I haven’t been bored since 2007. That was my freshman year of college when I thought taking 12 credit hours was exhausting and I took three naps each afternoon.

I’ve fallen in love with learning over the last few years. I always have something new on my radar to learn. Coding. A new language. A skill to refine. Learning prevents me from accruing multi-nap days and it helps make my life matter.

Below, I’ve compiled a list of my favorite ways to destroy boredom.

Subscribe to remarkable podcasts.

I subscribe to a handful of podcasts that help me learn. I mostly listen on my commute to work or the gym. A few recent podcast favorites include The Dave Ramsey Show, LifeChurch.tv, Michael Hyatt’s This is Your Life, Michael Locke’s Web Design Podcast and The Accidental Creative. Listening to podcasts turns travel time into a portable classroom–a time to grow instead of just mindless travel.

There are podcasts for everything–so start checking them out. By the time you subscribe to a few podcasts, you’ll have new content to rock out to every day.

Learn a new skill.

This year I’ve studied HTML and CSS web coding, and it’s been a blast. I took this free course from WebTuts+ and I learned a lot, for free, in very little time. The internet is a magical world of resources to teach yourself anything. Dive in, find a course or set of tutorials, and start learning. Coursera and Khan Academy, both offer awesome free courses and lessons. There are honestly endless, free, online options.

Follow resource kings and queens on Twitter

Social networks can be a total waste of time or a tool for learning and connecting. If you carefully craft a curated list of people and organizations to follow, you can use Twitter to learn more than you’d imagine. Here’s how I use Twitter to find the best resources and people to follow.

Save articles to Instapaper

Every interesting link I find on Twitter or anywhere else on the web automatically gets saved into Instapaper. It’s essentially my daily newspaper and article reference tool. It saves webpage content and strips away the ads so I can read those pages later on my computer, iPhone or iPad. I have over 500 articles saved there waiting for my eyes. It’s an endless repository of self- curated, stellar content

If you aren’t using a Twitter client that allows you to long-click links to save them to Instapaper, I suggest splurging on Tweetbot for iOS.

Learn a new language

You may trade boredom for sheer frustration here, but learning a new language is a great way to escape the cobwebs of lethargy. My favorite language learning blog is The Every Day Language Learner, where Aaron Myers gives you tips, resources and activities for learning any language. This site has been especially helpful in my journey of learning Slovenian.

Curate a reading list

I posted my 2013 reading list and I’m wading through everything from theology to blogging books–adding new interesting books as I go. Having a list and a plan for what I’ll read next is motivates me to get on to the next book. That way I’m not wandering around aimlessly through old episodes of The Office instead of keeping my brain from turning to mush.

Connect with friends and family

Drop by and spend time with your parents. Or Skype them if they live in another country. Email a friend from college and set up a time to talk. The best way to stay on top of this is creating a ping list (which I learned about from Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi). It’s simply a list of people in all of your different social circles–family, friends, school mates, old roommates, business contacts, etc. that you want to stay connected to. You can do that by sending a text, tweet or email here and there to stay connected. Which reminds me, I need to update my own ping list and do a better job of initiating with old friends.

Start a blog

If you’re looking for a black hole for your time to be irretrievably sucked into, definitely start blogging. I love writing, designing and equipping others, so the time vortex is worth it. But trust me, you’ll never be bored again once you launch a blog. Between creating content, updating, redesigning, and everything in-between, you’ll wonder how you were ever bored before.

Make a giant to-do wish list

Places you want to go. Movies you want to see. Books you want to read. People you want to meet. Things you want to experience. I’m sure you say to yourself pretty often “I’d love to _____” but then reality sets in, a fire starts at work, or you just get distracted and forget what it was that you’d love to do.

The solution is to start a list you can turn to when you feel boredom creeping up on you. You have natural interests and hobbies, you just don’t always remember that book you wanted to read or that thing you wanted to share with your dad. If you’re looking for a way to keep track of these things, try creating an Evernote “Someday To-Do List” or download the Thinglist app where you can store restaurants, books, food, ideas, movies, music, people, places and products you want to check out later in a beautiful interface.

Keep a journal

Nearly every morning I spend time writing how I’m feeling , what’s going on in life, what I’m praying about–as a way to connect with God but also to reflect on my life at that moment. Start a journal, and after you’ve been at it for a while, review your old entries and prepare to be blown away at how much you’ve grown and all that you’ve learned in a short period of time.

Create a list of yearly goals

Dream and think about what you want to achieve in the next 365 days. Write your goals out, in specifics, and start taking a crack at what you want to finish this year. When you’re bored, review this list and take some tangible steps towards accomplishing your goals. If you need some inspiration, I shared my 2013 goals here.

Question: What do you do to destroy boredom? What’s on your list of favorite things to do when boredom starts to creep into your life?