Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi; born 29 September 1934) is a Hungarian psychologist. He created the psychological concept of flow, a highly focused mental state. He is the Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Management at Claremont Graduate University. He is the former head of the department of psychology at the University of Chicago and of the department of sociology and anthropology at Lake Forest College...
NationalityHungarian
ProfessionPsychologist
Date of Birth29 September 1934
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi quotes about
competent educate face future generation next original zest
If the next generation is to face the future with zest and self-confidence, we must educate them to be original as well as competent
encouragement creativity self
Each of us is born with two contradictory sets of instructions: a conservative tendency, made up of instincts for self-preservation, self-aggrandizement, and saving energy, and an expansive tendency made up of instincts for exploring, for enjoying novelty and risk-the curiosity that leads to creativity belongs to this set. But whereas the first tendency requires little encouragement or support from outside to motivate behaviour, the second can wilt if not cultivated.
distracted form involved mind music needs otherwise
Music is usually resorted to as a form of self-therapy when you?re not involved enough in what you?re doing so that part of your mind needs to be distracted from what otherwise would become boring.
business goal viktor-frankl
Half a century ago, the Austrian psychiatrist Viktor Frankl wrote that happiness cannot be attained by wanting to be happy - it must come as the unintended consequence of working for a goal greater than oneself.
business ocean fall
Enjoyment, on the other hand, is not always pleasant, and it can be very stressful at times. A mountain climber, for example, may be close to freezing, utterly exhausted, and in danger of falling into a bottomless crevasse, yet he wouldn't want to be anywhere else. Sipping a piña colada under a palm tree at the edge of the turquoise ocean is idyllic, but it just doesn't compare to the exhilaration he feels on the windswept ridge.
effort flow wasting-time
Flow is hard to achieve without effort. Flow is not 'wasting time.
business reality psychics
To know oneself is the first step toward making flow a part of one's entire life. But just as there is no free lunch in the material economy, nothing comes free in the psychic one. If one is not willing to invest psychic energy in the internal reality of consciousness, and instead squanders it in chasing external rewards, one loses mastery of one's life, and ends up becoming a puppet of circumstances.
business believe feelings
Contrary to what most of us believe, happiness does not simply happen to us. It's something that we make happen, and it results from doing our best. Feeling fulfilled when we live up to our potentialities is what motivates differentiation and leads to evolution.
business journey perfect
If we agree that the bottom line of life is happiness, not success, then it makes perfect sense to say that it is the journey that counts, not reaching the destination.
business hands psychics
Attention is psychic energy, and like physical energy, unless we allocate some part of it to the task at hand, no work gets done.
independent punishment anxiety
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.
facts unhappiness resources
And, in fact, you can find that the lack of basic resources, material resources, contributes to unhappiness, but the increase in material resources do not increase happiness.
feelings excellent greater
One cannot lead a life that is truly excellent without feeling that one belongs to something greater and more permanent than oneself.
miserable consciousness persons
A person can make himself happy, or miserable, regardless of what is actually happening 'outside,' just by changing the contents of consciousness.