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

  95 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

  12 Copy quote

• 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

  13 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

  27 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”

  71 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

  81 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

  91 Copy quote

• 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

  17 Copy quote

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

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Inspiration, Inspire, Trying

  22 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

  44 Copy quote

• Purpose provides activation energy for living.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Energy, Purpose, Activation

  "Creating Purpose" by Jen Grisanti, www.huffingtonpost.com. Janaury 12, 2011.

  11 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

  37 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”

  61 Copy quote

• Act as if the future of the universe depends on what you do, while laughing at yourself for thinking that your actions make any difference.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Thinking, Differences, Laughing

  21 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

  49 Copy quote

• Flow is hard to achieve without effort. Flow is not 'wasting time.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Effort, Flow, Wasting Time

  35 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.

  13 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

  16 Copy quote

• Control of consciousness determines the quality of life.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Quality, Consciousness, Quality Of Life

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2009). “Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience”, p.26, Harper Collins

  20 Copy quote

• How we feel about ourselves, the joy we get from living, ultimately depends directly on how the mind filters and interprets everyday experiences. Whether we are happy depends on inner harmony, not on the controls we are able to exert over the great forces of the universe.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Happiness, Laughter, Joy

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

  33 Copy quote

• Unless a person knows how to give order to her thoughts, attention will be attracted to whatever is most problematic at the moment.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Order, Giving, Attention

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

  30 Copy quote

• It is how we choose what we do, and how we approach it, that will determine whether the sum of our days adds up to a formless blur, or to something resembling a work of art.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Art, Add, Blur

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1997). “Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement with Everyday Life”, p.13, Basic Books

  13 Copy quote

• It is not the hearing that improves life, but the listening.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Listening, Hearing

  11 Copy quote

• 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

  People, Quality, Able

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

  15 Copy quote

• 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.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Business, Reality, Psychics

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (2004). “Good Business: Leadership, Flow, and the Making of Meaning”, p.143, Penguin

  45 Copy quote

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