38. People can be in a Flow State

Imagine you’re engrossed in some activity. It could be something physical like rock climbing or skiing, something artistic or creative like playing the piano or painting, or just an everyday activity like working on a PowerPoint presentation or teaching a class. Whatever the activity, you become totally engrossed, totally in the moment. Everything else falls away, your sense of time changes, and you almost forget who you are and where you are. What I’m describing is called a flow state.

The man who wrote the book on flow is Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. He’s been studying the flow state around the world for many years. Here are some facts about the flow state, the conditions that produce it, what it feels like, and ...

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