Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Quotes

Quotes about:

• Flow is being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Fall, Time Flies, Ego

  91 Copy quote

• The best moments in our lives are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times...the best moments usually occur when a person's body or mind is stretched to it's limited in voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Effort, Mind, Body

  10 Copy quote

• Find a way to express what moves you.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Moving, Expression, Way

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1996). “Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention”, Harpercollins

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• The happiest people spend much time in a state of flow - the state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience itself is so enjoyable that people will do it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Inspirational, People, Cost

  11 Copy quote

• If you are interested in something, you will focus on it, and if you focus attention on anything, it is likely that you will become interested in it. Many of the things we find interesting are not so by nature, but because we took the trouble of paying attention to them.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Nature, Interesting, Focus

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1997). “Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement with Everyday Life”, p.128, Basic Books

  87 Copy quote

• A joyful life is an individual creation that cannot be copied from a recipe.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Freedom, Joy, Recipes

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2001). “Flow: the psychology of optimal experience”

  69 Copy quote

• Those periods of struggling to overcome challenges are what people find to be the most enjoyable times.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Struggle, Teaching, Learning

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2001). “Flow: the psychology of optimal experience”

  9 Copy quote

• We shape our life by deciding to pay attention to it. It is the direction of our attention and its intensity that will determines what we accomplish and how well.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Attention, Shapes, Pay

  24 Copy quote

• What I "discovered" was that happiness is not something that happens. It is not the result of good fortune or random chance. It is not something that money can buy or power command. It does not depend on outside events, but, rather, on how we interpret them. Happiness, in fact, is a condition that must be prepared for, cultivated, and defended privately by each person. People who learn to control inner experience will be able to determine the quality of their lives, which is as close as any of us can come to being happy.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Happiness, Happy, Discovery

  75 Copy quote

• Try to be inspired by something every day. Try to inspire at least one person every day.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Inspiration, Inspire, Trying

  18 Copy quote

• To be successful you have to enjoy doing your best while at the same time contributing to something beyond yourself.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Success, Happy, Doing Your Best

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2004). “Good Business: Leadership, Flow, and the Making of Meaning”, p.28, Penguin

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• Flow is the process of achieving happiness through control over one's inner life. The optimal state of inner experience is order in consciousness. This happens when we focus our attention (psychic energy) on realistic goals and when our skills match the challenges we face.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Order, Psychics, Skills

  15 Copy quote

• Creativity is a central source of meaning in our lives...most of the things that are interesting, important, and human are the results of creativity...when we are involved in it, we feel that we are living more fully than during the rest of life.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Art, Creativity, Rest Of Life

  34 Copy quote

• Whatever the dictates of fashion, it seems that those who take the trouble to gain mastery over what happens in consciousness do lead a happier life.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Fashion, Mastery, Gains

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2001). “Flow: the psychology of optimal experience”

  6 Copy quote

• To overcome the anxieties and depressions of contemporary life, individuals must become independent of the social environment to the degree that they no longer respond exclusively in terms of its rewards and punishments. To achieve such autonomy, a person has to learn to provide rewards to herself. She has to develop the ability to find enjoyment and purpose regardless of external circumstances.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Independent, Punishment, Anxiety

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2001). “Flow: the psychology of optimal experience”

  56 Copy quote

• If you do anything well, it becomes enjoyable. To keep enjoying something, you need to increase its complexity.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Joy, Needs, Increase

  42 Copy quote

• Find out what you like and what you hate about life. Start doing more of what you love, less of what you hate.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Life, Hate, What You Love

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1996). “Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention”, Harpercollins

  46 Copy quote

• Happiness is not something that happens ... It does not depend on outside events, but, rather, on how we interpret them.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Events, Doe, Happens

  6 Copy quote

• When people restrain themselves out of fear, their lives are by necessity diminished. They become rigid and defensive, and their self stops growing.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Self, People, Growing

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2001). “Flow: the psychology of optimal experience”

  5 Copy quote

• Goals transform a random walk into a chase.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Goal, Walks

  "Go With The Flow" by John Geirland, www.wired.com. September 01, 1996.

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• There are two main strategies we can try to improve the quality of life. The first is to try making external conditions match our goals. The second is to change how we experience external conditions to make them fit our goals better.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Change, Two, Goal

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2001). “Flow: the psychology of optimal experience”

  36 Copy quote

• The ability to take misfortune and make something good come of it is a rare gift. Those who possess it are ..said to have resilience or courage.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Teaching, Learning, Resilience

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2001). “Flow: the psychology of optimal experience”

  11 Copy quote

• For original ideas to come about, you have to let them percolate under the level of consciousness in a place where we have no way to make them obey our own desires or our own direction. Their random combinations are driven by forces we don't know about.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Ideas, Intellectual, Intelligence

  26 Copy quote

• For better or worse, our future will be determined in large part by our dreams and by the struggle to make them real.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Motivational, Dream, Real

  98 Copy quote

• It is amazing how little effort most people make to improve control of their attention. If reading a book seems too difficult, instead of sharpening concentration we tend to set it aside and instead turn on the television, which not only requires minimal attention, but in fact tends to diffuse what little it commands with choppy editing, commercial interruptions, and generally inane content.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Book, Reading, Editing

  23 Copy quote

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