Flow
In which we step into the rich river of experience and (try to) stop paddling
River
In 1975, Hungarian-American psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi wrote a book called Beyond Boredom and Anxiety: Experiencing Flow in Work and Play. It was the birth of the modern term ‘flow’ for a specific psychological state that has popped up in writings throughout the ages.
In the book, Csikszentmihalyi interviews several people who describe a state of ‘effortless effort’; a fulfilling experience of intense concentration during which the rest of the world seems to fall away. Many of the interviewees used the metaphor of being carried by a river or flow. There wasn’t a catchy name for it yet, so Csikszentmihalyi christened it ‘flow’.
Since then, the idea has been imported into many different fields, not unlike antifragility, which was the topic of our previous journey into psychology (and in which I briefly mentioned flow at the end).
You experience ‘flow’ when nine conditions are met:
Challenge-skill balance: the challenge of the task at hand slightly exceeds your skillset. (Slightly being the keyword.)
Action-awareness merger: there is only the here and now, your awareness and your actions in the present become one. (Aka you’re completely absorbed by the task.)
Goal clarity: speaks for itself. You know exactly what you’re supposed to do; there is no ambiguity.
Immediate, unambiguous feedback: also without ambiguity is the feedback you receive. The experience itself provides constant feedback.
Concentration on the task at hand: your point of focus does not waver to matters beyond the task.
The paradox of control: you control without controlling. During a flow state, your actions feel automatic, yet you also feel fully in control.
Transformation of time: your subjective experience of time slows down or speeds up.
Loss of self-consciousness: you are so absorbed in the task that you don’t care how you look or what others think of you.
Autotelic experience: a flow state is intrinsically rewarding. ‘Autotelic’ means ‘goal in itself’. While the flow might be part of a greater goal you set yourself (get fit, write a book, etc.), during a flow experience, that is not the goal that matters. Instead, it is simply the action (exercising, writing…) in itself that becomes the goal.
Those are the nine oars we need to travel the river of flow. Missing even one will steer us in another direction. This is why, for most people, flow doesn’t come easily.
Clutch
One example of people who have (seemingly) mastered flow are athletes who become known as clutch players. Behind one point? Shot clock ticking down? Better get it to the player on the team who has ‘the hot hand’ (or foot, or whatever body part matters in your chosen sport).
The ‘seemingly’ between parentheses in the above paragraph is the most interesting bit. Relatively recent work in sports psychology suggests that flow and clutch states show overlapping characteristics, but are not exactly the same.
Important similarities: joy in the activity, perceived control, altered perception, complete immersion, and lack of self-consciousness.
Some key differences:
Clutch: absence of negative thoughts.
Flow: absence of critical thoughts (as in assessing one’s own performance).
Clutch: heightened arousal.
Flow: optimal arousal for the task at hand (which can be ‘relaxed’).
Clutch: awareness of the demands of the situation and consequences of succeeding/failing.
Flow: ‘effortless’ effort; demands and consequences are not on your mind.
Clutch: fixed goals (score this many points, for example.)
Flow: clear but open goals (perform to the best of my ability.)
My own very random hypothesis is that clutch and flow states can transition into each other depending on the types of goals at the moment. To return to sports for an example, during the game great players flow, but near the end, when open goals (play as good as possible) become more fixed (score enough points to erase the deficit), they flip into clutch.
It would be interesting to see if well-known clutch players are also better at finding their flow state. Given the shared traits between the two states, I suspect they might (again, no data, just a guess).
Beyond happiness
What about us mere mortals, though? How do we get into flow? Why would we even want to? That last question is the easiest to answer: research suggests that flow states may be linked to increased levels of happiness, satisfaction, and self-actualization. They help us climb to the top of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.
Sign me up.
It’s not so much that flow is happiness, it’s more that flow involves the absence of unhappiness. It’s nuanced, but there is a difference. Moments of flow reduce the overall level of personal unhappiness, which bumps up your average level of happiness, so to speak. This is important, because last time we’ve seen that explicitly chasing happiness makes you very unhappy. By finding flow, we get happier without having to chase happiness.
Okay, time to find our flow. I’m sure there are plenty of self-help (e)books and websites that give a bunch of tips. But let’s focus on what we know, rather than on what sells best. If we look at the nine components of flow we listed earlier, we can infer some useful things to try:
Take on challenges that slightly exceed your current skill set.
Set the right scene for the activity (e.g., do complex tasks at a time when you are naturally most alert and focused).
Eliminate distractions.
Include some form of action (which can be as simple as typing on a keyboard).
Set clear, open goals and incorporate immediate feedback.
Take breaks regularly to give yourself a chance to rest and recharge. It may feel effortless, but the intense focus during flow implies the need to recharge after a while.
Finally, do something you’re passionate about. This means you’ll keep coming back to it and, even for flow, practice makes pretty good (there is no such thing as perfect).
Do you experience flow? Do you have any tips or tricks to get into a flow state? Feel free to share your knowledge in the comments.
Before proceeding to the obligatory button pyramid to click: this is the last Thinking Ahead post for 2022. Thank you for reading and sticking around! I hope that the universe will smile at you in 2023. May all the good stuff head your way.