Have you read “Flow” from Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi? Well, I just recently found out about it and even more recently, read it. In very brief terms, Flow is the state you are in when you are ” in an activity, fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity” (wikipedia).
For instance, I like to draw, and often try to draw difficult perspectives. Most of times I dont really end up satisfied, but in the process, it is quite common that i lose some track of time and have total focus on the task and each time I get better. You could argue that for a moment, I was in Flow. Does it make sense?
A cool aspect of Flow is that it tends to lead to growth. You reach Flow and it is likely that you learn something (not always a craft, mind you). This growth happens in two ways that must co-exist: Differentiation and Integration. By learning something new, you differentiate yourself from you previous self and from others around you. And when you integrate this knowledge, when you give it some order, it becomes part of you and sets the now larger limits of your existence. I´m really not into esoteric stuff and if this post is sounding like anything of the sort, well…Cskiszentmihalyi wrote a nice book about the topic that should set the record straight. Flow is about psychology. Not the dark arts.
Why am I talking about this?
Because “growth”, in the context of Flow, reminds me of the Design profession and how it keeps on expanding its skillset and integrating imported methods into its broader definition.
