Copyright © 2009 Willie Horton

Most people lead normal lives. Those lives are, generally speaking, repetitive – where anything spectacular rarely happens. Of course, the normal life is punctuated by the spectacular – falling in love, marriage, the birth of a child, the odd special holiday. But, generally speaking, normal lives plod along.

Research tells us that at least 96% of us are normal and that normal people are rarely really engaged in or attentive to what they are doing in the here and now – research estimates that the normal person is only 1% engaged. In other words, the normal person is only 1% present in the only place and time we have – the here and now. If you consider the findings of quantum physics, that the universe works on the basis of energy exchange – that is universal energy responds to our input of energy – it is little wonder that the spectacular is a rare occurrence in the normal life. After all, universal energy will hardly notice if one only invests 1% energy in the present moment.

The same research indicates that normal people rarely experience “peak performance” – that’s the spectacular that I was talking about a moment ago. However, we also know that we can experience peak performance or peak experience if we become more engaged or more attentive in the present moment. You see, a peak experience is peak because it is so out-of-the-ordinary that it grabs more than 1% of our attention – an abnormal amount of our attention. When our attention is that engaged, parts of our brain that are otherwise inactive become highly activated. It also works the other way around. If we deliberately pay more attention to the present moment, if we deliberately become more engaged in the here and now, those same parts of our brain become highly activated and, as a result of our own choice, we experience a peak moment. Or, to put it in terms of the University of Chicago, we experience “flow”.

When we are in flow, universal energy flows with us. Because we are abnormally present to the moment, universal energy notices and gives us an abnormal return on our investment. Life flows – we seem to be the right person in the right place at the right time. Things we need to happen simply fall into place. We stumble across opportunities that take us in the right direction. Carl Jung would have called that synchronicity. A quantum physicist would explain it in terms of universal energy’s ability to respond to our intentions.

Many of us have experienced that type of “flow” – at some point in many lives it comes naturally. But, the more burdened we become by the cares of everyday life, the less likely we are to experience flow. That’s when many of my clients meet me for the first time. They either find themselves at a crossroads in their professional or personal lives and hanker after that “flow” that they may have once experienced or that they inherently know is “out there”.

In fact, flow is “in there” – it is within. Flow is found by calming one’s mind. Research tells us that the normal mind has 50,000 random thoughts – most of them useless – each day. That noise in our heads distracts us, takes us away from the moment, disables our desire to be more present and focused, more effective and “turned on” in the here and now. As a result, flow doesn’t flow! We get stuck in the rut that is repetitive normal living – where flow is no longer experienced, where life becomes mundane and routine.

To re-experience flow, you have to take an inner journey, one which involves switching off that useless distractive noise. It’s as simple and as challenging as that! Because our thoughts will always be with us, we have to learn how to let them pass, we have to learn how not to give them our energy. In doing so, we begin to learn how to invest an abnormal amount of our energy in the present moment. In doing so, we activate those otherwise dormant areas of our brain and, once again, experience flow.

How does one turn off that incessant inner chatter? I give my clients a variety of “mental tools” – but the one that’s most effective is meditation. Meditation is like a multi-purpose power tool – it gives you the ability to ignore the mental noise completely and not only enter into flow whilst meditating – but enables that clear and present state of mind become your default state of mind as you go through your normal day. In that way, your normal day becomes abnormal, your ordinary life becomes extra-ordinary.

Many people meditate – and, for many, it makes precious little difference in their lives. But meditation, practiced with the purpose of disciplining the mind to pay attention to the here and now, will bring you into flow, will change your life – beyond recognition.

But, be under no illusion. Meditation is a lifelong journey requiring discipline and daily commitment. However, for the investment of a few minutes in each twenty four hours, the returns are more than well worth it.

Photo: Gayle Lindgren