The Act of Flow

In the book Grit by Angela Duckworth, she talks about a state that people with grit describe as flow. Where everything seems to be going perfect without much effort. This can be seen in athletes, musicians, and even spelling bee champions (Angela studied spelling bee contestants). Many people who do repetitive tasks over and over again can get into a flow. For example you could work on an assembly line sorting widgets. Eventually it starts to flow and you don’t even have to think about the sorting. For me the flow comes in the form of writing. I seem to be able to put my thoughts in a logical order, or at least I hope they are, LOL! I even enjoy the act of typing. I get into typing so much that I type with pizzazz. I had to look up the spelling of pizzazz because I’m not a spelling bee champion. I will hit a key extra hard and then lift my hands from the keyboard as if I were playing the piano and having fun. Angela says that when we practice we have to practice with intention. Like we are not just going through the motions but really concentrating on what we do to improve. The practice is about quality. However, when you are in a flow you are enjoying your practice. The thing is you have to practice over and over again to be able to be good enough to get into the state of flow. You just can’t pick up a violin and start practicing and expect it to flow let alone enjoy it. Flow comes when you start to master things. So my advice to you is practice practice practice until you can reach a state of flow. Trust me the flow will feel great when you get there.