Are You Engaged?
Contrary to what the title or the preview picture may suggest, this article is not about inter-human relationships. Staying true to the title however, it is an article on engagements, only of a different type. The one between the thoughts and emotions which leads to a harmonious state of consciousness. Some call this state the FLOW, some call it ‘being in their zone’, some think of it as bliss and some say, it is simply happiness.
Before moving further, I would first like to delve into happiness. I have touched upon it earlier as well but this time in a new light, in a new perspective. What is Happiness? An emotional state is what it is, and state changes. It does not remain constant.
I had come to decorate happiness so much that I had started looking at it like a drug. In my quest to remain happy all the time, I was never able to be happy. Instead of treating it like a state of mind, I had come to treat it like a perpetual state of being. I expected myself to get up happy and beaming, drive to work humming, answer calls with joy and treat everyone with grace. The question is, if I spend all my energy in thinking about beaming, humming, joy and grace, how am I going to be able to go about finishing my work effectively? Confused?
Let me give you an example. I love playing squash. When on the court, time flies for me. I’m deeply engrossed in the game. All my energies are invested in the game at hand. I’m hardly thinking about the car I drove in or the breakfast I’m going to eat soon after. I don’t know how I am feeling because I don’t have necessary resources free to think about it. I am only playing. In other words I am engaged completely. It is only after the game that I have the resources freed to let me know that I am feeling good, that it was a good game and to be happy with myself for the great workout. Can you imagine the result if I started to think before playing each shot? I guess that is what is called distraction and we all know what the end result of a distraction in a sport is. Not only is it detrimental to the result of the game but also to the overall experience.
I am someone who gets swayed by emotions very easily. One minute I’m ecstatic and the other I’m like a deflated tyre. This to and fro motion keeps me forever on the edge, anxious and restless. Therefore it was important for me to objectify happiness. I set out and started by reading a book called FLOW by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. As I went through the book and explored the concept of happiness I had an insight of it being a state of emotion and not of a being and any state of emotion can only be reached a state of doing, an action, as we saw with the example of squash.
Doing or being involves engagement of the mind. The mind is the source of all the emotions. Logically, the quality of engagement of the mind will reflect the quality of emotions too. The engagement can be based on two parameters — skill and challenge. When the challenges meet the skills appropriately, Mihaly says we are in a state of FLOW. Any other state is potentially undesirable for the mind as we can see from the graph below.
Yes ladies and gentlemen, this is the engagement that I was referring to. As human beings we derive the greatest pleasure from engagement, not from withdrawal. We are social animals after all.
I am a soul who always needs a plan. It need not be necessarily enterprising but there has to be a plan. As trivial as catching up with friends at a bar, but a plan always has to be in place. That’s because I like to keep myself engaged. An introvert may find engagement in herself, but she needs engagement too nevertheless. The engagement brings a sense of fulfillment and purpose to life which avoids feelings of boredom, stress and anxiety.
An interesting thing to note here is that the activity is devoid of judgement (positive or negative). While I might be at a bar having a drink and someone else at home meditating, we are both in bliss because our skills are fulfilling our needs( need of connection in my case and need of meaning for the other). The bottom line is when an activity is pursued with all consciousness and autonomously, it ends up bringing joy irrespective of what the activity is. In the long run of course a positive act is sustainable while a negative isn’t.
I don’t know about you, but even when on a vacation I get bored and anxious really easily unless I have activities that keep me involved and my mind at bay. I’m hardly the type who can appreciate a sunset for more than ten minutes or sit by the beach all day long! A sense of purpose is very essential for me. While most of my goals seem mostly extrinsic, the ones who have more intrinsic goals can handle sunsets and sea beaches better. What is important is a sense of purpose and that purpose becomes the challenge that needs our skills engaged. The higher the purpose the more difficult it might be but so will be its rewards in terms of how one feels.
SPOILT FOR CHOICE
When the thought to objectify happiness came to my mind, so did another thought. Isn’t the natural state of the mind to be happy? Turns out not. On the contrary, the mind if left ideal will tend to focus on some real or imaginary pain, on some long term frustrations or ponder over fears of uncertainty. This is possible because we are capable of having more than one goal in mind and that is thanks to the evolution of the mind and the development of the cerebral cortex. Another major reason for this psychic entropy( state of mind where your thoughts cannot flow to have concrete ideas but are stuck in the same state of thought like a Merry go Round) is the fact that we have ever more increasing choices to choose from.
Think about it. Back in the 90’s a vanilla and a chocolate ice cream was all that there was. One had a simple choice to make and the chances of being content with the choice were fifty percent. Today when we go to an ice cream store, choosing a flavour is no less stressful than choosing a career. You have vanilla in your mind, while you see someone ordering a black currant and you end up going for a tender coconut only to regret not having taken the guava flavour! So much for eating ice-cream, instead of relieving one of stress it only adds more.
The mind is a very powerful object. It has the power to create as it does to destroy. We must remember, “With great power comes great responsibility”. To be aware of what our attention is on is the first step. If one is in a good space the mind is positively engaged, if not one has to act with caution. The reason I started investigating this topic was that the psychic entropy within me was disturbing me. I needed to understand what was happening within me. My conclusion is that this psychic entropy, whenever it occurs is a challenge and an indication to develop appropriate skills to master it. In my case, my challenge is my emotional instability. I cannot let situations get the better of me and hence I need to develop the skills to overcome this infirmity. When my mind is involved in acquiring those necessary skills my attention will not be on my distress or pain but instead on the solutions, not on what I cannot do but on what I can.
PS: If you liked the article and want to delve further into the topic I highly recommend you read FLOW by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.
