Experiencing Flow

Have you ever been so absorbed in what you were doing that time seemed to disappear?

Focused, energised, fully engaged. You lose track of time. Self-doubt quiets down. The task itself becomes rewarding.

This is flow – the optimal state between boredom and anxiety – where high challenge meets high skill and experience becomes deeply absorbing.

In Experiencing Flow, psychologist Susan A. Jackson, PhD, draws on four decades of research, applied practice, and direct collaboration with Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, the founder of flow, to explain what flow really is, why it matters, and how to make it more likely in sport, work, creative pursuits, and everyday life.

Experiencing Flow is a grounded, practical guide to the conditions, habits, and mental skills that help flow emerge more often, and help life feel richer when it does.

Through stories, research, interviews, and reflection exercises, Jackson shows how flow grows when:

• Challenge and skill are well matched, and both extending the individual
• Goals are clear
• Feedback is immediate
• Attention is fully engaged in the task
• The experience becomes rewarding in itself

Inside this book, you’ll discover how to:

• Understand the core dimensions of the flow experience
• Create conditions that make flow more likely in work, sport, creative arts, and daily life
• Move from anxiety towards flow through acceptance and psychological flexibility
• Lift yourself out of boredom through challenge, growth, and a mastery mindset
• Use mindfulness practices such as breath awareness, meditation, and body-based attention to support deeper presence and steadier focus
• Pursue high performance in ways that also deepen enjoyment, meaning, and engagement

Bringing together science, lived experience, and examples from elite athletes, climbers, performers, and professionals, Experiencing Flow offers more than a definition of flow. It offers a way to understand what makes life feel engaging, meaningful, and worth returning to.

At its heart, this book makes a simple but powerful argument:

A good life is not measured by outcomes, but by the quality of the experiences that make it up.

Whether you want to perform better, focus more deeply, or simply feel more alive in your work and daily life, Experiencing Flow is a thoughtful and practical guide to a more engaged way of living.

Dr. Susan A. Jackson is a renowned psychologist and author, celebrated for her pioneering work on the psychological concept of flow. Her expertise includes high-performance psychology consulting, academic research, writing, and flow experience assessment. With a PhD in Sport and Exercise Psychology, Sue has extensive experience in the sports, performance, and health industries. Her profound insights into flow stem from her close collaboration with Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, the founder of the flow concept. Together, they co-authored Flow in Sports, which was instrumental in bringing an understanding of flow to athletes and coaches. In Experiencing Flow, Sue shares practical strategies for achieving optimal experiences and unlocking human potential across various domains, solidifying her as a leading voice in the field.