by Dale Shumaker
4spirit@gmail.com
The Rise of Superman by Steven Kotler is about how living in flow is the way to ultimate performance. It is a state where we feel our best and perform our best. Learning to stay in flow we are constantly at our best, living seamless, but moving at high speed in problem solving and performance. You get confident in your ability to do the impossible, you begin expecting it.
When flow is going right work is effortless, fluid and automatic, time flies.
Flow has these ten components:
Clear goals: expectations and rules are discernible and goals are attainable aligning with one’s skill set and abilities.
Concentration is at a high level.
A loss of feeling and being self-conscious: action and awareness merge.
Unaware of a sense of time.
Direct and immediate feedback: can see successes and failures readily and adjust to them quickly.
Ability and challenge meet: the activity is neither too easy or too hard.
A sense of personal control over the situation exists.
Action is intrinsically rewarding, so it is effortless.
A lack of awareness of body needs exist such as food, sleep.
Becoming totally absorbed in the activity itself.
The human being has two distinct systems for processing information… the explicit system and implicit system. The explicit is tied to conscious awareness, implicit is unconscious controlled by skills and abilities not consciously accessible. The implicit system is known for speed and efficiency. The implicit system says “let’s go for it and rely on me and we’ll make it.” Whereas the explicit systems says, hold up let’s take a look at this. Flow relies on the implicit system which increases creative decision-making, being imaginative, resourceful, ingenious, we just let the flow side flow.
Flow has a feel good nature and relies on the neurochemicals it produces. These include dopamine: creating a feeling of engagement, excitement, creativity, desire to investigate, making meaning out of the world. We are hardwired to exploration, to push the envelope.
Norepinephrine: it’s an energy primer keeping us locked on target, holding distractions at bay. As drugs, dopamine is like cocaine, norepinephrine is speed.
Endorphins: relieve pain and produces pleasure. It is about 100 times stronger than medical morphine.
Anandamide: keeps the flow state going at high levels. Elevates mood, eliminates fear.
Serotonin: helps us cope with adversity. It keeps us going so we can sort things out. These five chemicals are flow’s cocktail. It creates the second wind to keep performing ultimately. They are all functioning at peak levels, putting us in a fluid state of flow.
Everyone has the shot at perfection; there are no chosen few. Over-practice makes us move into a realm of flow. 10,000 hours of doing anything can bring a natural flow, effortlessly, efficiently, at high levels of performance. Deliberate well-structured practice is a vigorous compliance based approach to mastery. Doing what we love, doing what we see as important. (10,000 hrs. is 10 years of 3 hours a day. Start at 7 years old excel by 17 or start at 50 and excel by 60. A college student can achieve this in 5 years, with an 8 hr. per day focus, 5 days a week.) Never too young to start, or too old to still make it happen.
Hacking into flow is the quest. Flow is based highly on focus and consequences. Great challenges, both positive and negative, hack us into flow. One study found cubicle layout of furniture in an office breaks down flow. Open spaces are better. Risk can create fear, although it can be mentally structured as a challenge where flow increases. Clear goals are important. The most important part is the clear part. Clarity gives us certainty. We know what to do and where to focus.
The first step of flow is struggle, where we may be overloading the brain with information. We work through various parts of the problem. The next stage is release, taking the mind off the problem. That is do something totally different for a while. The next part of the flow cycle is the zone. Where we just let the brain take over to do all the things we stuffed in it to do. The final step is recovery. Where we spent our energy and now come back from the superman state, and just feel ordinary. The intensity of the project is over, so take it slow for a while to recover.
Creativity triggers flow, then flow enhances creativity. Learning the impossible helps us see ourselves doing the impossible. Seeing is believing, so visualization of the end as desired is important so our brains can put us into a flow to get there. Since learning is the first part of the struggle process, visualization hacks into flow and shortens the struggle. Work the brain to overload it with knowledge, then walk away from it and let the brain bring it back in ways you can use it.
To learn more on figuring out your flow profile, check out
Elijah was in flow in the Spirit on earth. He was so much in flow in the Spirit that he was one of the few taken to Heaven without dying… in chariots of fire.
There is an expression to be baptized by fire of the Spirit. That is the source of Spiritual flow. Elijah prayed and fire came down from heaven and started a bonfire soaked with water, fire from Heaven destroyed false prophets, he prayed and it rained in a drought, he ran faster than chariots and beat them back to the city. He was in a flow in Spirit constantly.
To be in flow requires a discipline of being at a positive spot for you (a room, outside, a thinking/pondering place). To be in Spirit for me starts the same way. I find when I follow this pattern I get thoughts, ideas, things that exhilarate me. If I go to a place where I can see outside or be outside, read the Scriptures and ponder, it seems after a while something takes over in my brain, my soul. I ask God about these things that come to mind and what I should do about them. I get a wisdom in what to do as I am ponder them. It lasts for maybe an hour to an hour and half. It takes maybe 30 minutes to get there, to get my mind focused on Things of Spirit. When I do that, other things come. I have had articles, a presentation roll out in my mind, strategies on how to do things, or wisdom on the best way to do something. When I think of people in a positive way, things change in regards to them. I try to remain in that state. And the next couple hours it feels like my life is in more of a flow.
When this Spiritual flow begins to wane, with the disruptions, frustrations of life, I try to find a place to go back into that state. I have not mastered this, but a plane to build on is emerging. Finding a quiet, tranquil spot, reflecting on the Scriptures, or inspired book, positive hope-filled music(for me I like Praise and Worship type music) and let the Spirit take over. What comes to mind then I will note, so I don’t forget it. And take action on it.
There is a flow in Spirit where we see things happening beyond our own efforts.
....
No comments:
Post a Comment