The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

I liked the breakdown of the multiple factors of how flow is created. By explaining it many things fall in place and it gives more reality to what flow actually is. For me personally I experienced true flow sometimes and now better understand why this happens how this ties into my personal beliefs. On the other hand I sometimes find the book takes too much time to explain.

I highly recommend this book as it gives new insight on what it means to do something enjoyable while giving a frame work on how people find flow. Keep in mind that this is not a self-help book but a more scientific view on the concept of flow. This goes beyond finding flow in daily activity, sports, or hobbies by giving examples of people who have found a life theme that gives meaning to their life as a whole.

An extremely helpful book. Well written and easy to follow the idea of this often intangible concept of flow. To some degree it provides a great insight for why we do what we do. Flow as the optimal experience transcende our daily activities, religious practices and science.

The book is also very objective about it's limitation, that it does not provide a step by step guidance for how one can achieve flow, as the path is often differs person to person, it depends on a great deal of inner conditions.

One of the most helpful and enlightening Book!

shows what people enjoy naturally and why you have experiences that are more enjoyable than others-the most important part is that it shows you how to make other more mundane experiences more like the enjoyable ones-incredibly interesting

I got this book because it talked about consciousness and it's relationship to happiness. It's a heavy read, like reading 20 pages takes 2 hours. But each chapter feels like a class at Berkeley. Top five best books that changed my view on my role in the world.

The first sentence of the Preface sums up this book nicely: "This book summarizes, for a general audience, decades of research on the positive aspects of human experience - joy, creativity, the process of total involvement with life I call flow." I had been hearing a lot about "flow" pertaining to how we live our life, and it seemed like a good concept. After reading this book, I can confidently say it is a GREAT concept! I highly recommend this book to anyone who is ready to enter a state of mind that will allow you to make any activity completely involving and satisfying.

This is something everyone should read. Insightful and relevant for anyone who has ever experienced boredom, unfulfilling work, unsatisfying relationships, and who wants to improve how they experience life.

Valuable and informative book on what makes human day-to-day experiences enjoyable. The author also provides actionable insights on how one can apply the ideas presented in book to their own life. The language might seem academically tedious, sometimes diffuse, but certainly is unobtrusive allowing the reader to decide what's more important for her.

Anyone intrigued by happiness and the pursuit of happiness as mentioned in our constitution will find the insights carefully explained in this fine book 'right on the money.' I like the way all the notes and references where concisely provided at the end. And those references we see in most technical writing are not in the content of this book. This mitigates the distractions and makes the read itself a flow experience.

Though I recently bought a 1990 edition of this book it still is quite relevant to this day. A well researched book which really makes one aware about how one can enhance the quality of one's own life. A must read for all those who are in purusit of happiness and beyond. I have been through what Mihaly describes as the state of 'FLOW' many times before. In fact at the time I was reading 'FLOW' and even at this very moment as I am writing these lines of this review I am experiencing 'FLOW' and the book apart from resonating that feeling has provided me with the awareness of ways of sustaining this state longer and has taught me how to bring this state about more often and perhaps in due course at will.

A fairly enjoyable book. I had heard great things about this book before I bought it and so far I'm not disappointed with the purchase. At the moment, unfortunately, I'm not done with the book, but I do not expect my experience to be any less than what it has already been.

This is a very thought provoking book apparently solidly based on published research. It is neither a self-help book nor a how-to book in my estimation. I plan to reread it and to share with others in my circle of friends as "food for thought" about issues on all of our minds related to choices in life. I also plan to read the author's academic articles and will comment following that. I am not a psychologist but a researcher in physical science so want to read the foundational work just for more background. At this time I highly recommend this book but am not qualified to rate it as scientific work. It would be interesting to see reviews from the field of psychology research.

There are really important ideas here which I shared with people important to me. Who wouldn't choose happiness over frustration? I have seen Mr. Cskiszentmihalyi quoted in articles, so it was good to get the original. And I have made better decisions in guiding my granddaughter since reading the book.

This book is outstanding, challenging, controversial, enlightening, and fun. I knew this book would provide a gateway into a new line of thinking and I want disappointed. Please do yourself a favor and read this book.

Extremely unimpressed with this book. There are really only a few chapters worth reading, and the rest is padding. Several parts would have been better off as a blog or article of some sort. Even then, the content was weak, circuitous, and boring. He used random quotes from big names in history to argue his points, but they felt like afterthoughts inserted in to validate his opinion instead of being strong arguments. I suppose I was expecting much better since I had read journal articles for a class on this topic (some of which were co-written by this author). Initially, I didnt even want to buy the book, but I couldn't find it at local libraries so I took the $10 risk. Turns out to have been a bad one. If anything, see if you can find it at your library. If not, I'd recommend that you save your time and money.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi has explained to me why many parts of life are enjoyable and others aren't. By knowing what creates joy, I've been able to turn some of the more mundane parts of life into flow - into joy. Life truly is what we make it. With mindfulness and conscientious effort, there seems to be no limit to joy.

Once many of the bigger life decisions are made, for many there remains a "what else?" itch. This book takes a quantitative approach to systematically finding contentment. The answers are surprisingly easy, if not intuitive in retrospect - the best ones often are - and Csikszentmihalyi's writing style makes very consumable. Best book I've read this year, partly as it touches on so many other things.

A great psychological and social commentary about the aspect of meaning to life itself. Detailed and beautiful description of the idea of flow. Interesting and we'll written for anyone in a mid-life crisis.

I'm well into the book and skipping entire sections now. This book so far has been an attempt to relate flow to a myriad of topics, but what it reads like is an assortment of essays on different topics with one or two senentences tangentially relating flow to it. Most of this book could be removed and it wouldn't be worse for it.

You're better off watching some youtube videos or reading some articles instead of reading 300 pages of assorted essays.

We get it flow can improve experience, and people have all kinds of experiences. Where this book goes wrong is rambling about the contextual experiences, and not about flow.

Once many of the bigger life decisions are made, for many there remains a "what else?" itch. This book takes a quantitative approach to systematically finding contentment. The answers are surprisingly easy, if not intuitive in retrospect - the best ones often are - and Csikszentmihalyi's writing style makes very consumable. Best book I've read this year, partly as it touches on so many other things.

A great psychological and social commentary about the aspect of meaning to life itself. Detailed and beautiful description of the idea of flow. Interesting and we'll written for anyone in a mid-life crisis.

I'm well into the book and skipping entire sections now. This book so far has been an attempt to relate flow to a myriad of topics, but what it reads like is an assortment of essays on different topics with one or two senentences tangentially relating flow to it. Most of this book could be removed and it wouldn't be worse for it.

You're better off watching some youtube videos or reading some articles instead of reading 300 pages of assorted essays.

We get it flow can improve experience, and people have all kinds of experiences. Where this book goes wrong is rambling about the contextual experiences, and not about flow.

I really can't adequately express how great "Flow" is. Many of my own disconnected introspective ideas and life experiences were drawn into a greater, more meaningful picture as I read this book, like (pardon the cliche) puzzle pieces fitting together. "Flow" manages to be a rare combination of inspiring, enlightening, and calming. It is not an exaggeration to say that this book will affect the way I live my life.