Wow, day 16 of 50 ideas in 50 days is Flow by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. I’m sure everyone has felt in a state of flow even if only once. It is that place where what you are doing seems effortless and almost as if from another source. Mihaly is a positive psychology expert and professor and has been researching the subject of flow for over 35 years.
Mihaly echoes many self-help writers when he states that external situations need not determine our inner well being. He says, “a person can make himself happy or miserable regardless of what is actually happening outside just by changing the contents of consciousness.” He adds, “to develop this trait, one must find ways to order consciousness so as to be in control of feelings and thoughts. It is best not to expect shortcuts will do the trick.” Yes indeed, don’t expect shortcuts! On the other hand, don’t expect it to take forever either, because that would just deflate the whole purpose of self-development. Be mindful that the conditioning you have at the moment didn’t happen overnight and positive conditioning also needs time to develop, with practice and persistence.
My other favourite point from this book talks about how control over your consciousness cannot be prescribed by another, be it from a book or a person – it comes from within. I particularly love the idea of finding your own truth and do believe that many spiritual aspects of tradition and culture are lost over the years due to a variety of different factors. Mihaly says, “the knowledge of how to control consciousness must be reformulated every time the cultural context changes.” It is true, everything changes constantly and traditional ideas can become irrelevant or can’t be adapted. I also think however that true spirituality and ideas that come straight from the heart never change, they are timeless. He says, “the wisdom of the mystics might have been excellent in their own time…but transplanted to contemporary California, they lose quite a bit of their original power…they contain elements specific to their original contexts.” This is true, to an extent, however if you are talking about the wisdom of the mystics, this is completely internal and cannot be communicated. The problems occur when, “the path to freedom gets overgrown by brambles of meaningless mumbo jumbo” because this takes the focus away from the inside, perhaps with rules, regulations and rituals.
The heart of truth, wisdom and compassion is completely timeless. It is an energy that just is and keeps us in connecton with others around us and the universe as a whole. When we are in control of the chit chat of the conscious mind, we can allow that energy to radiate and we can be in perfect flow with forever we choose to do.
