In this inspiring article about mastery, Marcia Reynolds gives us some hints on how to get into "the zone of mastery" or, as Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi calls it, in the "Flow".
There is one passage in the article that I find fascinating.
"I found the best competitors do not think about anything, not even winning, when they perform at their best. Thinking of winning causes their brains to entertain the possibility of losing."
Isn't it ironic that the best performers avoid thinking about winning to express their full potential in a society so obsessed with results and achievements?
Keeping the focus on the prize is a common mistake in goal settings. You set an audacious goal, maybe a SMART one and then, because you want to be sure to get it, you keep your eyes on it all the time. As a result, you're not in the here and now. And Marcia says, "being fully present while performing is the critical factor that can put you over the top into the zone of mastery".
I created a process called FREE to transform goals into intentions to create flow. It goes as follow:
FIND: First, I set a goal, and I spend time finding what makes it meaningful to me
REWRITE: Then I think about what I need to change to get where I want. Who do I need to become to achieve that goal? What do I have to learn? Which habits, rituals, and structures do I have to install? This step transforms the journey into a learning process.
EXPERIENCE: Finally, I forget about the goal and focus only on the experience, on being consistent with the new habits and rituals.
EXPAND: even if I don't consistently achieve the results that I set at the beginning, I always learn something valuable in the end that I can apply in other parts of my life.
Note:Â On Jan 7 2022, the post was edited to do a few minor language tweaks and to add the opening image.