A compass is different from a map. A compass provides an orientation. Flow can be a compass for you as you find your way in life.
Flow is a term popularized by Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi. For decades, Csikszentmihalyi has researched happiness and engagement. Asking people about their happiest moments, he frequently heard them use the term, "I was just in the flow." It is when we are fully engaged in life - whether it is in conversation or rock climbing, surgery or problem-solving - that we feel the happiest. A couple of the characteristics of flow are losing track of time and becoming unselfconscious.
One other characteristic of flow is a balance between challenge and skill. If your skill is great but the task you're doing is not particularly challenging, you feel bored or, at best, in control. If your skill is poor but the task you are doing is challenging, you feel stressed or anxious. But when your challenge and your skill level are both high, you experience flow. Your skill is sufficient for the task, but it requires your full engagement to do it.
In this way, flow can work like a compass. When you begin to feel too much in control or bored, you need a new challenge. When you begin to feel anxious or stressed, you need a new skill, or need to develop your skill more fully. The absence of flow can point you in the direction you should be going. I would argue that if one subordinates career development to long-term attainment of flow, one's career will ultimately do well. Finding flow means following a path of development.
If you accept a job that soon bores you, you'll probably find yourself facing one of two things. You may find your wages stagnating or you may find your employer eventually unable to afford you. If you don't develop skills needed to overcome stress in a job, you'll probably soon find yourself fired or demoted.
There is a temptation to stay in a job that lets you feel in control. This is particularly tempting for people who already feel overwhelmed by life and don't particularly want a big challenge at work. Women in poor relationships or burdened with extra work at home may well opt for jobs that let them feel in control rather than jobs that require their full engagement, for instance.
It is often easier to find flow than to find a "direction." Flow can be a compass for people willing to struggle to stay engaged in life and work. Insisting on the experience of flow does not just mean that you'll experience more happiness and satisfaction in life. It means that you'll be compelled to develop your potential.
Showing posts with label work. Show all posts
Showing posts with label work. Show all posts
Saturday, March 10, 2007
Thursday, January 25, 2007
The Alignment of Head, Heart & Gut
I’ve had four aha moments in my life – four events that brought an alignment of head, heart, and gut. I’ve used those rare moments to guide my life since.
Some conclusions I’ve reached with my head. They make sense even if my heart is not in them. “Don’t treat yourself with so many baked goods” is an example of a conclusion that my head has reached but my heart is not in. To this day I eat too many scones and muffins.
Other conclusions I’ve made with my gut. “Don’t trust that person.” I don’t have a real reason for it – it’s just a gut feeling. Sometimes these gut feelings prove right and other times they don’t. Sometimes my gut feelings seem like intuition and other times they seem to me like they were just superstition.
And some conclusions have been emotional, arrived at by the heart. “I can totally see myself getting rich by signing up 3 new clients each week!” Or, “I am going to get fit by running 5 miles each day!” And as with the decisions made by the head or gut, the decisions made by a heart alone have a mixed track record.
What I’ve found is that there are few times in life when the head, heart, and gut all align, like planets in an astrologer’s forecast. When reason, emotion, and instinct all converge on a decision, it’s a conclusion that I trust with my life. And I have.
The first three moments were both personal and, I’m embarrassed to say it, probably fairly generic. These were moments when reason, emotion, and instinct conspired to tell me that this was a direction to move in my life. My religion, my wife, and my children all hit me with this force. The fourth moment of brilliant clarity, of conviction, has to do with my work, my calling.
About 15 years ago, I saw a pattern that I’ve worked to research, develop, articulate, and translate into action ever since. I am 46 now and I suspect that I’ll merely be getting it started when I stop working at the age of 96. My head tells me that this next great transformation is going to occur and that the pattern of past revolutions predicts the future. My gut tells me that social change is overdue and imminent. My heart tells me that this offers the most exciting opportunity ever afforded a generation and to be an advocate and guide to this transformation promises more excitement than one person has the right to expect. A similar alignment can occur in romance.
When a romantic impulse or insight excites your head, heart, and gut, you have as clear a signal as the universe provides. Honestly do this check for a romantic partner. Does your head, coldly analyzing the facts and situation, feel that this person makes sense as a partner? Do you see reasons why you two wouldn’t be compatible? Does your heart fill with excitement, with emotion, when you are with this person or thinking about him / her? Finally, does your gut send any warning signals or do you feel a great deal of ineffable comfort and sense of belonging with this person? And for a romantic interest you should probably include a fourth organ as well when talking about the alignment of head, heart, and gut.
For a great deal of life, it is enough to have the vote of head, heart, or gut. You don’t need alignment of all three to go try a new restaurant or pick a vacation spot or even move a task up on your to do list. But for the truly defining choices in life, you should patiently wait for just this kind of alignment.
For me, these rare moments of clarity have been enough. If I stay true to them on the dark and confusing days, I can still find my way.
Some conclusions I’ve reached with my head. They make sense even if my heart is not in them. “Don’t treat yourself with so many baked goods” is an example of a conclusion that my head has reached but my heart is not in. To this day I eat too many scones and muffins.
Other conclusions I’ve made with my gut. “Don’t trust that person.” I don’t have a real reason for it – it’s just a gut feeling. Sometimes these gut feelings prove right and other times they don’t. Sometimes my gut feelings seem like intuition and other times they seem to me like they were just superstition.
And some conclusions have been emotional, arrived at by the heart. “I can totally see myself getting rich by signing up 3 new clients each week!” Or, “I am going to get fit by running 5 miles each day!” And as with the decisions made by the head or gut, the decisions made by a heart alone have a mixed track record.
What I’ve found is that there are few times in life when the head, heart, and gut all align, like planets in an astrologer’s forecast. When reason, emotion, and instinct all converge on a decision, it’s a conclusion that I trust with my life. And I have.
The first three moments were both personal and, I’m embarrassed to say it, probably fairly generic. These were moments when reason, emotion, and instinct conspired to tell me that this was a direction to move in my life. My religion, my wife, and my children all hit me with this force. The fourth moment of brilliant clarity, of conviction, has to do with my work, my calling.
About 15 years ago, I saw a pattern that I’ve worked to research, develop, articulate, and translate into action ever since. I am 46 now and I suspect that I’ll merely be getting it started when I stop working at the age of 96. My head tells me that this next great transformation is going to occur and that the pattern of past revolutions predicts the future. My gut tells me that social change is overdue and imminent. My heart tells me that this offers the most exciting opportunity ever afforded a generation and to be an advocate and guide to this transformation promises more excitement than one person has the right to expect. A similar alignment can occur in romance.
When a romantic impulse or insight excites your head, heart, and gut, you have as clear a signal as the universe provides. Honestly do this check for a romantic partner. Does your head, coldly analyzing the facts and situation, feel that this person makes sense as a partner? Do you see reasons why you two wouldn’t be compatible? Does your heart fill with excitement, with emotion, when you are with this person or thinking about him / her? Finally, does your gut send any warning signals or do you feel a great deal of ineffable comfort and sense of belonging with this person? And for a romantic interest you should probably include a fourth organ as well when talking about the alignment of head, heart, and gut.
For a great deal of life, it is enough to have the vote of head, heart, or gut. You don’t need alignment of all three to go try a new restaurant or pick a vacation spot or even move a task up on your to do list. But for the truly defining choices in life, you should patiently wait for just this kind of alignment.
For me, these rare moments of clarity have been enough. If I stay true to them on the dark and confusing days, I can still find my way.
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