First and foremost, being bored motivates you to search out something less boring to do. Feeling bored at work, for example, could inspire you to explore a change of career. Or if you decide there’s nothing worth watching on TV, you might choose to switch off and make your own entertainment by taking up a new hobby.

This, according to researchers at the University of Central Lancashire, could explain why the lockdown of the past two years saw a surge in creativity among people stuck at home. From banana bread making to picking up a paintbrush for the first time since childhood, many of us realized there are only so many times you can watch Tiger King on Netflix before you need to find other ways to amuse yourself.

But what about those times when you have no choice but to stick with the boring situation — carrying out a mundane task at work or waiting for a bus, for instance? The good news is that the boredom you’re feeling now could spark your creativity and help you come up with some of your best ideas, says a 2019 study published in the Academy of Management Discoveries journal. People who’d taken part in a boring bean-sorting task later performed better at coming up with creative ideas than people who’d been given something more interesting to do first.