How To Unlock Insane Focus On Command
Summary
TLDRRyan Doris, co-founder and CEO of Research Collective, introduces the concept of Flow State and its four pillars: flow blockers, flow pronus, flow triggers, and the flow cycle. He explains that Flow State is a neuroscientific phenomenon where work feels effortless, and it's characterized by heightened productivity and creativity. Doris emphasizes the importance of training oneself to access this state consistently, especially in the modern workplace, and provides insights on how to overcome common obstacles to achieve a Flow State, ultimately leading to enhanced performance and success.
Takeaways
- 🚀 The concept of 'flow' is a neuroscientific state that makes work feel effortless and enhances productivity, creativity, and learning.
- 🌟 Ryan Doris and Stephen Cutler have taught professionals and organizations how to access the flow state at will for increased productivity.
- 🛑 'Flow blockers' are obstacles like distractions and stress that prevent individuals from entering a flow state, common in the 21st-century workplace.
- 🌬️ 'Flow before phone' is a strategy to engage in productive flow on high-priority tasks for 2-3 hours before using any digital devices.
- 🏃♂️ 'Flow pronus' refers to one's tendency to enter flow states, which can be improved by waking up and starting work within 90 seconds to leverage morning productivity.
- 🎯 'Flow triggers' are preconditions that help individuals enter flow, such as clear goals, immediate feedback, and a balance of challenge and skill.
- 🔄 The 'flow cycle' involves a struggle phase, release into flow, a period of flow, and then recovery, which is essential for consistent flow experiences.
- 🧘 'Attention span stretching' helps to increase focus and persistence through the struggle phase, leading to a deeper flow state.
- 📈 The flow state is characterized by the deactivation of the prefrontal cortex, allowing for rapid, instinctive decision-making.
- 🌈 Achieving flow involves neurochemical changes like increased dopamine, serotonin, and endorphins, as well as brainwave alterations like alpha Theta waves.
- 📚 Applying the four pillars of flow (blockers, pronus, triggers, cycle) can lead to consistent productivity and peak performance in the 21st century.
Q & A
What is the main issue discussed in the transcript?
-The main issue discussed is the struggle to complete tasks efficiently and the concept of 'flow' as a solution to increase productivity.
Who are Ryan Doris and Stephen Cutler, and what is their role?
-Ryan Doris and Stephen Cutler are the co-founders of a research Collective. They have taught thousands of professionals and organizations how to access the Flow State to become more productive.
What are the four pillars of Flow State?
-The four pillars of Flow State are flow blockers, flow pronus, flow triggers, and the flow cycle.
What is Flow State and why is it important?
-Flow State is a state of consciousness where work feels effortless and productivity is at its peak. It's important because it enhances skills critical for thriving in the 21st century, such as learning, creativity, and productivity.
What are some historical examples of individuals who were in a Flow State during their significant accomplishments?
-Examples include Alex Honnold during his free solo climb of El Capitan, Sam Altman's team at OpenAI while coding for Chat GPT, Marie Curie during her pioneering research, and Einstein when he formulated the theory of relativity.
What are the neurochemical and neurophysiological changes that occur during Flow State?
-During Flow State, there is a neurochemical cascade of dopamine, norepinephrine, anandamide, serotonin, endorphins, and the alpha Theta brain waves. There are also performance-enhancing alterations to neuroanatomical changes in the brain.
What is the 'flow before phone' rule and why is it recommended?
-The 'flow before phone' rule suggests getting two to three hours of productive flow on the highest priority task in the morning before turning on or touching a phone. This helps to avoid distractions and enhances productivity.
How can one increase their flow pronus?
-One can increase their flow pronus by waking up and getting to work within 90 seconds of opening their eyes, ensuring their physiology, psychology, and environment are conducive to flow, and doing the most important work in the first two to three hours of the day.
What are the three initial flow triggers identified by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi?
-The three initial flow triggers are clear goals, immediate feedback, and challenge-skills balance.
How can the flow cycle concept be applied to improve productivity?
-The flow cycle concept suggests that flow states are like dimmer switches, requiring persistence through the struggle phase, attention span stretching, and eventually reaching a flow state followed by a recovery phase. This understanding helps in consistently achieving productivity and focus.
What is the goal of the research and teachings mentioned in the transcript?
-The goal is to decipher every research paper on peak performance and flow into easy-to-understand, instantly applicable steps, helping individuals consistently drive themselves into a flow state, which is a critical skill set for thriving in the 21st century.
Outlines
🚀 Understanding the Flow State
This paragraph introduces the concept of the Flow State, explaining why people often struggle to complete tasks efficiently. It introduces Ryan Doris and Stephen Cutler, co-founders of Research Collective, who have taught professionals and organizations how to access the Flow State to increase productivity. The paragraph outlines the four pillars of Flow: flow blockers, flow pronus, flow triggers, and the flow cycle, which are essential for harnessing the power of the Flow State. It emphasizes the importance of flow for productivity and peak performance, providing examples of individuals who have achieved great accomplishments while in this state.
🌞 Maximizing Flow Pronus and Triggers
The second paragraph delves into the concept of flow pronus, which refers to one's tendency to enter the Flow State and the likelihood of doing so. It suggests strategies for increasing flow pronus, such as starting work immediately after waking up. The paragraph also discusses flow triggers, which are preconditions that facilitate entry into the Flow State. It highlights the work of psychologist Mihai Csikszentmihalyi and Stephen Cutler in identifying these triggers, such as clear goals, immediate feedback, and challenge-skill balance. The paragraph emphasizes the importance of incorporating these triggers into daily activities to enhance the ability to enter and sustain the Flow State.
🔄 The Flow Cycle and Persistence
The final paragraph discusses the flow cycle, a concept introduced by Herb Benson and further developed by Stephen Cutler, which explains the stages one goes through when accessing the Flow State. The cycle begins with a struggle phase, where one must persist through discomfort and distraction. This is followed by the release phase, where dopamine increases focus and motivation, leading to the Flow State itself. After the Flow State, there is a recovery phase where one integrates the knowledge or skills acquired. The paragraph emphasizes the importance of persisting through the struggle phase to experience the full benefits of the Flow cycle and suggests techniques like attention span stretching to improve one's ability to enter and maintain the Flow State.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Flow State
💡Flow Blockers
💡Flow Pronus
💡Flow Triggers
💡Flow Cycle
💡Neuroscience
💡Productivity
💡Ryan Doris
💡21st Century Workplace
💡Attention Span Stretching
Highlights
The concept of 'flow' is a neuroscientific explanation for productivity and peak performance.
Flow is a state of consciousness where work feels effortless and is often experienced during activities like biking, surfing, or working on a project.
Ryan Doris and Stephen Cutler have taught professionals and organizations how to access Flow State at will to increase productivity.
The four pillars of Flow State are flow blockers, flow pronus, flow triggers, and the flow cycle.
Flow State is characterized by neurochemicals like dopamine, norepinephrine, anandamide, serotonin, and endorphins, as well as brain waves and neuroanatomical changes.
Alex Honnold, Sam Altman, Marie Curie, and Einstein were able to achieve great feats due to the neurophysiological shifts that occur during flow.
The 21st-century workplace, with its rapid distractions and chronic stress, is not conducive to accessing flow consistently.
Flow blockers, such as smartphones, are the main obstacles to entering a flow state.
The 'flow before phone' rule encourages individuals to engage in productive flow before using their devices.
Flow pronus refers to one's tendency to access flow and the likelihood of entering a flow state.
Waking up and starting work within 90 seconds increases flow pronus and productivity.
Flow triggers are preconditions that drive us into flow, such as clear goals, immediate feedback, and challenge-skill balance.
The flow cycle, as described by Herb Benson and Stephen Cutler, outlines the stages of struggle, release, flow, and recovery.
Persistence through the struggle phase is key to entering flow, which can be achieved through attention span stretching.
During flow, the prefrontal cortex deactivates, allowing for efficient, instinctive decision-making.
The recovery phase after flow is crucial for replenishing and integrating the knowledge and skills acquired during flow.
Understanding and applying the four pillars of flow can lead to consistent productivity and incredible results.
The goal is to make the skill set of driving oneself into a flow state consistently accessible, which is essential for thriving in the 21st century.
Transcripts
have you ever struggled to complete a
task that should have taken 90 minutes
yet after 8 hours of slaving away you
still haven't finished the thing
well there's a neuroscientific
explanation for why this happens and a
simple way to solve it behind the
world's most successful people
stand the four pillars of flow which
allows anyone to become effortlessly
productive now my name is Ryan Doris
co-founder and CEO for research
Collective along with my partner Stephen
Cutler and we've taught thousands of
professionals and organizations how to
access Flow State at will so they can
become drastically more productive in
their working lives it all comes down to
the four pillars of Flow State first
there's the flow blockers second flow
pronus third the flow triggers and
finally and fourth the flow cycle these
are the pillars that power the brains of
the most productive people on the planet
well coverage in a moment but first what
is flow
I want you to remember for a second the
last time you were hyper productive and
totally absorbed in what you were doing
that was flow now flow is a state of
consciousness that makes work feel
effortless you've experienced flow
perhaps when you were riding a bike
surfing a wave making music singing
dancing maybe working on a big project
many of Humanity's greatest
accomplishments have happened in this
state of flow
[Music]
Alex Honnold in the movie free solo was
in a flow State when he summited El
Capitan with no gear Sam Altman and his
team at openai when they were coding
chat GPT which has already changed the
world were deep in flow while doing it
when Mari Curie did her pioneering
research and Einstein finally figured
out the theory of relativity they were
harnessing the power of flow to pull off
these superhuman Feats that drove
Humanity forward and flow isn't just a
metaphor in fact over ten thousand
research papers on Flow have found that
the neurophysiological shifts that occur
while in flow increase the exact skills
that research has shown are most
critical to thriving in the 21st century
like learning creativity productivity
and the reason why Alex and Sam and
Marie and Einstein were able to
accomplish such Feats is because of what
happens in the body and in the brain
when flow kicks in from the
neurochemical Cascade of dopamine
norepinephrine anandamide serotonin
endorphins the alpha Theta brain waves
and the performance enhancing alteration
to the neuroanatomical changes that
occur in the brain in flow listen this
all sounds great flow sounds like some
kind of a Panacea that's going to solve
all of your productivity and Peak
Performance problems in a heartbeat and
that would actually be true if you could
access a flow State on demand but the
problem is most of us can't
so until you train yourself in the four
pillars of flow flow is going to remain
Elusive and nowhere is less conducive to
accessing flow with consistency and
reliability than the 21st century
workplace and the 21st century way of
working where distractions are rapid
Across the Nation plagues us and chronic
stress is just considered the norm you
know that horrible feeling of being over
caffeinated and riddled with
productivity guilt from delaying doing
what you know you should have been doing
and then hitting Lunchtime with barely
any work done even though half the day
is done
well if this has ever happened to you
it's due to the flow blockers
if you go were to run a marathon first
off you'd have to ensure that you don't
have some foundational injury or health
condition that simply blocks you from
doing it and it's kind of similar when
it comes to Flow State because research
shows we're evolutionarily wired for
flow your brain and body actually wants
to kick you into a flow State when the
condition is necessitated most of the
time our 21st century work style blocks
flow at every turn think about it when
you get up in the morning what's the
first thing you look at well if you're
like 80 percent of people you check it
within 15 minutes of waking up and it's
packed with flow blockers distraction
uncertainty task persistence deficit
attention deficit trait and this one
thing is the source of over a dozen
other blockers for flow like a damn
blocking a river from naturally moving
forward now obviously this thing is your
phone so what's one tool to remove the
most common source of flow blockers well
it's simple we call it flow before phone
the golden rule is to get two to three
hours of productive flow on your highest
priority task in the morning before you
turn on or ideally even touch that
device now this is easier said than done
it's hard to change ingrained habits
especially when the Habit itself is
linked to a device that's designed to be
addictive but once you try this and once
you experience deeper and deeper states
of flow the flow states that you can
access become more compelling and
overrule the addiction next up we have
flow pronus so let's say you have
removed all the blockers and you still
can't get into flow because this is what
happens to lots of people it's because
they missed the second thing which again
is is flow pronus so using the marathon
analogy consider this your overall
Fitness level because flow pronus is
simply your tendency to access flow and
the likelihood of getting into flow at
any given moment we need to make our
physiology our body our psychology up
here and our environment conducive to
flow proneness to maximize our
likelihood of accessing a flow State now
the easiest way to do this is to wake up
and get to work within 90 seconds of
opening your eyes
you're probably like what this sounds
like some kind of a weird workaholic
thing to do but it's actually the
opposite by getting your most important
work done within the first two to three
hours of the day in a float state
just going to amplify productivity
dramatically you can relax a lot more
the rest of the day the neuroscientific
reason to do this is that your flow
pronus is highest first thing in the
morning this works for a few reasons one
being that the brain waves of sleep
Theta or Delta are similar to the alpha
Theta brain waves of flow as a bonus the
first 90 seconds of the morning are also
before the rest of the world can impose
its will upon you which makes it easier
to focus okay so you've removed the main
source of flow blockers and you've
increased your flow pronus so how do you
actually trigger flow directly well this
is where the flow triggers come in
these are preconditions that instantly
drive us into flow now back in the 1960s
psychologist mihai chick family had the
Godfather of Flo who coined the term
flow identified several of these
triggers and since then Stephen Cutler
and other researchers have identified
even more while mihai trixemihai
pioneered the psychological research on
Flow kotler has pioneered the
neurobiological research on the state
and is commonly regarded as the world's
leading expert on Flow now the more
triggers you have present in an activity
at any one time the faster you'll enter
flow the deeper the flow state will be
and the longer you'll be able to hold
and sustain that flow State certain
activities are naturally rich in flow
triggers like surfing playing music
video gaming the three first triggers
for flow that mihai chick sent me high
identified or clear goals immediate
feedback and challenge skills balance so
here's an example of each of these in
action let's say you're surfing you spot
the wave you catch it you write it these
are the clear goals that are going to
pop you into flow then you're feel the
balance on the board and the waves power
this is immediate feedback you're taking
action in response to the information
you're receiving from the wave and as
you continue surfing you ride waves of
varying sizes varying difficulty and if
you're a surfer varying weight matching
your skill level to keep engaged which
is the challenge skills balance of play
now that's all well and good for surfing
but what about your work well the trick
is to take these triggers and add them
to activities that they don't
necessarily show up within so to apply
this right away you can tune the
challenge skills balance by engaging in
tasks that are about four percent more
difficult than your current skill level
our constant goal as mihai chick sent me
High's book title suggests is to move
beyond boredom and anxiety That's The
Sweet Spot that leads to flow the fourth
pillar flow is seldom discussed but it's
the reason behind the world's most
productive people and how they operate
and it's called the flow cycle herb
Benson was a Harvard cardiologist and he
wrote about this for the first time in
his book called The breakout principle
and then Stephen Cutler mapped it
further directly to flow in his book The
Rise of Superman what the flow cycle
tells us Is That Flow states are more
like dimmer switches than light switches
now first there's struggle this is a
loading phase that's when you first
start a task in the neurochemistry
involved which is cortisol and
norepinephrine kind of makes you squirm
the discomfort causes us to want to
avoid the task relieve ourselves of the
discomfort and distract ourselves the
sad truth is that most people spend
their entire careers dropping in and out
of the first few minutes of the struggle
phase they never persist long enough to
get into flow they're an inch deep into
work forever so start by getting Grace
at persisting through the struggle phase
this comes down to task persistence you
can do this with something that we call
attention span stretching
so if you had a bar that you were
hanging from every day research shows
that if you did that you would actually
grow by an inch in height
similarly if you stretch your attention
your attention span becomes longer so
for example read a book all the way
through even if it's uncomfortable even
if you retain less you gain more
sustained attention you're training your
intentional capacity if you do a long
meditation just try adding another
minute and another minute same with deep
focused work add another minute then
another treat it like a Muscle Max out
the Reps then release happens once you
reach the edge of wrestling with the
task or problem true sustaining focus
and attention as you persist your brain
increases dopamine enhancing focus and
motivation finally popping you out of
struggle through release and into the
Flow State itself then next up we have
flow which is the state we've been
talking about this whole time during
flow the prefrontal cortex deactivates
to allow efficient instinctive rapid
decision making to occur after the Flow
State itself we have the recovery phase
on the back side of flow where we're
replenish finishing the expanse of
neurochemistry that's involved in flow
or recuperating after expending so much
energy and we're integrating the
knowledge or skills acquired during flow
so there you have it the four pillars of
flow which underscore Elise productivity
extreme accomplishment and Hyper focus
by understanding and applying these
pillars of flow you can become
consistently productive and Achieve
incredible results our goal here is to
take every research paper on Peak
Performance and flow and decipher it
down into easy to watch instantly
applicable steps so that as you stay
tuned to our Channel you build the skill
set of driving yourself into a flow
State consistently which the critical
skill set to thrive in the 21st century
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