Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience

by Mihály Csíkszentmihályi

It often requires strenuous physical exertion, or highly disciplined mental activity.

“Why am I doing this? Should I perhaps be doing something else?”

in flow there is no need to reflect, because the action carries us forward as if by magic.

if one chooses a trivial goal, success in it does not provide enjoyment.

If I set as my goal to remain alive while sitting on the living-room sofa, I also could spend days knowing that I was achieving it, just as the rock climber does. But this realization would not make me particularly happy, whereas the climber’s knowledge brings exhilaration to his dangerous ascent.

unless a person learns to set goals and to recognize and gauge feedback in such activities, she will not enjoy them.

What makes this information valuable is the symbolic message it contains: that I have succeeded in my goal. Such knowledge creates order in consciousness, and strengthens the structure of the self.

In normal everyday existence, we are the prey of thoughts and worries intruding unwanted in consciousness.

Once we were at sea there was no point in worrying, there was nothing we could do about our problems till we reached the next port….

It is not possible to experience a feeling of control unless one is willing to give up the safety of protective routines. Only when a doubtful outcome is at stake, and one is able to influence that outcome, can a person really know whether she is in control.

In flow a person is challenged to do her best, and must constantly improve her skills.

“Two things happen. One is that it seems to pass really fast in one sense. After it’s passed, it seems to have passed really fast.

The key element of an optimal experience is that it is an end in itself. Even if initially undertaken for other reasons, the activity that consumes us becomes intrinsically rewarding.

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.

when the experience is autotelic, the person is paying attention to the activity for its own sake; when it is not, the attention is focused on its consequences.

Most enjoyable activities are not natural; they demand an effort that initially one is reluctant to make.

So much of what we ordinarily do has no value in itself, and we do it only because we have to do it, or because we expect some future benefit from it.

Many people feel that the time they spend at work is essentially wasted—they are alienated from it, and the psychic energy invested in the job does nothing to strengthen their self.

Leisure provides a relaxing respite from work, but it generally consists of passively absorbing information, without using any skills or ...

When experience is intrinsically rewarding life is justified in the present, instead of being held hostage to a hypothetical future gain.

We should reconcile ourselves to the fact that nothing in the world is entirely positive; every power can be misused.

The goals to which it is applied can make life either richer or more painful.

we must constantly reevaluate what we do, lest habits and past wisdom blind us to new possibilities.

Why is playing a game enjoyable, while the things we have to do every day—like working or sitting at home—are often so boring?

If extrinsic goals—such as beating the opponent, wanting to impress an audience, or obtaining a big professional contract—are what one is concerned about, then competition is likely to become a distraction, rather than an incentive to focus consciousness on what is happening.

One cannot enjoy doing the same thing at the same level for long. We grow either bored or frustrated;

it is probably true that no social system has ever survived long unless its people had some hope that their government would help them achieve happiness.

Without challenge, life had no meaning.

surveys agree that citizens of nations that are more affluent, better educated, and ruled by more stable governments report higher levels of happiness and satisfaction with life.

Opportunities alone, however, are not enough. We also need the skills to make use of them.

Surrounded by an astounding panoply of recreational gadgets and leisure choices, most of us go on being bored and vaguely frustrated.

At the individual level anomie corresponds to anxiety, while alienation corresponds to boredom.

There is ample evidence to suggest that how parents interact with a child will have a lasting effect on the kind of person that child grows up to be.

The traits that mark an autotelic personality are most clearly revealed by people who seem to enjoy situations that ordinary persons would find unbearable.

With enough psychic energy free to observe and analyze their surroundings objectively, they have a better chance of discovering in them new opportunities for action. If we were to consider one trait a key element of the autotelic personality, this might be

If the functions of the body are left to atrophy, the quality of life becomes merely adequate, and for some even dismal. But if one takes control of what the body can do, and learns to impose order on physical sensations, entropy yields to a sense of enjoyable harmony in consciousness.

Without the relevant thoughts, motives, and feelings it would be impossible to achieve the discipline necessary to learn to swim well enough to enjoy it.

because enjoyment takes place in the mind of the swimmer, flow cannot be a purely physical process: muscles and brain must be equally involved.

The essential steps in this process are: (a) to set an overall goal, and as many subgoals as are realistically feasible; (b) to find ways of measuring progress in terms of the goals chosen; (c) to keep concentrating on what one is doing, and to keep making finer and finer distinctions in the challenges involved in the activity; (d) to develop the skills necessary to interact with the opportunities available; and (e) to keep raising the stakes if the activity becomes boring.

However, enjoyment, as we have seen, does not depend on what you do, but rather on how you do it.

Are people happier when they use more material resources in their leisure activities? Or are they happier when they invest more of themselves?

But it is never a waste to write for intrinsic reasons. First of all, writing gives the mind a disciplined means of expression. It allows one to record events and experiences so that they can be easily recalled, and relived in the future. It is a way to analyze and understand experiences, a self-communication that brings order to them.

But when writing is used to control experience, without letting it control the mind, it is a tool of infinite subtlety and rich rewards.

As long as we didn’t care how much we ate, whether or not we lived in solid and well-decorated homes, or whether we could afford the latest fruits of technology, the necessity of working would rest lightly on our shoulders, as

we need increasingly high inputs of labor, mental and physical, as well as inputs of natural resources, to satisfy escalating expectations.

the great majority of people who lived at the periphery of “civilized” societies had to give up any hope of enjoying life in order to make the dreams of the few who had found a way of exploiting them come true.

He had been working at this plant for over thirty years, but never wanted to become a foreman. He declined several promotions, claiming that he liked being a simple welder, and felt uncomfortable being anyone’s boss.

Yu was the proper way to live—without concern for external rewards, spontaneously, with total commitment—in short, as a total autotelic experience.

The more a job inherently resembles a game—with variety, appropriate and flexible challenges, clear goals, and immediate feedback—the more enjoyable it will be regardless of the worker’s level of development.

When we feel that we are investing attention in a task against our will, it is as if our psychic energy is being wasted.