A rare combination of skills
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| Mihaly has the most sublime combination of skills. It is rare enough for someone to understand psychology in such a clear cut and penetrating way. Most people thus skilled tend to write in a kind of techno-speak. Mihaly writes with amazing clarity and succinctness.
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| He talks about 'autotelic' people :
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| "Autotelic" is a word composed of two Greek roots: 'auto' (self), and 'telos' (goal). An autotelic activity is one we do for its own sake because to experience is the main goal"
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| And compares such peiple to non-autotelic people :
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| "If there is one quality that distinguishes autotelic individuals, it is that their psychic energy seems inexhaustible. Even though they have no greater attentional capacity than anyone else, they pay more attention to what happens around them, they notice more, and they are willing to invest more attention in things for their own sake without expecting an immediate return.
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| Most of us hoard our attention carefully. We dole it out only for serious things, for things that matter; we only get interested in whatever will promote our wellfare. The objects most worthy of our psychic energy are ourselves and the people and things that will give us some material or emotional advantage. The result is that we don't have much attention left over to participate in the world on its own terms, to be surprised, to learn new things, to empathize, to grow beyond the limits set by our self-centredness."
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| These extracts should illustrate the type of understanding that he exposes in the book. He does not seek to show how clever he is, or to sway us with a repeated mantra, but merely gives the current understanding.
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Happy times
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| One of the themse of the book is happiness. Or more to the point, making us aware that we are happy at times that are not so obvious. For example, we are more likely to be happier at work than when sitting idly at home. He explains that we are happy when in the flow of life, even if this is during a task that we might label as unpleasent.
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| He talks of a worker he knew in a very noisy factory. Unlike his coworkers, who were frequently clock watching, and departed on the stroke of the hour, he was happy to linger on. He had developed a fascination with fixing anything and everything in the factory. He had found flow where others had found great discomfort.
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| But striving for happiness is not the central theme of the book. The paradix, that few of us realise, is that when we are in the flow of life, we actually don't have time to feel happy. It is only after the flow ends that we find ourselves in a happy mood. To seek for happines is therefore misplaced - it is the after effect of what we should be seeking - flow.
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In summary
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| This short book makes for wonderful reading, and should give you a revised insight into your life and behaviours. But the book also makes for enjoyable reading, just to experience elegantly and efficiently written prose. Highly recommended.
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