A common time I experience a flow state is when I'm riding my motorcycle. I connect with Mihalyi's idea that a flow state is possible when an activity is not too hard, but not too easy either - when I first started riding motorcycles, I was mostly terrified, not exactly in a flow state. And if I'm stuck in traffic the experience is boring (unless I'm blasting music from my speaker). But the middle zone, when I'm riding, comfortable but not too comfortable, is when I achieve a higher level of focus.
There are many other experiences that can allow me to cultivate a state of flow. Reading, writing, listening to music. I can experience flow doing chores. Painting my nails. Being around people who I love, and making silly jokes.
What exactly prompts a state of flow is not entirely clear to me. Because not every experience that is within the right difficulty zone will induce a state of flow. Renewing my passport is not particularly easy, and it's far from the most difficult thing I've done - but in no stage of the process have I been in a flow state.
Many kinds of magical and spiritual practices emphasize states of mind that allow people to be fully or partially engaged with their subconsious - trance states, gnosis, meditation, and many more names. I propose that the key element of a flow state is not the difficulty being in the right level (although that is a prerequisite), but rather the relative engagement of the subconscious and the relative disengagement of the overseeing conscious. Is your conscious mind following your gut, or is it mystifying and clouding your understanding?
Although I've sometimes experienced flow states in the past with mathematics, when I'm deep in focus working on a challenging problem, I don't typically experience flow states with math these days. I suppose it is possible to get some or most students in a classroom to enter a flow state with math, but it seems extremely difficult, since most students are either bored or overly confused in a math class, and most students don't want to be in the classroom. I typically don't experience flow states in classrooms because they are places with very chaotic and disgusting energies. That's not really something I can change, but I could make math class a little ritualistic, being intentional about lighting, sound, and timing. Anyways, what's a math test if not a ritual?
You’ve surfaced a really compelling theme here: flow isn’t just about getting the challenge level “right.” Across all your examples, what actually seems to matter is whether the environment and your internal state make room for embodied focus — that moment when the conscious mind eases off and the intuitive, subconscious part takes the lead. I love how you contrast activities that naturally invite this (riding, joking with loved ones, painting your nails) with ones that shut it down completely (bureaucracy, chaotic classrooms). You’re naming flow as something deeply contextual, not mechanical.
ReplyDelete(P.s. I laughed at your passport task mention - appreciated!)
A question to carry forward:
If flow depends so much on the emotional and environmental tone, what small intentional choices might make a classroom feel more like the spaces where you do find flow — not to guarantee it, but to make it more possible?