Research Hit: How to Get Your Brain Into Flow
A new neuroimaging study gives us new information on how we can get into flow state
Didn’t you report on the brain and flow previously?
Yes, I reported on a study in 2021 which also looked at the brain and flow - that study was however more descriptive of what is happening during flow. This study just out, by David Rosen et al. of Drexel University in the USA, focused specifically on how to get into a flow state.
Remind me, and readers, what flow state is?
I’ll repeat from my previous post (to save time): Flow is that state of being totally immersed in something when you are totally engaged and may also, for example lose track of time, being in the zone, and not notice tiredness or fatigue until you’re done. Famously proposed by the American-Hungarian psychologist with the unpronounceable name, Mihaly Csiksgentmihalyi, in his book of the same name in 1990.
Yes, I get that at times - it would certainly be good to know how to get into that state!
Indeed but there are many problems, being in the zone, in flow, can happen in many different contexts, sports people report on it, as do writers, and also musicians, to name a few. We already do know some of the conditions such as being at the optimal level of challenge for your ability.
David Rosen et al. focused on Jazz improvisation and took 192 EEG recordings of 33 musicians who were asked to improvise to various jazz tunes which had pre-recorded accompaniments.
The musicians rated their own feeling of being in flow. The pieces were then subsequently rated by four jazz experts.
So what happened - how was flow achieved?
The first thing and most important was that flow states were primarily driven by expertise. The higher the expertise, the higher the chance of getting into flow.
So expertise drives flow, not flow expertise - I think some people get this wrong!
Yes, it is tempting to think that if you get into flow you will be better (admittedly you probably will be) but that expertise is actually a prerequisite. If you are focusing too much on getting it right, you cannot get into a flow state - irrespective of the skill set.
But there was something else that was more important...
Oh, what?
Well the EEG results showed increased activity in regions associated with music, logical with these jazz musicians, but decreased activity in the left frontal regions.
And what do these regions do?
These are the regions associated with so-called “executive control”. So basically you can only achieve flow if you reduce control, if you “let go”.
Ahh that makes sense. So expertise combined with an ability to just let go, lead to flow states.
Precisely. It is important to note that you should build expertise first and then learn to let go.
Good to know!
Reference:
David Rosen, Yongtaek Oh, Christine Chesebrough, Fengqing (Zoe) Zhang, John Kounios.
Creative flow as optimized processing: Evidence from brain oscillations during jazz improvisations by expert and non-expert musicians.
Neuropsychologia, 2024; 196: 108824 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2024.108824