One of my minor goals this year is to achieve a psychological “flow state” most days.   I consider myself successful if I accomplish that state of timeless immersion while birding or cleaning or gardening or tax planning…. 

My approach, which might be ridiculous, is to have 5 to 10 tasks on my calendar for the day, but to just plan for 15 minutes per task.

If during those 15 minutes I don’t get into it, I move on to a different task.

If I do get absorbed, I ignore my timer and go with the flow.  Occasionally I really get into it and work or play for hours.  More often my chore list or my phone distracts me and I’m not in the zone for long.

I rarely get in a state of flow  with other people unless we have some outward focus such as working on an interesting project, traveling, or playing a game. 

I don’t count online shopping or reddit scrolling as a flow state.

While I was working I would sometimes get into flow at work, and in reading on my weekly day “off off”.  More often (whether at work or while off) I was madly hopping from chore to chore and never getting on top of everything.

One of the lovely things about being retired is that I have time to achieve flow with a wider variety of tasks. 

My best recent change has been to choose an active task immediately after I eat.  I am less likely to overeat or to lose hours of my day on the phone or computer. 

I’m torn about whether engrossing reading counts towards my flow goal.   I  certainly get immersed in a good book, so why not count it.