I’m working through a mini-learning project: reading ten books on focus at work and study (1).
A few themes are repeating themselves: focus is great for productivity. It unlocks your thinking and learning. And so on. Interestingly, there’s a key point that doesn’t get addressed nearly as often as it should. That focusing at work and study is also the key to lead a happier life.
Here’s why:
On Buddhism and Flow
You’ve probably heard of mindfulness. The idea is simple. Be present so you can be happy. Our brains like to time travel. It often keeps going over the past and future when not focused on anything specific. These are unhappy places to be. Mindfulness overcomes this. You become fully absorbed in what’s happening around you right here and now. Nothing is wrong when you’re absolutely present. You find contentment by living moment-by-moment (2).
Increasing the amount of focused work you do regularly increases total hours spent mindfully. Consider how happy you feel on a day where you’re rushing in between calls, constantly checking your phone, and being interrupted all the time. Then contrast it with how you felt when you were able to get a few hours of truly focused work done. There’s probably a stark difference.
But there’s more to enjoying your day than mindfulness. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi coined a term you’ve probably heard before: flow. He calls it optimal experience. When you’re completely engrossed in your workout. When you’re having dinner with friends and don’t notice time go by. When you’re completely hooked on a book you’re reading. These are all states of flow. Key traits include a focus on clear goals, a feasible challenge that makes use of skills, immediate feedback, and others. Flow taps into a powerful driver of happiness: growth. You need a challenge that requires using your skills. And you need a new and bigger challenge once you meet the old one. It’s a process. Striving towards something difficult is what makes you truly content — not the outcome of your efforts.
You can’t have optimal experience unless you’re focused. Csikszentmihalyi points out that it’s a defining trait of flow. It’s hard to be truly challenged unless you dedicate all of your cognitive resources towards meeting the challenge. This is why absolute concentration at work is key. The more you concentrate, the more you achieve flow. The happier you become.
Interestingly, he also emphasizes that flow blurs the line between the self and task at hand. You lose your sense of separation from the world and activity you're doing. You become one. This is remarkably similar to one of the key goals of Zen Buddhism: letting go of your traditional conception of the self. Most people feel strongly attached to what they see as themselves: their thoughts, their feelings, their past, their consciousness. It’s a major cause of suffering. They feel attacked when someone criticizes identities they are strongly attached to (“how dare they think I’m not [insert positive adjective here]?”). They also feel a strong drive to satisfy the needs of this self by fulfilling ever growing desires. So they chase cars and money and status. All futile attempts at finding happiness.
True presence (and flow) overcomes this. It’s easier to see your own reflection in water when it’s still. When the turbulence of everyday thoughts and emotions aren’t so turbulent. Presence also uncovers an important truth: it’s pretty damn hard to pinpoint who you are. Your thoughts come and go. That can’t be it. Your feelings come and go. That can’t be it. Hell, even your personality comes and goes. That can’t be it either. Who are you really then? Eventually you find this is the case with everything else, too. Everything is a constant dance of change. Nothing is permanent. It’s all a process instead. It’s all one process. Separation exists, yes. But it’s superficial (and arbitrary). It’s like seeing how your left and right hands are actually part of one whole (3). Many of your desires and fears just don’t make sense from this standpoint.
Now, focusing at work will probably not by itself create a lasting sense of interconnectedness. It often takes thousands of hours of meditation practice. At the very least, though, it will set you on the right path. Many Zen practitioners would also argue that being totally focused is to be living this truth. This is in line with Csikszentmihalyi’s point: to be in flow is to become one with the world. Don’t underestimate how powerful this is.
Notes:
1: Ten books is roughly what would be covered in many half-semester modules at university. It’s not a small project. But I call it “mini because it pales in comparison to the other one I’m working on: learning the equivalent of physics undergraduate and graduate degrees on my own.
2: Many people think they enjoy a certain hobby when they actually enjoy the fact that they’re present when practicing it. Our favorite activities are usually those we can devote our total concentration to.
3: This is how a feeling of connectedness can develop compassion (and fearlessness). Your right hand would naturally put out a fire on the left hand. In fact, the reaction wouldn’t require any deliberation. This is what many people who perform heroic deeds report. They didn’t need to think about doing the right thing. They just did it.
Comments