In a culture obsessed with productivity, boredom seems like a sin. (Not to mention impossible when so much of the everyday stimuli we take for granted—email, ads, Facebook—is bent on robbing us of our attention.) But sometimes sitting back and doing nothing is, ironically, exactly what you need to do in order to get more done. We were so scared of being bored at all that we failed to appreciate the frightening repercussions of not being bored enough.