Constable: You're bored at home? Try living in the now, Lake Barrington psychologist says
It's been a month since Gov. J.B. Pritzker issued the stay-at-home order, and some people might be feeling a little restless. Working from home and sheltering in place with his wife, Cheryl, Russ Riendeau isn't going to get bored.
"If I do, it's my fault," says the 62-year-old executive recruiter who owns New Frontier Search Company and lives in Lake Barrington. "It's not that you're bored. You're just being lazy."
Riendeau has a doctoral degree in behavioral psychology and knows how to keep busy. He is founder of Lucky Savage Leather Goods, where he makes wallets and other items out of old baseball gloves. He's written 11 business books (one with a forward from Pat Hughes, the radio voice of the Chicago Cubs). He's published a collection of his Rusty & Pogo comic strips. He is working on a new book of his poetry. His sculptures have been displayed in art shows. He's produced seven CDs of his music. He's given TED Talks and delivered humorous keynote speeches. He's an accomplished abstract painter. And he golfs, flies planes, rides motorcycles and runs marathons.
"I am an adventure capitalist," Riendeau says, explaining he works to make money to do the things that bring him joy. "It funds the things I love to do."
Growing up in Rolling Meadows as the oldest of five boys gives Riendeau a leg up when it comes to sheltering at home.
"People who are older have an advantage because we're used to solitary confinement and making games for ourselves," Riendeau says. "We literally had to invent ourselves every day. We learned how to be creative, how to make things with our hands."
As a young boy, he helped his father plant a silver maple tree in their backyard. Years later, when he and the tree had grown, Riendeau would shimmy up the tree, lie on a branch and gently sway in the breeze, watching his brothers playing below. "That feeling of flight and freedom still stays with me," says Riendeau, who suspects his time "flying the maple tree" led him to get his pilot's license at age 19.
Frustrated while looking out his window on a beautiful day at the golf course closed because of the COVID-19 mandates, Riendeau writes a poem titled, "Golf Eternal," in which he "thinks about the world's struggles and dreams of plaid golf pants."
He spends about 90 minutes on it.
"This is good enough," Riendeau says. "I had fun doing it. I worked on my writing skills. It forced me to use my thesaurus."
More people stuck at home should try something new, stretch their boundaries, he says. That doesn't mean you need to compete with friends and celebrities on social media.
"We don't have to share it with anybody. The joy is in the creation. The fear and anxiety is in the presentation," Riendeau says. "When we put a label on it, a label comes with a set of expectations. Detach from the outcome. Simply do it."
Society puts a premium on production these days, trying to figure the return on investment of everything we do and wanting to shame people who aren't being productive. That's not good for us, Riendeau says.
"I'm going for a walk. Gee, what's the ROI on that?" he says. He advises parents struggling to pry kids away from screens to tell them, "Put your phone down and go outside and dig a hole." They might work up a sweat, smell the earth, appreciate the texture of the soil, find a worm.
"Just embed yourself in that moment. That experience is as good as it gets," Riendeau says. Letting go of your inhibitions is preferable to giving up, he says.
"If you are bored now, what are you going to look like on the other side of this pandemic?" Riendeau says. The coronavirus gives us a chance to try new things in the privacy of our homes. Calling himself a "Now-ist," Riendeau advises people to live in the moment.
"Don't worry about the outcome," Riendeau says. "Just do it for the love of doing it."