Hi!
For this week I want to share a concept that I first stumbled upon by accident.
A few years ago, when I was still in school, I realized that I have a passion for basketball, so every day I took almost any chance to go to my school’s gym and play with a couple of friends.
One day I went out of class for a lunch break, but despite feeling hungry and not having eaten anything for about 8 hours, I started playing basketball, it was on an outdoor court in the middle of summer, with the blistering sun in my skin, and lots of people around me.
A few minutes went by and all of these seamlessly vanished; the feeling of hunger, the intense heat from the sun, and everyone around me just felt as if they weren’t even there. The only thing on my mind was the ball and the hoop, so much so that suddenly I hear the bell ringing indicating that I had to go back to class, an hour had gone by, but it felt like only two minutes. And as I snapped out of it and got back my conscious understanding of what was going on, I got a feeling of bliss, unlike anything I’d felt before.
Back then I didn’t understand what had happened; now I know that I had experienced the topic of this post: Flow States
Understanding flow states
Flow, also referred to as 'being in the zone' or experiencing a 'runner's high', is a technical term that was largely worked on by Mihály Csíkszentmihályi in the field of positive psychology during the late 20th century.
It is defined as an optimized state of consciousness in which we feel our best and perform our best. Over the years further research has been conducted that indicates that this unique state of consciousness is driven by a powerful cocktail of neurochemicals (Dopamine, Serotonin, Norepinephrine, Endorphins, Anandamine) that are responsible for the effects associated with flow states.
These effects have been studied extensively and include things like intense focus and deep absorption in the task, the vanishing of our sense of self that results in the silencing of our internal chatter and self-critical thoughts that helps us get out of our own way, the feeling of “time dilation” that refers to the subjective experience of time feeling distorted where several hours can feel like only a few minutes, accompanied by a profound sense of pleasure and fulfillment.
The unbelievable benefits of flow states
As I said before, flow can have a profound impact on a person’s physical and cognitive performance and lead to higher levels of happiness and overall life satisfaction. But how much of an impact does it really have?
In terms of performance benefits, some interesting data suggests that getting into the flow state can be one of the best things for people to do to get more leverage from the use of their time.
These include:
Up to a 500% increase in productivity,
Up 700% for creativity,
The ability to reduce the time for learning and acquiring skills up to half of what it would normally take,
Producing higher levels of engagement when working, something that is becoming increasingly rare in our world these days.
When it comes to emotional well-being, flow can also be a powerful way for people to increase their levels of emotional well-being and happiness, in fact, all the people that have the highest levels of overall life satisfaction also tend to be the ones with the highest levels of flow in their lives, this is thanks to a range of emotional benefits that include:
Freedom from self-doubt
Reduced stress and anxiety
Increased levels of intrinsic motivation
Higher levels of positive emotions like joy, excitement, and enthusiasm.
Cultivating flow in our lives
The good news about all of this is that flow is considered to be universal, meaning that unlike what most of us tend to think, peak performance is not exclusive to Olympic gold medalists, genius scientists, creative artists, or hard-working entrepreneurs, it’s something that seems to be available for pretty much anyone.
The other thing that we must take into account is that flow is not a state that we can access on command just by willing ourselves into it, we cannot force it. Instead, it is something that we tend to fall into by accident.
But there is something we can do, to get into flow some studies have discovered flow triggers. These are conditions that we can control and will make it more likely for us to get into a flow state, and the idea would be that if we want more flow in our lives, we should craft our environments in a way that favors the presence of these triggers.
Among multiple triggers that are known these days, the most prominent I’ve found are:
The challenge-skill ratio: This means that we must choose a task that matches or slightly exceeds our current skills, if we pick something too easy we’ll get bored, if the task is too difficult it can feel impossible and frustrating.
Total focus: This involves managing distractions ahead of time, like turning off your phone or finding a quiet place, because distractions will prevent you from getting into the flow.
Risk-taking: This does not mean you should risk your life, it could be a social, physical, creative, or financial risk that helps us pay more attention to the thing were doing.
Novelty: This could involve going to a place we’ve never been to before and it can help us capture our attention and stimulate our curiosity
Complexity(but not too much): This can also drive a more intense focus, as well as make sure that the task we do is challenging for us
Immediate feedback: This provides real-time information about our performance and progress, and it will help us know whether we are on the right track or not, which enhances the level of clarity we have about the task we need to do.
At the end of the day, these can still differ from one person to another, this way I recommend you try to find which are the ones that work best for you through some trial and error and reflection.
To put an end to this post, I’d like to leave you with a question to spark some reflection; imagine you can access flow consistently and without any problems, what would you do? How would you use the increased productivity, creativity, and faster learning time you get from it? What are things that seemed impossible before, but are now within your reach?
I hope this was helpful, have a great weekend.
-Alan.