When I went for my first big interview in New York City to manage the Fitness Department at Reebok Sports Club, the first question they asked me was, “What is your definition of flow?”  Being 25 years old, I wasn’t very profound with my answer, but I thought quickly and answered the best that I could explaining that flow was when everything works in sync.  It seemed right, but never really thought about it again until I my father gave me a book called Flow.  Being at the point in my life where I now enjoy learning about the deeper meaning of things and how life works I was interested in this flow phenomenon.

The book explains how Psychologists investigated “optimal experiences” and revealed that what makes an experience genuinely satisfying is a state of consciousness called flow.  During flow people typically experience deep enjoyment, creativity and a total involvement with life.  We can learn as human beings how to control this positive state and how we can order information in our consciousness to discover true happiness and improve the quality of our lives.

Each of us finds our own experiences that put us in a state of flow.  Examples of activities would be making music, rock climbing, dancing, sailing, playing chess and so forth.  What makes these activities conducive to flow is that they were designed to make optimal experience easier to achieve.  They have rules that require the learning of skills, they set up goals, they provide feedback, they make control possible.  You must use concentration and total involvement by making the activity different from everyday existence.

Games give us the opportunity to go beyond the boundaries of ordinary experience.  In competition, the participant must stretch his/her skills to meet the challenge provided.  The roots of the word “compete” are Latin and mean “to seek together”.  What each person actually seeks is to realize their potential and this task is easier when others force us to do our best.  Competition improves experience only if the attention is focused on the activity itself and yourself doing the best you can.  If goals are focused on beating the opponent, wanting to impress audience or obtaining a big contract then competition becomes a distraction rather than an incentive to focus consciously on what is happening.

Exodus has been training clients for the Ocean City Triathlon which is being held on Sunday, May 20^th.  We have taught people that training consciously is a very important part of the game.  I hope that each participant in this race finds his/her own flow.  And it provides them with a sense of discovery, a creative feeling of growth.   When pushed to higher levels of performance, the participant is tapping into undreamed states of consciousness and therefore transforms the self.

Find flow in your life to expand your self mentally, physically and spiritually.