Going with the flow

Imagine you are on a long drive through lush green mountains. Fresh air fills your lungs and you are completely focused on driving as well as you can. You know exactly how to move at each moment. There is no future, no past. There is only the present. You feel the cold air filling your lungs, your warm car seat, your body, and your consciousness united as a single entity. You are completely immersed in the experience, not thinking about or distracted by anything else. Your ego dissolves, and you become part of what you are doing.

This is the kind of experience Bruce Lee described with his famous “Be water, my friend.”

We’ve all felt our sense of time vanish when we lose ourselves in an activity we enjoy.

What makes us enjoy doing something so much that we forget about whatever worries we might have while we do it ? When are we happiest ?

Let’s try to find answers to them.

What is Flow ?

AS Csikzentmihalyi asserts in his book Flow : The Psychology of Optimal Experience, flow is “the state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience itself is so enjoyable that people will do it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it.

But what happens to our mind when we are in that state ? When we flow, we are focused on a concrete task without any distractions. Our mind is “in order”. The opposite occurs when we try to do something while our mind is on other things.

If you find yourself losing focus while working on something you consider important, try integrating below framework into your daily life.

Achieving Flow

1. Challenge 🥊

   Choose a task that is challenging enough to complete but not hard, if its too easy you will be bored, if its too hard you will be anxious and overwhelmed. It is important to have a clear, concrete objective to avoid unnecessary mental blocks.

2. Focus 🎯

   Be in a distraction free environment.

   Have control over what we are doing at every moment.

3. Momentum 🏆

   Get small wins under your belt

How to choose a task that is hard enough ?

🔹1. Define Your Current Capability (Baseline)

Assess your current level with brutal honesty:

• What skills do you already have?

• What types of tasks feel effortless, and which ones cause strain or hesitation?

Use simple categories:

• ✅ Easy: Can do without thinking

• 🟨 Medium: Takes effort but achievable without failure

• 🟥 Hard: Fail repeatedly or require frequent outside help

🔹 2. Target the “Goldilocks Zone”

Pick a task that:

• Is just one level harder than what you can do comfortably.

• Causes some friction, but not overwhelm.

• Makes you concentrate fully, but with occasional small wins.

🔹 3. Use the 70% Rule

Choose tasks where:

• You estimate you can complete 70% successfully with current skills.

• The remaining 30% requires growth, problem-solving, or stretch.

This prevents burnout while building resilience and competence.

🔹 4. Simulate Stakes or Feedback Loops

The task must provide:

• Immediate feedback (so you can correct fast),

• Or clear consequences (so your brain stays engaged).

Examples:

• Code that compiles or fails..

• Public content that gets reactions.

🔹 5. Time-Box Your Effort

Set a time limit (e.g., 45–90 mins).

• If it’s too easy, escalate complexity.

• If it’s impossible, downshift the scope slightly.

This prevents perfectionism and analysis paralysis.

🔹 6. Ask: Will This Make Me Stronger, Smarter, or More Valuable?

Challenge isn’t just difficulty — it must translate into one of:

• Increased competence

• Broader capability

• Higher market value

If it doesn’t, it might be just difficult — not useful.

✅ Example for a Solopreneur:

Let’s say you’re refining your product offer.

• Too easy: Watch a YouTube tutorial on offer writing.

• Too hard: Build and launch an entire funnel today.

• Flow Zone: Write a 300-word sales blurb and test it in a live post.

Takeaway: Structure Your Life for Flow, Not Balance

Your greatest advantage is autonomy. But without structure, autonomy becomes drift. To operate at your peak:

• Anchor each day around a single, demanding creative task. Not urgent. Not reactive. Meaningful.

• Design your environment to eliminate cognitive friction. Fewer inputs. Longer blocks of time. Less noise.

• Elevate your leisure. Read demanding texts. Pursue difficult hobbies. Recover through challenge, not sedation.

• Treat Flow not as a mood, but as your default operating state. With repetition, it becomes muscle memory.

The reward is not just output — it is presence. And from presence comes the only kind of mastery worth pursuing: one rooted in alignment between who you are, what you build, and how you live.

If you read it to the end,

Congrats 🎉🎉

You just experienced flow. You read 800 words without getting distracted.