Latest / Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor / Boost Productivity and Focus with Flow State Methods with Dr. Sue Jackson

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Boost Productivity and Focus with Flow State Methods with Dr. Sue Jackson · Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: We all have the ability to access flow. It's not
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: an easy state to be able to access. It's quite
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: difficult to access flow. However, it is accessible and that
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: we can get better at it through training our psychological skills.
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: Doctor Sue Jackson, welcome to the podcast.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: Thank you very much Paul for having me on your show.
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  Speaker 2: It is an absolute pleasure, and it's a real pleasure
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  Speaker 2: to actually talk about what we're going to talk about,
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  Speaker 2: which is all about flow state. But you refer to
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  Speaker 2: yourself as a performance psychologist, which I love because it
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  Speaker 2: crosses across different domains. Is kind of focused not on problems,
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  Speaker 2: but on about being really good or going from good
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  Speaker 2: to great. So just give our listeners a little bit
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  Speaker 2: of a high level tour of your experience, professional experience, academic.
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: So I call you, I put you firmly in the
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  Speaker 2: bracket of procademic p academic.
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  Speaker 1: Oh that's a nice term too. I hope that one
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  Speaker 1: takes some traction, or maybe it already has.
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  Speaker 2: I meete it up, and I call myself a practice
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  Speaker 2: somebody who takes all the academic research and then practically
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  Speaker 2: applies it to people to help them breath their lives. Right.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, Well, I mean, that's quite close to what
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  Speaker 1: I do, Paul. So, I began life as an academic
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: and worked in universities in Australia after returning from North America,
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  Speaker 1: where I did my master's and PhD in sports psychology
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  Speaker 1: at that time. And a lot of what we now
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  Speaker 1: call performance psychology is drawn from sports psychology, and obviously
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  Speaker 1: because sports psychology is about helping high performers be able
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  Speaker 1: to go to the next level, be the best they
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  Speaker 1: can be, and so it's that application to anyone who's
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  Speaker 1: seeking to be the best they can be, no matter
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  Speaker 1: who that is or what the context is. And so
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  Speaker 1: I transitioned out of an academic role to a practitioner
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  Speaker 1: role in performance psychology in two thousand and seven, and
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  Speaker 1: that's the space that I've been working in. And also
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  Speaker 1: I'm an author. I like to write, and I guess
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  Speaker 1: that's kind of what drew me into the academic world.
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  Speaker 1: Really was enjoying writing, enjoying that analytical process of research,
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  Speaker 1: but primarily like being able to make a difference. So
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  Speaker 1: that's why I am now practicing as a what do
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  Speaker 1: you call it, a p academic.
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  Speaker 2: Pracademic academic performance psychologist. Let's talk about flow stit. So
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  Speaker 2: you've written, you've written a book, an Amazon bestseller, no less,
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  Speaker 2: well done. I tip my hat to you all about
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  Speaker 2: experiencing flow. So let's just start from the start. A
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  Speaker 2: lot of people will have heard of flow, but I
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  Speaker 2: see it misused a lot around the internet. And I
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  Speaker 2: see people consultants talking about being in a permanent state
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  Speaker 2: of flow.
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  Speaker 1: Oh okay, well, good luck to them. I don't know
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  Speaker 1: what they're on.
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  Speaker 2: That's exactly what I was thinking. So, so you worked
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  Speaker 2: with the great man himself. And I'll give a terrible pronunciation,
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: mehs met me high? Who can you correct me on that?
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: The me high was great? And me high translates to Mike.
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  Speaker 1: So he's known by what was known by Mike. He
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  Speaker 1: passed in twenty twenty one at the good age of
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  Speaker 1: eighty seven. And so Mike Chick sent me high. So
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  Speaker 1: the last name is Chick sent me high.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, cool. So talk to us. So you had the
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  Speaker 2: pleasure of working with him for a bit of time,
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  Speaker 2: Can you give us a really good definition of what
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  Speaker 2: flow stee it is?
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  Speaker 3: Oh?
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  Speaker 1: I hope so. And I think that, as you said,
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  Speaker 1: many people are familiar with flow, but I also grew
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  Speaker 1: that there's probably different definitions or ideas about it bouncing around.
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  Speaker 1: And so one of the reasons for writing my recently
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  Speaker 1: released book Experiencing Flow is to try to help people
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  Speaker 1: to understand what flow is. So basically, flow is a
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  Speaker 1: set when you're totally focused on the task at hand.
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  Speaker 1: So that's the most simple experience of it. And it
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  Speaker 1: occurs when you're in a challenging situation and you have
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  Speaker 1: the skills and you trust those skills to be able
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  Speaker 1: to meet the challenge. So you basically take yourself out
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  Speaker 1: of your comfort zone, which I'm sure you'd be happy
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  Speaker 1: to hear me call that word. And so, yeah, we
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  Speaker 1: take ourselves out of our comfort zone by stretching boundaries,
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  Speaker 1: maybe stretching the challenge a little bit higher than what
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  Speaker 1: we might be entirely comfortable with. And that combined with
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  Speaker 1: skills to match that challenge, that is kind of like
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  Speaker 1: the first and main precondition to be able to experience
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  Speaker 1: this state when you get totally engaged in what you're doing.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, and this is where I see it bastardized because
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  Speaker 2: people on the internet talk about being inflousde it all
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  Speaker 2: day long and being influsty when you're relaxed. But challenge
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  Speaker 2: is critical to it, isn't it?
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  Speaker 1: Absolutely? Challenge is critical, and that's always been a component
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  Speaker 1: of Mike. I'm going to use the word Mike to
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  Speaker 1: refer to Mike Chicks and Me High because that's a
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  Speaker 1: lot more accessible for people. And Mike always was referring
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  Speaker 1: to a level of challenge being present. As to what
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  Speaker 1: that level of challenge is, you know, we're talking about
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  Speaker 1: a subjective experience, So basically it does come down to
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  Speaker 1: one's perceptions. So the same person or two people can
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  Speaker 1: perceive the same objective challenge quite differently, right, And so
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  Speaker 1: it really comes down to how you perceive the challenge
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  Speaker 1: and then also how you perceive your skills, your capabilities.
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  Speaker 1: Have you got what it takes to meet that challenge?
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  Speaker 1: So you need to get that balance, right, Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: And I think this plays into the whole idea of
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  Speaker 2: challenge or threat, which I talk a lot about in
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  Speaker 2: terms of I'm not sure if you're familiar with the
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  Speaker 2: hardiness literature a little bit, yeah, yeah, And so this
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  Speaker 2: idea that there can be a potentially stressful slash challenging situation.
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  Speaker 2: One person may view it as a challenge and the
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  Speaker 2: other person may view it as a threat. We know
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  Speaker 2: if that person views it as a threat, it has
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  Speaker 2: a different impact on the cardiovascular system and negative impact
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  Speaker 2: and it activates cortisol, whereas if they view it as
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  Speaker 2: a challenge, it actually has a positive impact on the
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  Speaker 2: cardiovascular system and activiates the fight or flight response, the
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  Speaker 2: more adaptive part. But I think what a lot of
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  Speaker 2: people don't get about the challengeing threat. You know, it's
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  Speaker 2: just like, oh, it's going to be a mindset, just
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  Speaker 2: have a positive mindset, this is Is this a challenge?
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  Speaker 2: In order to you to really view as a challenge,
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  Speaker 2: you have to be confident that you have the skills
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  Speaker 2: to meet it, right, absolutely, So that's kind of flow there, really,
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  Speaker 2: isn't it. I mean, are those elements come into it?
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  Speaker 2: Are there any any other elements about being any flow step?
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  Speaker 2: And then on the back of that, can it be
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  Speaker 2: both physical and mental, emotional, psych sach psychological or are
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  Speaker 2: there any particular constraints around it?
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  Speaker 1: Okay, So just to take one step back when you're
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  Speaker 1: talking about challenge or threat, if anybody has seen the
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  Speaker 1: model of subjective experience that is used to illustrate flow
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  Speaker 1: and where flow is positioned in terms of subjective experience.
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  Speaker 1: And that model is in my book and it's also
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  Speaker 1: available in other sources. But basically, if you think of
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  Speaker 1: a pigraph, and there's like eight channels in this paragraph,
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  Speaker 1: so you've got challenges on one access and skills on
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  Speaker 1: the other access. So flow is that channel where both
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  Speaker 1: your challenges and your skills are being extended. And then
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  Speaker 1: if you were to go to the left of that
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  Speaker 1: and you get to a state of arousal and then
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  Speaker 1: from there to a state of anxiety. So you know,
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  Speaker 1: it's very similar in terms of what you're calling threat.
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  Speaker 1: It's very close. It's fine tune right like so like
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  Speaker 1: it would be a challenge one moment and then the
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  Speaker 1: next moment is a threat. And it does come down
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  Speaker 1: very much to our perceptions but also to our psychological
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  Speaker 1: skills and how well we're able to sort of notice
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  Speaker 1: where our focus is and bring it back if it's
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  Speaker 1: not in the right place.
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  Speaker 2: So I'm really becoming more and more interested in attention
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  Speaker 2: and an attentional control was involved in a debthly study
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  Speaker 2: all around high performance cognition and all of the experts
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  Speaker 2: in the study we were all asked to re it
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  Speaker 2: trainable cognitive primaries that on Japan High Performance Cognition, and
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  Speaker 2: every single person agreed that the most important part of
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  Speaker 2: performance under pressure was attentional control. How does that play
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  Speaker 2: in to flow? I mean you hinted at it a
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  Speaker 2: little bit.
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  Speaker 1: There, Yeah, well, I mean if the very most simple
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  Speaker 1: definition of flow is when you've got your total attention
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  Speaker 1: on the task that you're doing at the present time, now,
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  Speaker 1: that is something that's hard for most of us to sustain.
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  Speaker 2: Particularly these days.
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  Speaker 1: Right, particularly these days exactly, And that is why mindfulness
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  Speaker 1: has become so important in life these days, is because
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  Speaker 1: we're dealing with so much that is a potential distraction
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  Speaker 1: or a real distraction. And so being able to train
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  Speaker 1: our attentional skills through mindfulness I think is really critical
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  Speaker 1: in terms of being able to have an awareness of
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  Speaker 1: where our attention is like as you would be very
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  Speaker 1: familiar poul like through mindfulness, with develop greater awareness of
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  Speaker 1: where our attention is so like without developing some sort
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  Speaker 1: of psychological skill, be it mindfulness, be it breathing something
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  Speaker 1: along the lines that helps develop our awareness, then we
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  Speaker 1: start to notice so actually my attention isn't on task.
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  Speaker 1: But also mindfulness obviously gives us the skill set to
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  Speaker 1: bring that attention back back to the present moment. So
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  Speaker 1: it's I think, and in my book, I spend quite
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  Speaker 1: a bit of time discussing how mindfulness can be a
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  Speaker 1: pathway to flow, and for me, it is a really
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  Speaker 1: relevant pathway to flow. And without that ability to pay
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  Speaker 1: attention and to refocus attention, you know, flow is not
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  Speaker 1: going to happen.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, because you know, we can think in this model,
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  Speaker 2: because I can picture the flow is in the top right,
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  Speaker 2: then you go left to have a risal, and then
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  Speaker 2: you have anxiety. And that can be when thought creep
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  Speaker 2: into your mind. Right, negative self talk keeps into your mind,
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  Speaker 2: and you can all of a sudden snap out of
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  Speaker 2: a flue stee it and back into through arizal and
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  Speaker 2: into threat pretty pretty quickly. But that self awareness is
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  Speaker 2: really critical, isn't it of where my attention actually is.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, self awareness, And then I think an ability to
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  Speaker 1: be okay with what you're talking about, which is those
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  Speaker 1: like self doubts that come into our experience and be
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  Speaker 1: able to not give them too much power, like in
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  Speaker 1: our mind, not give them too much space. And one
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  Speaker 1: of the things that there are actually nine dimensions a flow,
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  Speaker 1: but I'm sure we'll touch on them. But one of
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  Speaker 1: the things that makes flow as enjoyable an experience as
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  Speaker 1: it is is that during flow we let go of
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  Speaker 1: self consciousness. So we drop that sense of is this okay?
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  Speaker 1: Am I okay? What are they thinking of me? And
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  Speaker 1: because it's really hard to not be self conscious in
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  Speaker 1: the lives that we live, it's a lovely experience that
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  Speaker 1: we can then look back on and say, oh, wow,
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  Speaker 1: that was great. I wasn't so caught up in my
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  Speaker 1: own head during that time. And the reason that we're
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  Speaker 1: not self conscious in flow is it comes back to
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  Speaker 1: that key component is that you're totally focused on the
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  Speaker 1: task at hand. So if you are actually one hundred
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  Speaker 1: percent focused on the task at hand, you can't simultaneously
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  Speaker 1: have some percent also on worry about yourself. It's just
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  Speaker 1: doesn't add up, right, And so it's about training our
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  Speaker 1: ability to be able to know where our attention is
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  Speaker 1: and to bring it back again and again.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, if we could just create a button that people
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  Speaker 2: could press where they could drop self consciousness, the world
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  Speaker 2: would be so much of a better place, wouldn't it,
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  Speaker 2: And people's lives would be so much better because so
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  Speaker 2: many people spend so much time living in their heads.
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  Speaker 2: So in Japanese psychology, which my vice practitioner of, they say,
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  Speaker 2: the most important thing that you're in control of in
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  Speaker 2: your life is the flashlight of your attention. I like
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  Speaker 2: that and I love that because whatever you pay attention to,
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  Speaker 2: you bringing commits sales to it. Absolutely that's the key thing.
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  Speaker 2: So gaining control of that flashlight, I think not only
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  Speaker 2: really critical for flows to it, but I think it's
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  Speaker 2: really critical for our overall well being.
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  Speaker 1: And I think, all right, you're like how happy we are?
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  Speaker 1: For sure? You know because for most of us narcissists
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  Speaker 1: excluded perhaps being caught being caught up in our own
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  Speaker 1: heads and thinking about ourselves. It's pretty negative, right. It
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  Speaker 1: doesn't take long for us to be reminded about some
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  Speaker 1: reason why we're not good enough, we're not this enough, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: and so on, and that's just a downward spiral. And
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  Speaker 1: so you know, that's one of the greatest challenges, isn't
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  Speaker 1: it to be able to let go of that? But
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  Speaker 1: like that analogy about that flash flight of your attention,
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  Speaker 1: So like if you were to think about having that
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  Speaker 1: flash flight of attention totally on whatever it is you're
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  Speaker 1: engaged in. You could think of that as being like
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  Speaker 1: a flow state, right, because you're totally engaged in what's
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  Speaker 1: in front of you or what you've decided to focus
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  Speaker 1: your attention on.
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  Speaker 2: Hi different. I see as you were talking about that.
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  Speaker 2: I was gardening last weekend and I just find myself.
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  Speaker 2: I was putting out weeds and I was just fascinated
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  Speaker 2: by the resilience of the weeds, and I different weeds
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  Speaker 2: have got different routes, and I caught myself in actually
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  Speaker 2: flows to it, gardening right, So flows to it. You
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  Speaker 2: know a lot of people think, I think a natural
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  Speaker 2: thing that comes to mind is sport, right, And I
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  Speaker 2: think anybody who's done sport will be aware of that
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  Speaker 2: loss of self consciousness. You know, the high demands, high challenge,
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  Speaker 2: but also you've got the skills to meet it, and
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  Speaker 2: pain at time just melts a little bit. But I
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  Speaker 2: presume that you can be influenced it in so many
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  Speaker 2: different areas of your life.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, And sport was actually the area that I was
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  Speaker 1: initially most interested in looking at it because I was
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: studying for my masters and then my PhD in sports psychology,
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  Speaker 1: and I stumbled across the concept of flow and immediately
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: there was a language for those times when as an
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  Speaker 1: athlete myself, I had been totally engaged in what I
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  Speaker 1: was doing and generally performed to my highest level in
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  Speaker 1: whatever that activity was, and remember it as being special, like,
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  Speaker 1: no matter what the outcome actually was, it was that
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: experience of being in flow. And as I said, when
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: I read the first book on flow that I did,
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  Speaker 1: which was called Beyond boardom and Anxiety, was like, Oh,
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: there's actually this thing, there's this concept, there's psychologists studying this.
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  Speaker 1: And in this first book Beyond boardom and Anxiety. As
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  Speaker 1: well as athletes, Mike Chicks at me High, he studied
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: chess players, He studied physicians, dancers, and he studied surgeons
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  Speaker 1: and so very different activities, and there was this consistency
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  Speaker 1: of experience, consistency of reported subjective experience, even though what
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  Speaker 1: a chess player is doing is different to a surgeon
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: mid procedure. When we're looking at, well, what is it
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  Speaker 1: like when you're totally involved in what you're doing, the
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: characteristics do tend to have some consistency across different types
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  Speaker 1: of activities and settings.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, now I sort of deraeled you a little bit.
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  Speaker 2: Let's not go back and talk about the nine different
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: dimensions of flow. So one of them was dropping self consciousness,
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  Speaker 2: was it?
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  Speaker 1: Uh huh yep? So total focus on the task at
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  Speaker 1: hand is another one. We've also covered a challenging activity,
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  Speaker 1: So that's that challenge skill balance. It's not just a
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: challenging activity, but that there's this balance between challenges and skills.
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  Speaker 1: You've got clear goals about what you are doing in
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: the situation, and you get immediate feedback as you're going.
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  Speaker 1: That helps you to stay on task and just to pause.
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: There a moment in terms of why is sports so
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: conducive to flow, Well, if we just think about sport
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  Speaker 1: has graded levels of challenge that we can always place
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: ourselves into an appropriate level of challenge for our present
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  Speaker 1: skill set, and so we can extend ourselves a little
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: bit but not too much. So we've got that challenge
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: to your balance. And in sport that's just something that
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  Speaker 1: there's really no limits, right, we can just keep challenging ourselves.
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: As we see in the greatest athletes in whatever sport,
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: they are always pushing the boundaries. Like the recent Olympics,
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: for example, in Paris, we saw so many examples of
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: that anyway, So we've got your challenge to your balance
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: in sport. You've also got clear goals in sport. Like
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  Speaker 1: it's because each sport has its own set of rules,
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: its own set of expectations about what you do within
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: that sport, it is very clear. Like you've got clarity
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: as you're going along, and because you're moving your body,
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: you're getting feedback from many sources, including from your body,
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: about how you're going. So this idea of having a
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  Speaker 1: challenging activity greater levels of challenge, an activity where there
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: are clear goals and you're getting feedback is one of
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: the reasons that sport is very conducive to flow. Having
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: said that, there are other activities that you could probably
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: say would also have those three what are called preconditions
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: to flow.
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  Speaker 2: So they are preconditions. They're challenging and the skill balance,
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: the clearer goals, and the immediate feedback. Okay cool. And
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: then there's there was four more that we did.
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  Speaker 1: Yes, okay, So we've got as a result of the
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: title focus on the task. You have a characteristic called
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: action awareness merging, and that's where you and the activity
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: that you're doing, or you and the task tend to
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: meld into one. And that is also related to this
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: loss of self consciousness. And so like a cyclist might
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: describe the bike as an extension of their body, they're
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: just one machine moving in the same direction. A musician
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: might describe the instrument as an extension of their hands, say,
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: and that it's all the sense of oneness. So that's
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: another characteristic. We've got a sense of control in flow,
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: so we people like to feel in control. Having said that,
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: control is a slightly different state in this channel model
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: of subjective experience to flow, but it's the sense of
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: like you drop, worry about failing.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: Jeez, how important is that in sports psychology, right.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. So that's another one is sense
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: of control. Time transformation, which is an interesting one I
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: think of all of the nine dimensions. It's this sense
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: of time passes differently when you are engaged in something.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: It can be a conversation, it can be a sports activity,
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: it can be playing your musical instrument, it can be
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: attending a concept, whatever it is. When you have this
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: experience of flow during it, the sense of time often
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: seems to pass differently. And again it comes back to
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: this simple one of you're paying attention to the so
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: you're not sort of okay, so what time is it now?
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: How much longer have I got? Again? Comes back to attention.
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: And then the last of the nine characteristics poul is
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: called autotellic experience, which is really the culmination of having
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: these other eight factors all happening together, is that we
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: have what's known as an autotellic experience, which means intrinsically
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: rewarding or enjoyable, as in we enjoy it, you know.
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: And we may not enjoy it at the time, as
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: in we might not have awareness at the time that oh, wow,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: this is really enjoyable, but when we look back on it,
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: we definitely perceive it as an enjoyable experience.
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, very interesting, and that time transformation. I just bookmarked
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: a research people this morning which I'm going to go
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: back where they have identified neurons in the brillin that
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: are responsible for the concept of time. And wouldn't it
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: be interesting to see if in flow states those neurons
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: are quiet and down.
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: Wow, that would be really exciting. Yeah, it's just a
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: specific neurons.
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: Specific neurons. I'll flick in the research paper whenever we're done,
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: because I think that might be an area you might
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: be interested in exploring, because people will understand that that
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: time just kind of changes, right, And as you were
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: going through all that stuff, you know, what popped into
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: my head was when I was doing flying training back
• 22:31
  Speaker 2: in the military nineteen ninety eight I think it was,
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: and we're doing advanced flying training in helicopters. I was
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: doing anti submarine warfare. And what you do in the
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: flying training is you do created flights and each one
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: and you do a simulator and then you go out
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: and do a real thing where you you know, the
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: first one is so simple. You go out there, there's
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: a submarine on the surface hat and you see the submarine.
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: It goes on water and it goes in a straight line,
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: and then we've got to track it. And then the
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: culmination of this is what's called a thirsty war, which
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: I don't know if it still happens, but every thirsty
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: off the coast of the UK, NATO would run exercises
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: where it was war games and there was a whole
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: heap of ships and helicopters and submarines involved in this
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: war gaming. And I remember we were really caught behind
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: on weather and we were to do our third flight,
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: and everything was just backing up. So they said, like,
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: we're just going to go out and do a thirsty war.
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: You guys know this is going to be challenging. And
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: we took off and went out there and I remember
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: we joined and it was pandemonium. There was two radios
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: in my ears, there was all.
• 23:45
  Speaker 4: These contacts on the radars.
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: We're trying to get in. It's dark, the pilots are
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: hassling me, and I had a complete brain implosion. It
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: is the first, probably and only ever complete melt down
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: that I have had, and the instructor had to take
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: me out of the seat and he did it, and
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: then we went back and they debrief that. It turns
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: out the guy and the other helicopter, Simon, had the
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: exact same experience, right, He had a complete melt down.
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: And then about three weeks later, or maybe four weeks later,
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: woman did another Thirsty War and we both did really well,
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: and time went like that, and that was because we
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: had increased our skill level in between, right. But it
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: was exactly what you're saying that if the challenge is
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: too high for your skills, you go out, and I
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: went in about nine seconds all the way into anxiety
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: slash Brian implosion. Right, But then weeks few weeks pass,
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: and you know, you increase your skills, and that's what
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: they do. You know, that greated complexity on each flight
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: and stepping into that so that you increase your skill level.
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: So it's just a little bit of an example that
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: popped into my head that kind of explained everything. All
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: of the elements of flow were in that.
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: And so when you're experiencing what you called a brain
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: implosion and like really high levels of anxiety, you had
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: to like step out of that situation, right. It wasn't
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: possible that you could bring your anxiety level down sufficiently
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: to continue. And also in that type of scenario that
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: just probably isn't safe.
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: So yes, that's what it was a complete safety thing.
• 25:31
  Speaker 5: And it was because it was dark, it was clouding,
• 25:34
  Speaker 5: the piets needed to know where the other helicopters were,
• 25:37
  Speaker 5: and I was just I just how to complete another meltdown,
• 25:42
  Speaker 5: the one and only I think complete brain implosion that
• 25:47
  Speaker 5: I've had in my life, right, And it was just well,
• 25:50
  Speaker 5: I guess the pressure of the situation as well.
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: Right, So it's not like sport you can just tap out.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: A little bit, but yeah, true.
• 25:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and that leads me into I there are any
• 26:02
  Speaker 3: particular personality types or professions that tend to lend themselves
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: more towards flow steps.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: That's a really great question. Chicks and me High actually
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: talked about and wrote about the autotellic personality, which is
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: exactly that. It's a type of person that is more
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: likely to be able to experience flow. And some of
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: the qualities that make someone autotellic is that they tend
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: to seek out challenge, and they tend to be intrinsically
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: motivated towards most of the things that they're doing. And
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: rather than definitely you know, we've always got some intrinsic,
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: some extrinsic reasons behind what we're doing, but this sense
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: of a high level of intrinsic motivation, challenge seeking, high
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: level of resilience, and good skills at being able to
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: pay attention, and then what might referred to an autotelic
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: personality as the people of flow. Actually, I think that's
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: a really nice term, like the people of flow. Yeah,
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: these people are more likely to be able to experience
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: flow in whatever it is they're doing. Now, having said that,
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: everything that we've talked about in terms of flow and
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: what makes up flow. It's all trainable so we can
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: become more autotellic. It's not just there's this gene for
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: autotellic personality. You've either got it or you don't. Like
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: Chicks and me, High would say that we all have
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: the ability to access flow. He would also say it's
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: not an easy state to be able to access. It's
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: quite difficult to access flow. However, it is accessible and
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: that we can get better at it through training our
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: psychological skills, which is then where my work is based
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: is about what sort of psychological skills are we going
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: to help you with? And that is very much an
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: individual question. I think like there are certain standard things
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: like attention. We've talked about quite a bit here. You know,
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: attention is always important. We can always improve. Most of
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: us can improve our ability to pay attention. But some
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: people would be more praying to self consciousness, so you
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: might spend more time in that space, like helping somebody,
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: somebody maybe praying for anxiety and helping them manage that.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: And it's not about trying to get rid of anxiety,
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: because you know that's that's like a losing game anyway,
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: But your anxiety is close to flow if you think
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: about this model that I'm describing. So if we can
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: learn to trust ourselves in a situation that it's safe
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: for us to remain in unlike your example there, then
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: we can shift from anxiety into flow.
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: Sorry, so just on that, and I love that you said,
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: but not getting rid of anxiety, because I hate that
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: expression getting rid of anxiety. But how much of that
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: am helping some of the anxiety to experience fluisty? It
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: involves increasing their skill level or their perception of their
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: skill level.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Like are you saying, is it either or or
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: like it?
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: Well, that's a kind of a continuum, really, isn't it,
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: Because sometimes they have the skills, but they don't perceive
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: that they have it.
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: That's exactly the case. And so like the higher the
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: challenge that ones involved in, generally you've got skills that
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: are helping you to be able to be in that
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: challenging zone, whatever that challenging zone is. And therefore, actually
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: the higher we go in terms of elite performance in
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: whatever domain, those performers tend to have great skills. They
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: tend to have pretty outstanding levels of skills however, doubt
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: comes in. That's a human characteristic, is that for most
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: of us, doubt's going to come in, And so it is.
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: I think at the higher levels of performance that we're
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: talking about high level performers, it's very much about the
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: trust in the skills, whereas at the lower levels it
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: might be you simply don't have the skills, then you've
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: got to develop them, y.
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah for sure. And how much does discomfort tolerance
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: or distress tolerance play into this?
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I think that's an area you can probably
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: talk to pretty well right with your work. And I
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: think it's being comfortable with being uncomfortable, which is kind
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: of like a skill in anxiety management. Is just that
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: it's learning to be comfortable with these changes in physiology
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: that are happening that come with heightened arousal, and not
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: like putting a whole bunch of negative, unhelpful labels on those,
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: but just like recognizing my heart's beating fast, or my
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: palms are sweaty here, or you know, and being okay
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: with that, and then you know, if you are in
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: that anxiety channel, then learning to be okay with that
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: as well. And another skill or psychological approach that I
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: bring into my work is acceptance and commitment therapy, which.
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: Ah yeah, protestion and I love I love Okay, I
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: love it because it's action focused, right, it is.
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: It's action focused. And also that that first word acceptance,
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: that's like a way of managing anxiety is to accept it.
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: So to answer your question, accepting the discomfort, it doesn't
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: mean that you want it. It doesn't mean that you're
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: going to like go and seek it out, but like
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: if it's showing up, just being able to be Oh okay,
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: So this is my experience right now. What am I
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: going to do in light of that? And that's where
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: your attention skills come in. Well, what am I going
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: to do in light of that? Well, I'm going to
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: choose to focus on this because this matters to me.
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: So yeah, absolutely, I'll tell you if I was tizarre
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: of the language universe, I would ban the word anxiety
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: and replace it with over arisal.
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah for sure. Yeah. Yeah. Well, as you know
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: from what I've described with the flow model or the
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: model of subjective experience, you know, there's flow and then
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: there's arousal, and then there's anxiety, and then there's worrying
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: and so you know, yeah, arousal is can be a
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: neutral state to be in. It could be perceived as
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: a neutral state to be in, and it's only when
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: we start putting the labels on it that then it's like, oh, no,
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: I don't want to be here, I feel terrible.
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: And we medicalize it as well. Right, that's absolutely anyway,
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: that's a whole nother podcast. So tell me this. Is
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: there a difference between flow state and what people report
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: as being in the zone or this concept of deep work?
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: Are they just both alternative words for flow state?
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Really interesting? Well, being in the zone is a
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: colloquial term for flow, I think yeah, And I think
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: that that term has been around a long time, particularly
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: in sport, but in other domains, you know, being in
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: the zone is probably not that meaningful. But definitely in
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: sport that's a term that's used that athletes and coaches
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: talk about, and I think that they may well be
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: talking about flow in terms of deep work and cow
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: Newport's work there. Yeah, so deep work is a state
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: of total focus on the task at hand, and it's
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: not my concept, so I couldn't say whether it's flow.
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: I think it could be flow, but I don't know that.
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: I think it's necessarily all right because, as you said,
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: some of the key things, the key elements challenge and
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: skill balance, because you can be doing deep work that
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: either you don't have the skill for or is quite easy,
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: but you're just focused.
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: Right, true, Yeah, that's true.
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: I think it's probably contextual.
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, No, that makes sense.
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: And I guess that's where those prerequisites, was it, the
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: challenge and skill balance, the clear goals and immediate feedback.
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: Yes, that's exactly right.
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: So they're the ones that differentiate from these others stay
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: its potentially.
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: And from mindfulness as well.
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, cool, that makes sense. So
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: tell me, with your time working with me or make
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: what were the biggest lessons that you liked?
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: And this is something that I go into writing the
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: start of my book, and a big motivation to write
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: Experiencing Flow was to honor the work of Mike Chicks
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: at me High and to try to help to build
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: awareness of it through whatever ways I can in my
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: own small way to help people to understand what flow is.
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: And I think Mike embodied the work that he was
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: engaged in, you know, having spent time with him, we
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: wrote a book together called Flowing Sports in nineteen ninety
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: nine because we both shared a passion for sport, and
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: he was encouraging of my master's and PhD work in
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: that area. So Mike was always curious. There was never
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: a bad question, a silly question. Was always asking questions
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: and seeking to become the best version of himself. And
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: I think in my book are going a little bit
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: to his background, having grown up in wartime and having
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: experienced the chaos and the uncertainty of that. That was
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: probably one of the influencers in his life, and also
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: just the time in which he grew up in. There's
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: an environment in which we growing up in and living in.
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: But Mike, Yeah, Mike embodied somebody who was always looking
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: to understand more and to want others to share and
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: understand through his writings what this concept of flow was.
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: So he's written many books, and I really encourage anyone
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: that's at all interested in what we're talking about here
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: to check out any or all of his different books
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: that he's written. So he's written in the work of business,
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: he's written in the field of creativity, and he's written
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: in the world, in the realm of evolving self so
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: he's very much into complexity and growth in complexity. He's
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: written about flowing daily life and so, like Mike was
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: an extraordinary thinker, and I feel very grateful to have
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: had an opportunity to have learned from him.
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a bit of a legend, is he really?
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: So tell me this, what are so you work about
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: a lot of individuals around helping them and organizations helping
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: them to get into flu stit. What are some of
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: the common barriers that you see with individuals and with
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: teams and you can take those in any order you want.
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: I think we've touched on some of those barriers. One
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: is distractability. Another is self doubts and that in a
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: critic and that's that tendency to get caught up in ourselves,
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: which is so easy to do, you know, when things
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: aren't going well. So in terms of like barriers, I
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: think also like the type of society we live in
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: where technology is so much key to everything we do,
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: and other people have written about this is like we're
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: training ourselves and the lives that we have, and all
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: of the technology in front of us is actually training
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: distractability a lot of the time versus paying attention to
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: one thing for a sustained amount of time. And so
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: I think that you know, those are some key challenges
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: in terms of teams I have looked at and there
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: are researchers that are specific looking at flowing teams. Jeff
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: Founder out in the Netherlands is one of those people.
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: And what I've found when I've interviewed athletes, whether they're
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: in team sports or individual sports, is that difference with
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: the team aspect of whether the team can get into
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: flow or you can get to flow in that team
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: situation is how well is that is the team playing
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: because it's no longer just you, So it comes down
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: to team performance more much more variables. But also the communications.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: Something that comes up is like what's the type of communications,
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: what's the nature of communications, because that's a source of feedback, right,
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: So keeping those positive and task focused will help a
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: group or a team to be able to maybe tap
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: into flow.
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: And you know one of the biggest ones challenge not
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: stress challenge.
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: Yes, yes, exactly that perceptions.
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and then so look, look, I think you've hinted
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: at some of them that what individuals can do to
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: kind of enhance flow in their lives, whether it's in
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: the workplace or at home. I think one thing that
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: would pretty bloody obvious is put your guard down, mobile
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: phone away. I think that's going to be a prerequisite
• 39:22
  Speaker 2: unless year you get into I don't think it's possible
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: to get into flow stead when your doomscrolling, right, I
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: don't know.
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: Having said that, like, gaming is an area that you know,
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: some people will experiencing flowing, and it has been studied.
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: Because it's more of a controlled or potentially more of
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: a controlled environment, you can control more variables. But I think, yeah,
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: deciding if if you're going to be involved in a
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: task and you don't your phone isn't part of that task,
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: then having it on silent makes sense. Yeah, absolutely, because
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: otherwise there will be distractions.
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah. There's a really cool study called brain drain and
• 40:04
  Speaker 2: that I often start my talks with, and it showed
• 40:07
  Speaker 2: that if if your mobile phone is sitting on the
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: table upside down on silent, it reduces your working memory
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: capacity and your fluid intelligence by at least ten percent. Really, yeah,
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: it's very cool. So that just people think that just
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: having it on the desk upside down, it's still a
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: bloody attention thief.
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: Right, because you know what the phone's associated with them.
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: So yeah, correct, So a bit of an that's very interesting,
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: definite enemy of flow. Something just popped into my head.
• 40:40
  Speaker 4: Other particular Brian states or signatures like Has this been
• 40:45
  Speaker 4: investigated in functional MRI scanners or any other type of
• 40:50
  Speaker 4: tech imaging technology.
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: Yes, there has been some research in that area. It's
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: not the easiest area of research, as you can imagine, because.
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: Yes, and if you've ever been in an MRI scanner,
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: you know they're not particularly conducive to flow, star to flow.
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, So as technology, like we've we've kind
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: of been giving technology a bad rap. But as technology
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: continues to improve and we get better, more accurate in
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: situe ways of looking at what's going on in the
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: brain while people are engaged in their activity, we will
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: come to understand what's happening more. But you know, obvious
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: things like reduced levels of beta brain weigh frequency, you know,
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: less activity in the default brain network, some physiological measurements
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: of like ease and fluidity in terms of that synchronization
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: between brain and body that occurs when we're in flow
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: and so on. So yes, it is being looked at,
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: and I think it's a it's a very exciting area
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: for future research.
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And are people when they're in flow
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: do they have to be in alpha Brian way of steer? Its?
• 42:04
  Speaker 2: So can you be in little better and still be
• 42:07
  Speaker 2: in flow? Because you know that that challenge would seem
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: to suggest, are they arise? Well, maybe that's the demarcation
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: between where arisal turns into flow.
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, interesting area and I probably can't provide you with
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: a simple answer on that one, but I think that
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: better excludes flow. But I guess it's where that and
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: we've always got you know, different, we've got more than
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: our for and better brain waves happening, and so you
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: know the role of theater and gamma and so on. Like,
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: it's not an area that I can can comment on specifically,
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: but I think, as I said, as we get better
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: at being able to tap into what's going on inside
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: people's heads, we'll come to understand a bit more about
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: that psychophysiology of flow. However, there was just just one
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: thing that came to mine as I was talking there,
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: is that Mike was always cautious about trying to pin
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: flow down too much, you know, like to say it's
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: this and it's not that because of his attitude, his curiosity,
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: and his not wanting to sort of like be too
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: black and white, and also he didn't want to oversimplify
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: what is a very complex psychological state. And I think
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: that that's probably one of the concerns in the popular media,
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: is perhaps an oversimplification of what is quite a complex
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: psychological state and not an easy state for people to
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: get into.
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and these people who tell you can be in
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: flow all day long are just complete another Charlattan's right.
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: Well, I think that i'd probably have to agree with
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: you on that, pool Like, it's just like you can't
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: run a marathon twenty four hours a day. Like it's
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: about balance, it's about times of focus and times of
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: restoration and recovery. It's just it's not sustainable even if
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: it was possible, because you'd wear yourself out because of
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: the high level of intensity. Yes, yes, that is involved,
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: And I mean after a flower experience, you might be
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: feeling tired because you've brought all of your resources to
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: a very challenging activity.
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: I think that is a really good point, because it
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: really is complete resource, certainly brand resource, and depending what
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: you're doing, a lot of physical resources as well, particularly
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: if it's sport right. So, you know, the idea that
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: you can be in this huge periods of time I
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: think is completely ridiculous and not have self awareness and
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: all of that sort of stuff. It's preposterous.
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: It's also it's incorrect to sort of think that there's
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: just a switch that we can turn on and we
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: can like I've seen and written or I've not written about,
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: but I've read people writing about hacking the flow state,
• 44:59
  Speaker 1: like let's just find ways to hack into this, you know.
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: Like for me, again, I'm not supportive of that. I'm
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: more supportive of well, let's be And this is what
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: I think I could speak from my care is like,
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: let's become more psychologically complex selves by developing the skills
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: necessary to be able to access flow in a challenging situation,
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: versus find some way to just, oh, let's just hack
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: into it, you know that. Just to me, it cheapens,
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: It cheapens. What's a very rich experience.
• 45:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, totally agree. Last few questions, it's year twelve
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: for students, my daughters in the thrills of it right now,
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: coming up to exams. You presumably integrating flow into educational
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: settings is a great idea. Any thoughts on that, and
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: then any little tips for any parents that might be
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: less thing look at somebody in year twelve to help
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: them get into that flow with their studies.
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think what we're saying flow is about a
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: challenging situation. So your year twelve exams, there you go.
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: You've got your challenging situation tick. That's ticked. So have
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: you got the skills at this point in time? Well,
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: let's hope so, because you've applied yourself over your years
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: of schooling. So now it's about trusting the skills that
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: you do have. It's no time for self doubt. It's
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: no time for well what haven't I gone over or
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: what don't I understand? It's about focusing on what skills
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: can you bring to a very high level of challenge
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: and to provide you with the best performance that you
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: can achieve and to help you to focus the best
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: that you are able to in each of your exams.
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: And you may or you may not find flow, but
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: you'll certainly you'll do better than what you would if
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: you decided to take a negative attitude and to doubt yourself. Right, So,
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: in terms of education and flow, positive psychology has been
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: an area that's had a lot of growth, and Chicks
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: at Me High I actually had a lot to do
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: with the resurgence of positive psychology.
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: He was Seigman, didn't he for Seligman and Kicks.
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: At Me High. Yeah, And they wrote a great paper
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: in two thousand in American Psychologists where they outlined positive
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: psychology and why it mattered and so on, and flow
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: was situated as a central concept within their model of
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: positive psychology. And so when positive psychology has been uptaken,
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: and I do see that in educational settings that well
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: being programs are being offered more by schools and so on.
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: Some of those programs if they're well versed in what
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: positive psychology is about, including the flow concept. And one
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: of the leaders in this area in terms of schools
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: within Australia was Geelong Grammar School. Oh yeah, yep, yeah,
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: So Geelong Grammar School had a positive education or it's
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: called positive education, but Operating Positive Psychology Principles has had
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: a long standing positive education program and obviously has a
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: lot of resources and decided to invest in the positive
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: education space and they brought out Martin Seligman to spend
• 48:31
  Speaker 1: some time at Gelong Grammar School and Mike Chicks and
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: Me High also had some contribution, as did many leaders
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: in the positive psychology space into what makes a good
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: positive education program. And so Geelong Grammar School had a
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: flagship and still does have a flagship positive education program
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: that spurred on a lot of other schools to do likewise.
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: And I just want to mention that one of the
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: key players in that space is a cold league and
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: good friend of mine by the name of John Hendry.
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: And for many years he's retired now, but over fifty
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: years spent in education, and he was passionate about flow
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: and he was passionate about in his Director of student
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: Welfare at Geelong Grammar School about incorporating flow into their
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: positive education program. Also shout out to John.
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah cool, very cool. Last couple of questions, I presume
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: there would be a link between flow states and positive
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: mental health.
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure.
• 49:36
  Speaker 4: I think.
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: I think that that is something that goes hand in hand, right,
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: because you're challenging yourself and so you're extending yourself. Mike
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: uses this term growth in psychological complexity through floor experiences,
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: So we are becoming more complex human beings through floor experiences.
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: These experiences are almost always viewed as positive experiences being
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: in flow, and so there's a lot of reasons why
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: there are connections there between flow and positive mental health.
• 50:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think there's probably a link there in
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: stuff that you feel proud of. Right, So if you've
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: been in flow ste it, you know there's generally I'm
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: kind of prior to I achieved that that was high
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: dumb demand, high skills, and for me, exactly for me,
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: a life that you can be proud of is much
• 50:29
  Speaker 2: better than a life of happiness, particularly as we tend
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: to define it in the West. Are you familiar with
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: the Japanese term of ikey guy.
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: I have heard of that term.
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: Do you think there's an overlap here between flow and
• 50:42
  Speaker 2: ikey guy?
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: I have. I have heard people talk about that overlap.
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: John Henry would be one of those people, and I
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: probably am not well versed enough in it to comment,
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: But if it's something that you think from what we've
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: been talking about here, you see parallels between the two.
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: From what I know, and I interviewed professor Ken Mogi,
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: Japanese guy who all about ikey guy, and I think
• 51:10
  Speaker 2: there's definitely an overlap. It's probably like a then diagram
• 51:14
  Speaker 2: because ikey guy is stuff that you can be completely
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: immersed in that you kind of lose the concept of time.
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: But you can have ikey guy that's not particularly challenging.
• 51:27
  Speaker 2: So that's where I think there is that overlap, right,
• 51:30
  Speaker 2: So can't said one of his ichy guys is making
• 51:34
  Speaker 2: his cup of coffee in the morning and doing a
• 51:36
  Speaker 2: ceremony around it and then sitting down with a piece
• 51:38
  Speaker 2: of chocolates. Not particularly it's not particularly challenging. But other
• 51:43
  Speaker 2: ikey guys, you know, particularly the centregeneurians growing their own
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: vegetables and all of those sorts of things. But I
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: think there would definitely be that overlap in the ven diagram,
• 51:55
  Speaker 2: particularly if you throw challenging and then then I think
• 51:59
  Speaker 2: there is lots of similarities.
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: Can I just come in on that too, Like we
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: have talked a lot about challenge skill and High challenge
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: and so on, but in terms of flowing daily life
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: chicks and me. High has written about that something that
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: we can achieve and his book Finding Flow, The Psychology
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: of Engagement with Everyday Life, published in nineteen ninety seven,
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: was all about that, and he and others have looked
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: at flow in daily life settings, and it's about relative
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: balance of challenges and skills. So yeah, it's not like
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: a super high challenge necessarily, but you know you're describing
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: that cup of coffee, you know, that act of making
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: a cup of coffee. If you are bringing all of
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: your attention to it and you're trying to make the
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: best cup of coffee that you can, maybe you can
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: experience a bit flowing.
• 52:49
  Speaker 2: Okay, all right, so it doesn't have to be high chat.
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: That's interesting, right, because I always thought the challenge had
• 52:56
  Speaker 2: to be quite.
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: Well generally, Yes, it is a about a high challenge. However,
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: definitely if we can experience flow in everyday life and
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: it comes down to that balance of challenges and skills,
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: so that like if the challenge is just nowhere to
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: be seen and we're super skilled, we won't experience flow,
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: we'll experience bortum exactly.
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Cool, very last question, what gives you flow?
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: Sport has always been for me or moving my body.
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: So as an older person who has had a wonderful
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: time experiencing a number of different sports, now for me,
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: it's about physical activity and it's about just keeping on
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: moving and finding that sweet spot where the right level
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: of challenge for an aging injured body can find something
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: that's enjoyable and challenging and that you can develop your
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: skills in. So definitely, movement, reading and writing again would
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: be other areas for me that I would say that
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: I've achieved flowing and can achieve flowing.
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: Very cool.
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: How about for yourself?
• 54:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, look for me, pretty similar things actually, the sports stuff.
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: I actually find podcast interviews that you get into a
• 54:19
  Speaker 2: bit of flow, because absolutely no, there is a little
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: bit of challenge in that you've got to follow the conversation,
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: not what you're saying, and then think about the next
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: questions and think about the audience interpretation and all of that.
• 54:32
  Speaker 2: So so definitely I would say doing podcast stuff would
• 54:36
  Speaker 2: be and writing a book for sure. And my bloody PhD.
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: During your PhD Yeah, yeah, Well, I think that you've
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: demonstrated just a little bit of feedback because I think feedback,
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: you know, can always be helpful, Like just an excellent
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: level of attentional skills there, And so I can imagine
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: that you do experience flow in your podcasting because I
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: can see you've been taking some notes for example, and
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: but just like staying very engaged and I think that
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: you know, your ability to do that is probably a
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: reason why you then say, well, this is one of
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: those areas where I experienced flow, which is great, and
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: you know, for somebody else it might be that listening
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: to a podcast and what they're learning through that. You know,
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: that could even be a floor experience, so like a
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: lower level floor experience too. So yeah, it can be
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: in any any activity as long as we're bringing skills
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: to a challenge and we're finding a match there and
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: we're then we're bringing all of our attentional resources to
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: what we're doing.
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, very cool. So this has been awesome. Thank you
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: for clearing up some stuff. I've certainly learned a lot
• 55:48
  Speaker 2: about a subject I knew a reasonable amount of vote,
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: So that's that's a sign of your expertise. Where can
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: people go to buy the book and find out more?
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: Presumably you work one on one probably corporate stuff as well,
• 56:03
  Speaker 2: So where could people go because I think a lot
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: of leaders listening this go on, jeez, I need suit
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: in my business to help with a bit of flow stit.
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: Well, thanks for My website is called Body and Mind
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: Flow bodyomindflow dot com dot au. My book that was
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: recently published is called Experiencing Flow and the subtitle is
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: Life Beyond Boredom and Anxiety. And that's available through Amazon
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: and recently recorded a audiobook, so certain it'll be available
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: on audio platforms as well. And I have a small
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: social media presence and people can locate that through my
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: website as well. So yeah, body and Mind Flow, which
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: kind of is hopefully illustrating my interests, I guess in
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: terms of bringing things together, it's about that integration of
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: body and minding whatever we're doing to hopefully experience.
• 56:58
  Speaker 2: Flow learally after my my own heart, I tell you
• 57:01
  Speaker 2: that that body brain mind integration really critical.
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: I did notice we had some similarities in our website
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: emails anyway.
• 57:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, so there's been awesome, Thank you very much.
• 57:14
  Speaker 2: And yeah, people go and buy the book and get
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: yourself in the flow and put your goddown mobile phone away.
• 57:21
  Speaker 2: Thanks so