This week in sociology

This past weekend, we were assigned to do nothing for ten minutes. At first, I thought this was a tad strange. On Sunday, my family and I went to a flee market. It was a huge area and was relatively crowded. I stood towards the edge of the place, and I just did nothing. Some people looked at me, and some people gave me some confusing looks. No one approached me or asked me what I was doing, and I previously told my family about the assignment. Most people ignored me. They could have been thinking in their heads that maybe I was waiting for someone or that I was just standing there for no apparent reason. This ten minute period seemed like it was about an hour. It was a very long ten minutes. I didn't realize that being unoccupied makes time feel longer, especially if I wasn't allowed to do anything. Usually, if I am told not to do something, it makes me want to do that even more. If I were to be doing something productive during those ten minutes, it would have gone by quicker. I kept wanting to check my phone or go on twitter or something, but I couldn't during this experiment. Usually, if I feel somewhat awkward during a situation, like I did during this ten minutes, I would take out my phone to avoid the uncomfortable situations surrounding me. This experiment was a lot harder than I had expected it to be.