And dealing with boredom is something nobody learns how to do anymore. We have constant entertainment in our pockets with mobile phones, social media, and streaming.
When I go to the gym I sit in the sauna for 30 minutes just doing... nothing. Just sitting. No earbuds, no phone in hand. I'm usually the only one like this. I get asked how I can stand it. It's just normal to me. I think about stuff I need to do. I map out the next day, or the rest of the day, or next week. I reflect on last week. My mind always finds something to think about.
In the US, yes. I've seen this more than once, but the worst instance was a guy who came into the sauna with all of his gym clothes on, also looking at his phone. You can't make this stuff up.
I think every time I’ve been (or even been moving toward) excellent at something, it’s because I found very little or none of it boring. Even very-focused drilling and such, or studying “boring” material (it wasn’t, to me—I didn’t have to deal with boredom to progress!)
Office work and dealing with bureaucracy stands out as something that lots of people find themselves doing and almost all of them find unpleasant, including experiencing tons of it as very boring.
The key to excellence in any human endeavor is the ability to deal with boredom.
Wallace was a serious tennis player for awhile, surely he must know this.
It's as if he (and most of HN) has a kind of intellectual allergy to the word "bureaucracy" that suppresses his critical faculties.