My highlights of Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience

What is Flow?

Flow is a state where you are focused on doing something complex that requires intense concentration and effort and has a clear goal and feedback system.

You become so absorbed, you can't think of anything else.

"In normal life, we keep interrupting what we do with doubts and questions. “Why am I doing this? Should I perhaps be doing something else?” Repeatedly we question the necessity of our actions, and evaluate critically the reasons for carrying them out. But in flow there is no need to reflect, because the action carries us forward as if by magic."

These kinds of experiences "order your consciousness" and avert the default chaos of our minds.

You want this

Flow occurs with activities you do for the sake of doing them, regardless of the outcome.

Surgeons speak of their work:

“It is so enjoyable that I would do it even if I didn’t have to.”

The term “autotelic” derives from two Greek words, auto meaning self, and telos meaning goal. It refers to a self-contained activity, one that is done not with the expectation of some future benefit, but simply because the doing itself is the reward.

Playing the stock market in order to make money is not an autotelic experience; but playing it in order to prove one’s skill at foretelling future trends is—even though the outcome in terms of dollars and cents is exactly the same.
For me, writing is such an activity. It would be great to make an income from my writing, but even if I don't make any money or gain any recognition I still write because I enjoy it.

Many writers, when asked why they chose to write, despite writing being rarely lucrative, answer: "This is the only thing that when I am doing it, I never wonder if I should be doing something different."

A dancer describes how it feels when a performance is going well:

“Your concentration is very complete. Your mind isn’t wandering, you are not thinking of something else; you are totally involved in what you are do- ing.... Your energy is flowing very smoothly. You feel relaxed, comfortable, and energetic.”

A mother who enjoys the time spent with her small daughter:

“Her reading is the one thing that she’s really into, and we read together. She reads to me, and I read to her, and that’s a time when I sort of lose touch with the rest of the world, I’m totally absorbed in what I’m doing.”

You don't want this

The opposite of Flow sucks. That's when people feel like they're in a rut. As Dr. Maxwell Matlz writes in Psycho-Cybernetics:

"It has been pointed out earlier that since man is a goal-striving being, he is functioning naturally and normally when he is oriented toward some positive goal and striving toward some desirable goal. Happiness is a symptom of normal, natural functioning and when man is functioning as a goal-striver, he tends to feel fairly happy, regardless of circumstances."

Csikszentmihalyi demolishes the commonly held belief that effortless leisure such as watching TV is the pinnacle of "feeling great". Instead, such activities are typically ranked at the bottom of "experience" quality.

We've all felt hungover from scrolling social media for too long or binge-watching Netflix. (if you are overindulging often, read this).

Watching TV or scrolling social media are prime examples of entropic behavior. We yearn for these experiences because they feel pleasurable (for a while at least) but leave us unfulfilled afterward.

Designing your life for Flow

You want to structure your life in a way that you spend most of your time in flow, and the least in entropy.

With Flow activities you are an active participant in life, you are involved, you are there, you are living.

“Get action. Do things; be sane; don’t fritter away your time; create, act, take a place wherever you are and be somebody; get action.” -- Theodore Roosevelt.

So creating music will make your life more fulfilling than just listening to music:

Playing sports > Watching sports

Writing > Reading

Talking to friends > Watching "Friends" on the TV

Playing golf > Talking about playing golf

Why do we avoid doing things that are good for us?

"Instead of using our physical and mental resources to experience flow, most of us spend many hours each week watching celebrated athletes playing in enormous stadiums. Instead of making music, we listen to platinum records cut by millionaire musicians. Instead of making art, we go to admire paintings that brought in the highest bids at the latest auction. We do not run risks acting on our beliefs, but occupy hours each day watching actors who pretend to have adventures, engaged in mock- meaningful action."

So why do most people prefer to dedicate their leisure time to a vegetative entropic state?

"Most enjoyable activities are not natural; they demand an effort that initially one is reluctant to make. But once the interaction starts to provide feedback to the person’s skills, it usually begins to be intrinsically rewarding."

If you make that initial effort, the rest is easy. It's like jump-starting a car. You just need energy to start the car, but once you do, you can drive without trouble.

Work sucks...or does it?

As much as we like to complain about our jobs, for a lot of people, Flow happens more often during work hours than leisure hours.

The author interviewed an assembly line employee, who despite having a very repetitive job experiences Flow quite often.

"The task he has to perform on each unit that passes in front of his station should take forty-three seconds to perform—the same exact operation almost six hundred times in a working day. Most people would grow tired of such work very soon. But Rico has been at this job for over five years, and he still enjoys it. The reason is that he approaches his task in the same way an Olympic athlete approaches his event: How can I beat my record? Like the runner who trains for years to shave a few seconds off his best performance on the track, Rico has trained himself to better his time on the assembly line."

Any activity can achieve Flow states if we aim to improve it.

"For Pam Davis it is much easier to achieve this harmonious, effortless state when she works. As a young lawyer in a small partnership, she is fortunate to be involved in complex, challenging cases. She spends hours in the library, chasing down references and outlining possible courses of action for the senior partners of the firm to follow. Often her concentration is so intense that she forgets to have lunch, and by the time she realizes that she is hungry it is dark outside. While she is immersed in her job every piece of information fits: even when she is temporarily frustrated, she knows what causes the frustration, and she believes that eventually the obstacle can be overcome."

Examples of activities that lead to Flow

Physical activity: Running, rock climbing, martial arts, yoga, playing team sports, sex, dancing.
Senses: learning to appreciate beauty and aesthetics, appreciating and creating music (creating is more rewarding), enjoying food (people feel the most happy and relaxed at mealtimes).
Thought: reading, chess, scientific discovery, puzzles, memorization, philosophy, studying,
Work: work can be an absolute misery but it can also be thoroughly enjoyable.
Social relations: Maintaining good relationships and doing worthwhile activities with others can be a huge source of Flow.