Establishing Flow

Flow, according to Mihaly Csikszentmihaly, is the moment “a person’s body or mind is stretched to the limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile,” from his book, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience.

I'm intrigued, courtesy of Daniel Pink, whose book Drive introduced me to the concept of flow.

Although it may be a little late in the game for me to establish flow as a journeyman actor in the Royal Shakespeare Company, I am right on time for establishing flow as a journeyman (journeywoman? journeyperson?) homeschool mama. I may already be in flow, as I constantly feel stretched to the limits and I'm certainly not getting paid. But I digress.

I think this idea has taken such hold because, even though I believe (deeply) in what I'm doing, even though I see the big picture, the light at the end of the tunnel, my front row seat at DD's Nobel Peace Prize acceptance ceremony, the day-to-day mundane tasks have started to seep too much of the joy out of my existence. I might just have a bad case of the plain old winter blues, or SAD if I'm feeling fancy like Nancy. So the idea of flow, of continued peak performance pushing me toward a worthy goal, is invigorating. And elusive. But worthy. Very worthy.