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Go with the flow
- 1. GO W I T H T H E F L O W
- 2. 2 Jobs Eating habits Childcare / Education Time Dramatic shifts in… Social lives
- 4. 4 Everyone’s had their own BBC moment
- 6. 6 Good for simple tasks
- 8. “Doing whatyou love, the way youlike to do it, is the way to learn the most, that when you are doing somethingwith such enjoyment thatyou don’t notice thatthe time passes” ALBERT EINSTEIN
- 9. 9 “Pleasure, delight, creativity and process when we are completely immersed in life” MIHALY CZIKSENTMIHALY
- 10. “Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless like water… water can flow or it can crash. Be water my friend”. BRUCE LEE
- 11. 11 Creativity Increased… Productivity Happiness for the long haul
- 12. 12 Too easy Chosen task is… Too difficult Aligned to our abilities with a little stretch
- 13. Doodling adds a layer of complexity
- 14. Beat the enemy… or your own record
- 17. 17 Switch to silent A few tips… Check only at defined times of the day Combine similar tasks into the same time slot
- 18. 18 The Pomodoro technique 25 minutes of focus 5 minute break
- 20. A reason for being
- 23. Get some fresh air
Editor's Notes
- Hi my name is Atisha. I, like many of us, have been working from home for over a year now. Come to think of it, I haven’t been to the office at all since the beginning of lockdown.
- Thinking back, the last year has transformed almost every aspect of our lives. We’ve seen dramatic shifts in our jobs, social lives, childcare, education, our eating habits and even our collective sense of time. Have you ever found yourself wondering what day is it or how is it already June?
- In a year known for zoom burnout, PPE scandals and banana bread recipes, perhaps no other phenomenon will have a more lasting impact that WFH or work from home. A once much desired novelty to escape the office buzz has now become the norm and the reality of the future. But working from home can come with its own set of distractions – even if you’re working alone. Our personal lives have been merged with our professional lives and have somewhat blurred the lines between work and personal time.
- It has probably all given us our own BBC moment with kids or fur babies interrupting meetings or wanting attention while we’re trying to focus. I had been attending online lectures over the last year and all of them were recorded – going back and listening to the recordings – almost every time I spoke you could hear my teething 2-year-old in the background.
- More than a year in, most of us have developed some sort of routine that we stick to. Maybe make a cup of coffee, then check our emails or catch up on social media before the work day begins. Can you think of the last time that you broke out of this daily routine? Can you remember how you felt when you did this? Pre-covid we could break out of our routines a lot more than we do now. Maybe there was an accident on the highway and to avoid traffic you took a new route to work or maybe you went to a different coffee shop and then felt like you were cheating on your regular barista. Breaking out of a routine can make us feel uneasy or it can be freeing.
- Don’t get me wrong, routine can be good for simple tasks like getting kids ready for school or bedtime but when we stick to a routine our brain is working on auto-pilot. This means that our brain is running along the same neural pathways or ‘schemas’ that’s it’s learned to work over time. When we do this, we are doing very little to expand or ‘work’ our brains in any way. An on-going routine basically requires little thought or conscious processing – things we can do in our sleep – and it fails to adequately exercise our brains. We’re also under an enormous amount of stress right now from issues relating to job security and the health and well-being of our loved ones. When we are under stress our brains are wired to be reactionary and we limit our thinking to binary choices. Distractions combined with the routine or sameness of every day and the added stress can have a negative impact on our creativity. As designers we heavily rely on our ability to put ideas together in new and useful combinations to solve problems and creativity is often enhanced when we’re exposed to new situations.
- I want to now tell you a little about Hayao Miyazaki who is a Japanese animator and director. He is most famously known for the movie Spirted Away which was the highest grossing film in Japanese history. Miyazaki throughout his career made his entire team draw by hand. His directed his movies by rendering even the tiniest details on paper. As designers we can appreciate this as many of us start our design process by sketching on paper even though we have an arsenal of design tools available to us. Studio Ghibli where Miyazaki worked is one of the only studios in the world where almost the whole production process is carried out using traditional techniques. Miyazaki, who is now 80 years old, is so passionate about his work that even the day after he retired, he went back to Studio Ghibli to continue drawing. He could even be found at the studio on a Sunday, sketching away, not wanting to be disturbed by anyone. When Miyazaki draws he achieves a state of flow which he greatly enjoys. Many artists might seem reclusive, but what they are really doing is protecting the time that brings them happiness.
- Albert Einstein, aside from being one of the greatest physicists, was also an armature musician. He once wrote to his son advising him on piano lessons that his son had been taking. He wrote “Doing what you love, the way you like to do it, is the way to learn the most, that when you are doing something with such enjoyment that you don’t notice that the time passes”. When asked, Einstein said that if he hadn’t been a physicist, he would have been happy as a musician. When he wasn’t focused on physics and mathematics, he would play the violin. He achieved flow either by working on his formulas or by playing music. Albert Einstein, even on his deathbed, continued to work – writing down formulas that he hoped would unite all forces in the universe in a single theory.
- Mihaly Czikszentmihaly describes the state of flow as the pleasure, delight, creativity and process when we are completely immersed in life. You can think of it as the feeling you get when you’re going for a run and completely lose all sense of time or maybe even when you’re playing a game and you’re immersed in defeating the enemy that you don’t realise that you’ve been at it for hours.
- You are completely immersed in the experience, not thinking about or distracted by anything else. You become part of what you are doing. This is the kind of experience that Bruce Lee’s quote describes. “Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless like water… water can flow or it can crash. Be water my friend”.
- We all probably know that being in a flow state increases levels creativity, productivity and happiness but research has shown that people who experience flow states have more creative days – so flow doesn’t just heighten creativity in the moment – it heightens it over the long haul. Flow trains us to be more creative. There are a few ways in which you can achieve flow while working or doing anything for that matter.
- We need to choose a difficult task – but something that’s not too difficult. Everything that we do, for example any task, our job, or playing a sport has a specific set of rules associated to it. We need a set of skills to follow these rules. If the rules for achieving a task is too basic relative to our skillset, we will likely get bored. On the other hand, if we take on something too difficult in relation to our skillset, we will almost certainly give up and feel frustrated. The key is to find a middle-ground with a task aligned to our abilities with just a little stretch. It’s in our nature to feel a sense of achievement when we complete a task. As designers perhaps, we want to learn a new software program when prototyping or discover new things that a certain tool can do. It’s that ‘added extra’ that will take you out of your comfort zone.
- However quite often we are faced with tasks that are boring yet we need to do them. This could be things like doing the dishes or getting to all the admin piling up in your inbox. How do you get through these tasks? We’ve all been bored in meetings and maybe start doodling to keep ourselves amused. Doodling while in a meeting is one way of adding a layer of complexity to a boring task to make it more enjoyable. Maybe you’re doodling right now?
- Another way to achieve flow is by having clear and concrete objectives. If we think of any video game the objective is pretty clear – beat the enemy or your own record while following a set of explicitly defined rules. We often find that in organisations, a team’s mission or objectives are not always clearly defined or clearly communicated. As a result, employees don’t know what their objectives are.
- We can look at how we define objectives by using the compass vs maps analogy. A map can be a great tool to help you reach your destination. When a map is accurate, you can follow your course – without much hesitation. But what if the map is wrong? When new roads are built or when there’s roadworks in place, you find yourself relying on an outdated set of instructions. Maps in our world can be things such as lengthy requirements documentation or rigid processes that need to be followed. Think about how you and your team approach work or a new project in your organisation. Do you require detailed step-by-step instructions and handholding at every moment – this is a map. Or would you rather have a compass that provides you with a clear vision of your destination and equips you and your team with the tools to navigate your own path? A compass requires the user to employ creativity and autonomy to discover their own path. In the fast-paced world that we live in a detail map may lead you deep into the woods but a good compass will always take you where you need to go.
- It’s said that we’re plagued with an epidemic of multi-tasking. Concentrating on a single task is another way in which you can achieve flow state. Picture this, you’re listening to a podcast while trying to send an important email. A Teams chat appears from a colleague who has an urgent question. You chat to your colleague and give her the info she needs. You then decide that you’d like a cup of coffee. Half an hour goes by and you’ve forgotten what that email was about. We often think that multitasking or combining tasks saves us time. Our brains can take in millions of bits of information but can only process a few dozen per second. When we’re saying that we are multitasking we’re actually switching back and forth between tasks very quickly. We end up spending more energy switching between tasks that we don’t do any of them as well as we should. Research has shown that working on multiple things at once lowers our productivity by around 60%. Concentrating on one thing at a time is probably the most important factor in achieving flow.
- A few practical tips to concentrate on a single task maybe – switching your phone to silent when you’re concentrating on something or only checking your emails at defined times of the day. You can also group like tasks together so you can do them in the same allocated time – maybe paying a bill while catching up on other admin.
- Something that I personally use is the Pomodoro technique. This technique uses a timer to break down work into intervals of 25 minutes separated by breaks of 5 minutes. The idea behind this technique is that the time instils in us a sense of urgency. With working from home and the blurred boundaries that we experience – we can sometimes feel like there are endless hours in the workday to get our work done and then we end up squandering those precious work hours on distractions. When following the Pomodoro technique, you know you only have that 25 minutes to make as much progress as you can. You can even focus on a task for say 50 minutes and then take a longer break.
- If you think back to when you were a child you probably had an idea of what you wanted to be when you grow up. I wanted to be a scientist when I grew up and this came from watching TV shows at the time such as Popular Mechanics for Kids and Bill Nye the Science guy. Growing up there were things that I was good at and things that I wasn’t so good at. When I got to high school, I didn’t see myself wanting to do physics for a year longer than I had do. If you think back to your childhood you probably had an idea of what you wanted to do, but your parents and guardians probably had a different idea of what you should do – basically something that would ensure you would make some money and be financially stable. But there’s also an element of doing something that the world needs which is becoming increasingly important in the world we live in.
- IKIGAI is a Japanese concept which means a reason for being. It considers the elements of what do you love, what are you good at, what can you get paid for and what does the world need? It’s a thing that you live for. To put it in another way, Ikigai is what motivates you to get out of bed every morning. The idea is that if we design our lives around these 4 areas, we will be healthier, happier and wealthier than we’ve ever been.
- Looking at this diagram, doing something you love and something the world needs is described as your Mission. Your mission can be something like volunteering to teach underprivileged children a skill that you have or volunteering at a shelter. It’s something that fulfils a purpose, but you don’t get paid for it. We then look at doing something you’re good at and something you love. I love baking and I can say that I’m good at it, but not at the level where it could pay my bills. This is referred to as your Passion. If you’re good at something and you’re paid for it – this is your profession or your job. Even the joker would agree “If you’re good at something, never do it for free”. The last one is something the world needs and you get paid for it – this is your vocation. A vocation is different from your profession in that it is something outside your profession or something additional that you can get paid for. Someone may be good at singing and they get paid for it, but it’s something they maybe do in addition to their profession or day job. Your IKIGAI or reason for being can be seen as a balance of these 4 areas. You can use this diagram to identify the different aspects in your life and out what is your reason for being. This could change over time so this would need to be revisited occasionally. Flow is said to occur when you are consistently doing something you love, something you are good at, with the added benefits of being paid for it and something the world needs. Flow can be seen as being in tune with your IKIGAI, or activities that give your life meaning and purpose.
- Another way to enhance creativity is to expand your network. Research has shown that diverse networks enhance creativity and that knowledge diversity positively correlates with individual creativity. Interacting with people of diverse backgrounds enables us to understand multiple perspectives and this enhances our creative problem-solving ability. There are hundreds of events, meetups and conferences, similar to UXSA, which now take place online and attending some of these can help expand your network and enhance your creativity.
- Have you ever sat at your desk and looked outside into your garden and though to yourself that you could get so much more done if you could have a few minutes outside? Nothing beats a breath of fresh air or a long walk if you’re struggling to get through the work day. Several studies have found that spending time in nature is a great way to get your creative juices flowing. We spoke earlier about our collective sense of time. When you spend time in nature you experience a natural shift in how you view time. When you spend time in nature, you tend to feel a sense of awe – as though time is expanding instead of feeling pressured by time or a lack of time that we experience if we’re at our desks all day. People enjoy a sense of time abundance when they are in nature and this helps you slow down and find the inspiration you are looking for which will enhance your creativity.
- If you’ve tried any of these methods and it’s worked for your or perhaps you’ve tried something different that works to improve your creativity. Here are my details if you like to get in touch. Thank you