From Omar's notebook.
This post summarizes my takeaways from the book Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. This is the guy who originally coined the term "Flow" that we use for being "in the zone" in creative/deep work. But to him, it wasn't just a nice state you could be in every now and then, it was a whole way of life, something you could be experiencing all the time.
This book has helped me a lot in living a more happy & fulfilling life. Or at least understand why I feel unfulfilled by certain things and what I should pursue. I'd say peace of mind is another big thing I've gotten from it.
I hope you'll find my takeaways here useful. I'd love for more people in my life to read this so we can talk about it!
Contrary to what we usually believe, moments like these, the best moments in our lives, are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times [. . .] The best moments usually occur when a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile.
This is what resonates most with me in this book. I strongly believe this is true. It's always been true throughout my life, and yet I've struggled for a long time to find others who relate.
Growing up, I remember feeling like there was something wrong with me for finding summer vacation so boring, and excitedly looking forward to the school year. Or for not enjoying idle vacations as much as I enjoyed working on my creative projects & learning new things.
This book is here telling me: there's nothing wrong with you. I'm perfectly normal in fact! Everybody feels much better pushing themselves & growing, compared to idle leisure time. It's a human thing.
I've often felt like I was going crazy, having this same conversation over and over about dreading Monday & looking forward to the weekend. If we really had a few weeks or months off from work, would we actually enjoy it? I know I wouldn't unless I had my own things I was working towards. It was validating again reading that they've identified this paradox in their research:
Thus we have the paradoxical situation: On the job people feel skillful and challenged, and therefore feel more happy, strong, creative, and satisfied. In their free time people feel that there is generally not much to do and their skills are not being used, and therefore they tend to feel more sad, weak, dull, and dissatisfied. Yet they would like to work less and spend more time in leisure.
A lot of our dayjobs aren't enjoyable because we often have to do things we don't want to do, or that aren't meaningful to us. To me this book is very different from hustle culture because it's NOT about working hard & suffering so that you deserve success and great things. It's kind of the opposite. It's saying: we don't work so that we can get that out of the way and then enjoy life — the work itself is the point. It is what's fulfilling and it is when we feel most alive.
This is really important to me on a practical day-to-day level because it's changed what I decide to do after a long day of stressful, involuntary work. How do you relax? Watching TV and turning my brain off often leaves me still feeling exhausted.
I used to think that if I was so exhausted I shouldn't even try working on creative projects or anything. I need to rest until I feel better. But it's the other way around. A lot of times I've found the only way to find the energy is to actually do the work, and then I feel amazing. Doing the work gives you a lot of energy & excitement, and that in turns makes it easier to keep doing fun enjoyable work. It's a beautiful cycle.
It's really anything. Doing the dishes even.
Enjoyment is characterized by this forward movement: by a sense of novelty, of accomplishment. Playing a close game of tennis that stretches one’s ability is enjoyable, as is reading a book that reveals things in a new light, as is having a conversation that leads us to express ideas we didn’t know we had. Closing a contested business deal, or any piece of work well done, is enjoyable.
on "pleasure" vs "enjoyment".
Best advice that's helped me.
The book claims you can develop this ability to enjoy most situations in life, even when bad/stressful things happen:
The “autotelic self” is one that easily translates potential threats into enjoyable challenges, and therefore maintains its inner harmony. A person who is never bored, seldom anxious, involved with what goes on, and in flow most of the time may be said to have an autotelic self.
Sounds awesome! How do you actually do it? He talks about 3 steps that seem to help with this:
Unselfconscious self-assurance is about having an implicit trust in your ability to cope with whatever life situation you find yourself in. There are 2 parts to this. (1) For me, the "self-assurance" part helps me react to a new problem with "what am I going to do about this?" as opposed to reacting with paralyzing doubt like "why is this happening to me/everything keeps breaking today/this is awful" etc. I must work on developing this strong internal belief that I am reliable, that I have coped with hard things in the past, and that I will cope with things in the future. I must feel secure in this.
The (2) "unselfconscious" part is important because it's what separates this from arrogance. It's not about having a big ego or thinking about how clever or capable you are. The confidence in yourself must be "implicit" in that you trust your abilities, you feel secure in them, but you're not always thinking about it. Your attention is free to focus on the problem in front of you and what your available options are.
Basically, to arrive at this level of self-assurance one must trust oneself, one’s environment, and one’s place in it
Focusing attention on the world is about...you're more likely to be stressed focusing on your desires and how the environment is conflicting with that. If your car is broken, and you're too busy thinking about how important it is to get to work on time or hostile thoughts towards your car, you might not notice what the car is trying to tell you, the battery is dead or engine is flooded.
People who know how to transform stress into enjoyable challenge spend very little time thinking about themselves.
The discovery of new solutions is about how remaining open to the environment and forgetting the self makes you more open to alternative ideas, adapting to the environment.
Finally making games again, making my snow game, in Godot. Let go of a lot of "but it won't be as good". Building it up, step by step.
The anxiety of so many things to do and what to prioritize. Doesn't matter, just pick one.
Really accepting that it's worth doing things just for the sake of them. That the experience is worth it. And if nothing else, I am growing by doing it. But there is that paradox, forget about self to let the self grow.
Remind yourself, this is how you achieve happiness. Pick something out there, or someone:
Pay more attention to things. There's something to enjoy in everything, art, music. Go beyond the obvious. It gives you more to enjoy, doesn't destroy the beauty. Maybe there is somethign to all these film buffs. Auteur cinema. If I don't enjoy, why not?