Flow: Being Happy and Being in Control

‘Given that we are who we are, with whatever hang-ups and repressions, what can we do to improve our future?’
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, 2002

It may seem a contradiction to say we need to be in control in order to experience happiness or ‘flow’. However, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Professor of Psychology and Management and Director of the Quality of Life Research Center in the Drucker School at Claremont Graduate University, asserts that an individual experiences happiness when she or he takes control over her or his thoughts and feelings, and therefore orders their ‘consciousness’. Csikszentmihalyi acknowledges that control takes ‘determination and discipline’ but maintains that ‘being in control of the mind means that literally anything that happens can become a source of joy’ (2002, p 213).

The model of ‘flow’

1. The individual sets clear goals. Developing the goals means dedication, and actions are reliable and controlled.
2. The individual becomes immersed in the activity. Attention is invested in the task. Concentration matches actions with the opportunities of the actions – a balance of challenge and achievement.
3. The individual pays attention to what happens. There is the ability to sustain involvement because ‘psychic energy’ is invested and self-consciousness is reduced.
4. The individual learns to enjoy the immediate experience. The control of the mind enables an individual to enjoy life even when circumstances are difficult – a sense of ‘inner harmony’.

Research on flow

In his celebrated text, Flow: The Classic Work on How to Achieve Happiness, Csikszentmihalyi reported on his extensive research into happiness or ‘optimal experience’. Exercises were conducted with thousands of people with differing skills who lived in different countries. They were asked to record descriptions of what activities or tasks they enjoyed. In a range of contexts, they described similar states of enjoyment - among them, playing chess, climbing mountains, undertaking workplace tasks, reading books and writing creatively. The descriptions of ‘flow’ were similar for young and old, women and men, people from different socio-economic backgrounds, and individuals from Italian, Japanese and American contexts. Unequivocally, the subjects described an experience of taking control over their thought processes and their consciousness in which they felt ‘a sense of mastery … in determining the content of life…’ (Csikszentmihalyi, p 4). Interestingly, the experience of flow is not related to either external reward or punishment but ... located within an individual’s internal processes of thinking and feeling.

Characteristics of flow

The concept of flow - of people being so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter - is similar to happiness as described by Seligman. The seven characteristics that accompany the experience of flow are outlined below. For an individual to experience flow, she or he has to have:
1. complete concentrated involvement in the task
2. a sense of ecstasy - of being outside everyday reality
3. great inner clarity - knowledge of what needs to be done, and how well she or he is doing it
4. knowledge that the activity is doable - that her/his skills are adequate to the task
5. a sense of serenity - no self-consciousness and a feeling of growing beyond the boundaries of the ego
6. a feeling of timelessness - of being so thoroughly focused on the present that hours seem to pass by in minutes
7. intrinsic motivation - where whatever produces the experience of flow becomes its own reward.

The ‘how to’ of flow

The idea of flow is about exercising control over circumstances that produce a positive experience - that is, a sense of happiness or wellbeing. Csikszentmihalyi explains that even a simple act can produce flow. In the flow model, the activity becomes an end in itself because an individual concentrates psychic energy which is invested in the enjoyable experience. The capacity for happiness is available to us all, and there are practices that will assist us to develop this facility.

Csikszentmihalyi has successfully researched the experience of happiness. He has proved that it is a measurable state, and that it is possible for us to increase our level of wellbeing. However, we need to notice those practices that determine the degree or level of happiness we feel if we endeavour to take ‘control over the quality of experience’ (p 22). We can take steps in our daily lives to ensure that we maintain a level of wellbeing and positive emotion through the practice of setting goals for, and developing consciousness of, our actions, thoughts and feelings. We can develop awareness of our desires and work with purpose to achieve them through making our feelings, thoughts and actions congruent. This practice produces a state of ‘inner harmony’, ‘flow’ or happiness.

Flow in work and leisure

In an earlier text about flow, Csikszentmihalyi referred to the danger of splitting life into a binary positioning of work versus leisure time and seeing each of them as discrete activities that could be meaningless. The case for work being meaningless might be put because it is seen to be ‘unfree’ and leisure can be seen as meaningless because it has ‘no purpose’. Understanding the experience of flow can provide awareness that our working lives and leisure time do not have to be divisible because in flow, work … becomes as enjoyable as leisure … Free time at least will be a real opportunity for flow – for exploring the potential of the self and the environment’ (Csikszentmihalyi, 1997, p 77). In our working lives, we could reflect on what we might want to develop in ourselves that will ‘order our consciousness’ so that we might experience flow which we could also take into our leisure activities.

Comment

One of the key messages of the Staff Matters model is that teachers can take responsibility for their own mental health and wellbeing in the workplace. One approach to achieving positive mental health and wellbeing is to focus on developing congruence between feelings, thoughts and actions. When we take control over our circumstances, we can have ‘optimal experience’. We can recognise and build on our individual strengths in our work as teachers. We can plan for ‘flow’ and develop our capacity to explore our potential in the context of our environment at work and at leisure.

References

Caplan, J. (2007), ‘Getting Serious about Happiness’, Time Magazine: Health and Science, 3 April. Viewed on 28 April 2009 at: http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1606395,00.html

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1997), Finding the Flow: The Psychology of Engagement with Everyday Life, Basic Books, Perseus, New York.

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2002), Flow: The Classic Work on How to Achieve Happiness, Rider Books, London.

Csikszentmihalyi, M., Talk on Creativity Fulfilment and Flow, an 18.5 minute video.

Viewed on 28 April 2009 at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=GB&hl=en-GB&v=fXIeFJCqsPs