Achieving a Flow State

Examined the ideas of psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's  'Flow' way back. And now read a piece in medium by John Boitnott that points to work saying that multitasking is killing our brains.   Gives some ideas about achieving it.   Yes, need that protection with new devices popping up every day.  Also see the post on the 'Flow Game' tag below.

The Flow Game

I was reminded of the Flow game by Daniel H. Pink's recent book: Drive: The Surprising Truth about what Motivates Us. (P. 118) by Jenova Chen and based on Csikszentmihalyi's theory of being 'in the flow' in an almost trance-like state when excelling in performance. The free down-loadable game and more about it can be seen here.

" ... FlOw is a game about piloting an aquatic organism through a surreal biosphere where players consume other organisms, evolve, and advance their organisms to the abyss. As part of Jenova Chen's thesis research, flOw inherits an embedded design of active DDA (dynamic difficulty adjustment), players with differing skill levels can intuitively customize their experiences in the zone and enjoy the game at their own pace. “Addicting” is the most common word its fans use to describe it .... "

More on Flow.
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Csikszentmihalyi's Flow Game

Learned about Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's Flow Theory in a Sciam article about television addiction then tracked his work for some time, Flow " ... which holds that people are happy and fulfilled when they are fully immersed in what they are doing ... In short; flow could be described as a state where attention, motivation, and the situation meet, resulting in a kind of productive harmony or feedback ... "

Notably presented in his work: Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience and 1998 book Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement With Everyday Life. His ideas were naturally picked up by game designers.