Every year during finals week, I think of a million and one things that I would love to do after finals. Can’t wait for next week, I think. It’s going to be fun!

Now if you’re thinking that I spend my vacation doing those million and one things productively—well, that may not be entirely true. I’ve used these paradoxical words during vacations; maybe you have too: I’m bored!

So I came up with the B.O.A.R.D. formula to avoid vacation boredom!

B: Book of Ideas

Get a “book of ideas” or a small journal in which you jot down ideas, to-do lists, fun date plans, etc. that race through your mind at the randomest of times. If you’re like me, then whenever you’re meant to be focusing on something else, that’s when the best ideas pop into mind. Don’t let this frustrate you. Sometimes our minds might mull on an idea—causing distraction—because we’re afraid that if we don’t think over every aspect of it right then, we’ll lose it. Try this: as soon as a great idea pops into mind, write it in your book of ideas. That way, you’ll know that the thought isn’t going to slip and that when the time is right, you can get back to it. I’ve tried this, and it’s amazing how well it works. Then, when you’re bored in your free time, you can go down the list of ideas and you’ll have a bunch of interesting and useful things to do—and the time to do them. Plus you’ll find yourself accomplishing a lot of goals that otherwise could be neglected.

O: Organize

Every time you deep-clean or deleaven your room, don’t you find a lot of neat items? I do. A lot of them are great cures for boredom: an old glove and baseball, an unfinished stamp collection, a bookmarked novel, yarn, etc. When you feel you are on the verge of boredom, try this: organize! You’ll find a bunch of items in your room that can help you beat the blahs. After all, you bought them in the first place because you thought they would be useful to you. Now could be a great time to finally get to them. (Or you could give them away and purge them—but that’s another story.)

A: Ask Around

Guess what? Others get bored too. There is a saying that misery loves company—you could apply that to boredom as well, in a different way. Finding people to do things with you is a wonderful way to beat boredom, help someone else and build stronger friendships. Ask around to see if someone would like to go to the library for an afternoon, or play catch with that mitt and ball you just found buried in your closet, or play Monopoly with you in your tree house. Seek others out whom perhaps you’ve not had as much time to get to know before and use a sport, a toy or an occasion as an icebreaker to get to know them better. You’ll have something to do with your time, and building that friendship might open up new things to do in the future should you get bored again.

R: Read

A majority of us love to read—hey that’s why you’re reading this article. Reading sparks ideas, introduces you to hobbies, encourages travel, builds creativity and teaches you a lot about a lot. When I was a preteen, I loved reading the Five Findouters. It was a mystery book series about five kids and a dog who went on great adventures solving mysteries. One tiny, almost insignificant detail about these books always fascinated me: The Findouters usually had their meetings in a barn in the afternoons over scones and tea. After reading these books, I used to spend probably an hour at home in the afternoon eating biscuits and drinking tea. (I didn’t have my first scone until I came to America for AC.) That kept me busy even after the book. Another book that sparked an idea in my mind was when I read Anne Frank: The Diary of A Young Girl when I was around 10 years old. It got me hooked on journaling, which kept me entertained for hours each week. You get the idea. Books really can encourage ideas and activity.

D: Drive

In his book, The Seven Laws of Success, Herbert W. Armstrong wrote about drive. “An inactive person will not accomplish,” he wrote. We need to really work hard to get out of the boredom “rut.” We all need to prod ourselves to do more with full-hearted effort. I’ve often noticed that when I sleep in real late on Sundays, it’s hard to get much else done for the rest of the day with any amount of zeal. That’s because I’ve forsaken drive and set myself up for a lazy outlook! Then I feel bored. Ever felt that way?  Now of course it is good to get a few hours of extra sleep on the weekends to recuperate. But my point here is that just as with lazy Sundays, we can sometimes set ourselves up for just being plain lazy in everything we do—and be in a constant state of boredom as a result. By adding drive in your life—constantly prodding yourself to accomplish more, being positive about accomplishing the near-impossible, trying a new sport —you can set yourself up for a life of constant activity and accomplishment, and squelch out the boredom.

I’ve come to realize that when I think I’m bored, I’m not really being honest with myself. After all, I haven’t tried everything under the sun and am now out of ideas. That makes me go back to my B.O.A.R.D. formula and find some wonderful things to fill my time with. Right now I’m trying to finish up a blue scarf I had started knitting a few winters ago. I’m not bored anymore.