E26. Demystifying Flow: Active vs. Passive Flow and How They Work for Creativity and Life

You've probably heard of flow - aka being in the zone; being in your element - but did you know that flow can be active OR passive? Active flow is that state you enter when you're totally immersed in the moment and the activity you're doing just...flows. It can happen during creative practice, athletics, just about any activity. But what about the rest of the time? Is flow all or nothing? I don't think so. I believe there's such a thing as passive flow that we can cultivate in our lives to make life more enjoyable and active flow more accessible. If active flow can be characterized as swimming with the current, you can see passive flow as floating with the current. All of us have access passive flow - it's already there in our lives. Except most of us have let its streambed get clogged with junk. In this episode I talk about how to remove some of that junk and let the stream flow again. Plus, I announce a small change I'm making to the podcast format for its six-month anniversary next Friday!

This episode's corresponding blog post can be found here.

The previous week's blog post on discovery writing and flow can be found here.

Find out more about Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's classic book about flow here.

Find out more about the Star Trek podcast I was recently on here. The podcast is called Yelling About Star Trek, and I'm in episode 14.