The State of Flow. When the ego lets you escape for a while.

Evonne Goolagong Cawley playing tennis in the state of flow

"Even the enlightened person remains what he is, and is never more than his own limited ego before the One who dwells within him, whose form has no knowable boundaries, who encompasses him on all sides, fathomless as the abysms of the earth and vast as the sky." C.G. Jung

The ego and the true self are two different ways of looking at the world. Two separate thought systems which are opposed in every way.

We mostly identify with the ego, the personality or I. This is our vehicle on this planet. It is what we inhabit and operate from. It is what experiences our life and engages in it. It is what feels pleasure and pain, joy and suffering and all the various nuances of our sentient experience.

This is the part of us that has been studied exhaustively. All the psychological theories are about discovering and explaining this part of us. What helps this part operate functionally. What goes wrong with this part and how to intervene and make it functional again. What plagues this and makes it dysfunctional or even abhorrent and what inspires this and makes it perform outstandingly.

This part is always thinking, planning, judging, wishing, analyzing, remembering and daydreaming. It is comparing itself to others, to accepted norms or to others’ opinions. It is always telling us who we are or who we should be.

“I am smart”

“I am fat”

“I am not good at maths”

“Nobody likes me”

“I am better than you”

Positive or negative, these are just thoughts about ourselves. Words running through our minds. And thoughts and words about ourselves are not ourselves. 

 Our role as psychologists is to address this part of us and help it to operate smoothly and efficiently to meet our needs, or what we think are our needs.

There is another part of us, the true self, that can step back and observe all these thoughts and words we are having about ourselves. And that part is always there, always observing. Always has and always will. This part does not engage in all this tiring “mind stuff”, it only observes, notices, witnesses. This part notices our thoughts but does not engage in them, it engages in our experience directly. It does not speak in words,  it emerges in moments of intuition, stirrings of longing for something, or even more palpable experiences of union, oneness, transcendence of the body, conversion experiences.

These experiences are more common than we would think. Everyone has at some point in their lives had at least one experience which has baffled them or taken them beyond what they rationally relate to. It can be quite overwhelming at the time, but it often does not last very long. And before long, we are left again with our pedestrian vehicle which contains our sense of I and limits and restricts it. At other times, it is just seen as a nuisance interfering with the steady progress of our lives.

The State of Flow

It also emerges in states of “flow” or popularly known as “being in the zone”. This is the mental state in which a person is fully absorbed and immersed in an activity and feeling an energized focus and enjoyment in the process. This state is highly prized by artists and sports people who achieve their best results while in this state. They are not “thinking” in the usual sense, they are aligned with bigger forces and totally focussed on the ride. They do not pay attention to distractions and time seems to pass without notice. Their actions come naturally, with minimal thought.

Evonne Goolagong Cawley, in an interview on the ABC, said she remembers playing a few times “in the zone”. One such time was when she played in America against Tracy Austin.

“I felt like everything was in slow motion. And everything was quiet. I couldn’t hear anything. I couldn’t hear the crowd, nothing. And the ball seemed THAT big (she held out her hands and measured out the size of a basketball). And it was almost like slow motion. And then when I finished I suddenly heard the crowd. And I was purely connected to the whole court. You know the lines that seemed so big and I just seemed to have perfect timing. It was a weird sensation but I loved it because I played so well and that’s what I mean about “in the zone” you can’t do anything wrong.

I guess it’s like since coming back to Australia, connecting with my Aboriginality. It’s like connecting to the earth”.

It’s interesting how she called it “connecting to the earth”. An indigenous expression for what we might call being connected to the universe, to something bigger than ourselves. Being part of a larger experience, we forget our own little world and benefit from the nature of the whole.

Somehow our individual thinking and feeling reflects the nature of the greater and we find ourselves suddenly pulled into it and sharing its nature. And in this state, we can do no wrong because we are not consciously choosing a path of our own, we are being led by the forces of the whole and we become part of that. We feel in flow with the greater currents of the universe which carry us in the right direction, help us meet the needs of the moment perfectly and leave us feeling connected.

Popularized by Mikaly Czikszentmihalyi, he described the state of flow as “being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you’re using your skills to the utmost.” The state of flow also goes by another name: “optimal experience”. He reached a definition of some of the elements when you enter a state of flow.

A challenge that makes you use all your skills

Focus and concentration

Clearly defined goals

Direct, immediate feedback

Exclusion of other information

A feeling of control

You lose your sense of self-awareness

A change in your perception of time

In these kinds of states, it’s almost like your sense of self has completely disappeared. What this does is create a kind of “freedom” effect inside you. You are free of the prison of your own thoughts.

He goes on to say that people are their most creative, productive and happy when they are in a state of flow.

References

Jung, C G. Psychology and Religion: West and East (Collected Works) Vol. 11, 1970

Czikszentmihalyi, M. Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. New York: Harper and Row, 1990