Sublime

Two inner forces can drive a person to use all of his capabilities. He can be competence-driven or achievement-driven. The former concerns itself with job or task mastery. A virtuoso violinist who continues to practice day after day is obviously moved by something other than a need for esteem and recognition. He works to sharpen his own skill,

We know, at some level, that when we are not focusing, we are not using one of our greatest capacities. Starved of flow, we become stumps of ourselves, sensing somewhere what we might have been.

La Psychologie de l’expérience optimale porte sur le processus de la recherche du bonheur par la maîtrise de sa vie intérieure.

The more a job inherently resembles a game—with variety, appropriate and flexible challenges, clear goals, and immediate feedback—the more enjoyable it will be regardless of the worker’s level of development.

‘flow’ to describe the happiness that comes from being completely and unreflectively immersed in an activity, whether it’s guitar playing, rock climbing, or studying molecular genetics.

Second, we must be able to concentrate on what we are doing. Third and fourth, the concentration is usually possible because the task undertaken has clear goals and provides immediate feedback. Fifth, one acts with a deep but effortless involvement that removes from awareness the worries and frustrations of everyday life. Sixth, enjoyable

In our studies, we found that every flow activity, whether it involved competition, chance, or any other dimension of experience, had this in common: It provided a sense of discovery, a creative feeling of transporting the person into a new reality. It pushed the person to higher levels of performance, and led to previously undreamed-of states of

A person can master flow activities in almost any environment. A few will need to live in the wilderness, or to spend long periods of time alone at sea. Most people will prefer to be surrounded by the reassuring hustle and bustle of human interaction.

Happiness, or “flow,” occurs when we are: • intensely focused on an activity • of our own choosing, that is • neither underchallenging (boreout) nor overchallenging (burnout), that has • a clear objective, and that receives • immediate feedback.