Improvisation as Mood This genuinely changed my outlook on #life. An extract from Labyrinths of Information by Claudio Ciborra: If panic implies that things, including time, matter too much (the world overwhelms us), in boredom nothing really matters: the world is indifferent and time never seems to pass. If in panic we fall victim to the world and time, in boredom we try to kill time while being immersed in a fog of indifference. Depending upon the acuteness of the mood, there are three main states of intensifying boredom: becoming bored by something specific (waiting for a train); being bored with something (a nice evening spent with friends - time flies - still, when we get back home, we feel bored); finally, profound boredom - one finds it boring. Panic and lack of time; boredom and the passing of time, are intertwined. These moods are profoundly concentrated on our situation and perception of time. The opposite of improvisation, therefore, is not planned action, it is boredom or panic. During the latter, unarticulated time and refusal of the world leads to inaction. On the other hand, the former is a ‘moment of vision’, the resolute decision in which the full situation of action opens itself and keeps itself open to our initiative of quickly reregistering the world and creatively recombining resources.
