Flow On The Brain 🌀
On the effects of flow on your happiness & getting lost in Berlin. | Vol. 16
Welcome back to Launch Your Twenties, the newsletter supporting self-belief with brain science!✨
This week’s newsletter is a few days late because I was traveling with my parents for an Easter vacation.
If there are two things I’ve learned in the past 7 months living in Germany, it’s that #1. Germans love their holidays, and #2. for as much fun as traveling is, it leaves you a little off-balanced.
You flex your uncomfortability muscles while figuring out logistics like how to find your hotel late at night, how to navigate public transport, and where to get covid tests all in an unfamiliar environment. To make it more interesting, last weekend being Easter meant that basically everything was closed for the holiday. One day, my parents and I reached a nuclear point while we hangrily searched for a lunch spot, to no avail.
I apologize to the passer-byers of Berlin who witnessed our low.
While experiencing the small challenges of traveling, however, I was reminded of my family’s unofficial motto:
We’ll figure it out.
We’ll always be put in positions where we’re uncomfortable. Whether it’s finding your way through a new city, learning a new language, or starting a new job, there’s perpetually a new challenge to overcome. Although we may not have the answers yet, we will be able to find them. Feeling uncomfortable is temporary, and we will cross the threshold to knowledge eventually.
As Marie Forleo says, “Everything is figureoutable.”
We’ll definitely feel uncomfortable at first. We’ll probably stumble along the way. We may even gripe about it. But truly everything is figureoutable when you put your mind to it.
By the end of our trip, my parents are I were navigating through Berlin without the need for Google Maps. We did, indeed, figure it out.
What comes to mind when you think of flow? 🌊
A shimmering, mystical waterfall. Catching the perfect wave. The ability to sit down at your laptop and plug away at your work without distraction.
Things appear 10X easier when they happen in flow.
But what is flow exactly, and how do we invite more of it into our lives?
Technically speaking, flow is a peak state of consciousness where we feel our best and perform our best.
It’s a state of mind that feels exactly like it sounds.
Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, who coined the word flow, described a state where “every action, movement and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz.”
This is how flow works inside your brain:
• Flow triggers direct all your focus into the present moment. 🧘
• Neurotransmitters and hormones such as dopamine and (nor)epinephrine are released at increased rates. 🤯
•Studies show extra pleasure and extra energy are released into the brain. 🗣
Flow increases the feeling of pleasure in the brain, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy-peasy.
In fact, research shows that flow-state stems from a challenge. Your skills must be tested just enough to push you. This is why flow activities provide intrinsic rewards, which in turn help us develop our skills. The pattern is cyclical if the challenge level is slightly increased.
Like Goldilocks, the challenge must be not too hard but not too soft.
Flow is activated when we tackle the right amount of challenge. But is all this effort worth it?
Psychologist Martin E. Seligman studied the effects of flow on life satisfaction. He posited that there are three levels of happiness:
1. The Pleasant Life: how comfortable or uncomfortable do you feel at this moment?
2. The Good Life: how satisfied are you experiencing flow-state activities, like painting or surfing?
3. The Meaningful Life: how do you use your natural strengths & flow-state to work towards something larger than yourself?
The field of positive psychology stems from Seligman’s concept. So how does life satisfaction hold up to the three different levels?
The findings are surprising.
Seligman found that the Good Life and the Meaningful Life were both related to high life satisfaction. These are the so-called eudemonic paths that involve flow.
Interestingly, the Pleasant Life was not associated with higher life satisfaction. In short, the amount of pleasure experienced does not correlate to happiness.
The implications for us are huge.
The presence of flow can increase your overall well-being. Even if your flow is not related to a grandiose goal or your ultimate life purpose, flow correlates to life satisfaction. Knowing this, the question I leave you with today is: how can you create a habit of flow in your life?
Content Recommendation:
Have you ever enjoyed something in your life just to self-sabotage it?
I certainly have, even if it was as simple as solving one problem to immediately focus on another. Gay Hendricks coins this phenomenon as the Upper Limit Problem, as described in his book The Big Leap.
The Upper Limit Problem describes a set point we allow ourselves to feel happy at. Anything above this point we feel is too good to be true and ultimately self-sabotage it. In the book, Gay describes what it would look like if we could dismantle our Upper Limit to enjoy as much happiness, abundance, and peace as possible.
I’m still working on this read, but I’ll let you know what the answer to the Upper Limit Problem looks like soon.
That’s it from me! Please let me know what part of this week’s newsletter you enjoyed in the comments.
As always, have a wonderful week.
Xoxo,
Claire
I love every part of this post, love your direct information from researchers making your points on point! Ty