Thought is a spoilt child of the body. It is energetically expensive, often ruinously so, and generally ungrateful, and even when it chooses to honour its sole benefactor it generally does so in a patronising manner. If a pain arises then what can thought do but attempt to ignore it, to mount a distraction, it might hunt for a remedy, or pretend to, but its powers are limited when its object is not itself. Thought is a means for diverting attention, it performs before attention and absorbs it for a time, preventing the body from acting on its reflexive impulses. Attention unengaged is felt to be a hazard, expressed as ennui. You are bored, attention is diminished but continues, unable to refrain from playing its dim light over the empty stage; it experiences a hunger without a clear object - and this grows intolerable (to whom?) as it continues. Why should there be boredom, why is the empty state not one of rest? But boredom is far from empty, it seethes with undirected thoughts, with devilry. When thoughts are stimulated they are directed, the feeling of emptiness vanishes and there is pleasure, gaiety, innocence. Thought will do whatever it can to hold on to this feeling of fullness, but when it fails it grows bitter. Again, thought is needy, and when its needs are unmet it turns on itself, devours itself, turns sour with the effort. It insists on its marriage to attention, will do anything to deny it any other, any prior, beloved.