Mihai Chiksentmihayi "Potok". Non-standard approach to happiness

To the question "Are you happy?" Most people are unlikely to answer unequivocally. For each person the concept of happiness includes a number of these or other factors. This allows us to say that the state of well-being is subjective. But is there happiness that will have the characteristics of inalienability and transcendence? This question is answered by the psychologist Mihai Chikszentmihayi.

Theory of streaming experience and modern psychological knowledge

Most psychologists in the development of their theories relied on material obtained from unhealthy patients - neurotics. For example, such is the well-known Freudian psychoanalysis.

The work that Mihai Chiksentmihayi created was "Flow. Psychology of optimal experience "- reflects one of the most authoritative concepts in modern psychological science. Chiksentmihayi, like Maslow, is the scientist who placed the healthy person at the center of the corner. Flow theory finds applications in a variety of domains. This is clinical psychotherapy, increasing efficiency in educational processes, corrective work with juvenile delinquents.

What is missed by a reasonable man?

In our time, many for some reason predict the end of European civilization. On the other hand, we often forget about the scale of the progress that we managed to achieve. Chikszentmihayi emphasizes: our possibilities are incommensurably greater than those that people had, for example, in the times of Ancient Rome. What could not a man achieve? The answer is simple: he could not become happy. Moreover, in this respect, there is not even any progress.

Merciless statistics show that in civilized countries, since the nineteenth century, there has been a gradual increase in the number of suicides.

State of well-being and modern culture

In his book the scientist comes to the conclusion that happiness is a subjective concept. Satisfying one needs, a person inevitably encounters the fact that new ones come into their place. Well-being always eludes. Each culture sought to solve this problem in its own way. For example, by faith in God. But how many people do we know whom she made happy? When beliefs fail, their place is taken up with the desired goods: material wealth, power, sex. But they do not bring rest.

So, we have learned to satisfy our physical needs, but not spiritual ones. Obviously, happiness is largely determined by the conditions that life presents to us. A man without a roof over his head is unlikely to feel satisfied. People who live in an unstable political environment will not be particularly enthusiastic either. And, of course, those who have problems in family life can not be fully happy.

What is the state of the flow and its features

But in fact, thus, people a priori can not find peace? Each god gives his own cross, most often, seemingly unbearable.

Chiksentmihayi was able to answer this question. What a person needs to catch a bird of subjective happiness is not a greenhouse existence at all, with no problems at all. And not even a state of relaxation. What to say, if 1.4% of those who commit suicide do so because of ... satiety with life.

No. Happiness brings something completely different; The scientist gives this state the name "flow". The book (Mihai Chikszentmihayi argues that it is the result of twenty-five years of research) is devoted to how anyone can achieve it. Paradoxically, it is even akin to pain. This is the pursuit of the goal.

Should we feel comfortable achieving it? And the answer to this question is also negative. It's unlikely that the runner, who is approaching the finish line, feels himself like in a home armchair.

The state of control and power over the events of his own life is described by Mihai Chikszentmihayi. The flow is the point at which a person surpasses his strength; The point where you can find true happiness.

How Human Consciousness Works

The truth of our existence is the fact that we will never achieve complete security and fulfillment of all desires, says Mihai Chiksentmihayi. The flow differs from the state of temporary satisfaction by the fact that the latter is due to external factors. For some, the obstacle is something that can completely destroy them. For others - an incentive that provokes the maximum concentration and control of perception.

Consciousness behaves selectively in relation to all the diversity of surrounding information. It "snatches" from it those pieces that correspond to its internal content. Concentration on the negative only leads to its growth. Because of this, a person comes to a state of internal disorder or entropy, which is the opposite of happiness.

How to enter the state of the flow?

The condition for the creation of the flow is immersion in activity, says Mihai Chiksentmihayi. In search of flow, a person needs to be able to identify those activities that simultaneously correspond to his abilities, and are a challenge. Types of such activities are innumerable. It can be anything: competitions in a variety of sports, honing skills in the visual arts, work in the field of entrepreneurship, says Mihai Chiksentmihayi. The psychology of the flow has an important aspect: the state of true happiness is impossible without strenuous efforts.

Although it can arise spontaneously, in most cases, one can not do without diligence, Mihai Chiksentmihayi warns us. The flow is not favorable to those who are lazy.

So, satisfaction of vital human needs is an important component of life, but inner well-being is in a completely different field. "Potok" is a book (Mihai Chikszentmihayi emphasizes its universality), which is able to teach everyone to be happy: from the cleaner to the shareholders of transnational companies.