that's what it's like to be a human child. It's super cool.

Okay. If you have if you a help with this, like, for reals, like,

you're like, okay, darling. I'm listening to your podcast, and I love it. And,

also, I don't quite know how to do anything you ever say.

Then I think I get it Become I feel the same way sometimes about stuff

I'm learning. Just reach out. Book a consultation.

I have a free 25 minute complimentary consultation with me. I

have them, you know, scheduled, like, lots of times where you can

pop into my calendar, and we'll just meet. You can talk to me in

person. I'll tell you about my programs. I'll tell you about working with me, or

I'll just kinda listen and get to know you. It's really lovely. I love

these conversations so much. And, yeah. So do

that. A. Go to programs, scroll

down, schedule a consultation with me, and let's get to know each

other. Okay. If you're listening to this, the day it

comes out, happy 4th July, and I hope you are

in your summer mode and having a good time and that you have lots and

lots and lots of free, unstructured

time for yourself and for your kids.

Alright, a. I will talk to you next week.