Friday, February 11, 2011

What Do Surfing and Chess Have In Common?

I have never in my life played chess and I really don’t feel like I’m missing out on much. I have however spent about eight wonderful weeks of my life surfing in Costa Rica, and I enjoyed every minute of it. Even when I was getting absolutely pummeled by the waves. Surfing is like golf that way: even a bad day surfing is better than a good day in the office.

While surfing is a very complete physical activity, chess is the polar opposite – it’s a completely intellectual activity that requires no physical activity. It turns out you can play chess online and apparently there are a lot of people who do this every single day. Who knew? The online chess games even have a system for ranking the ability of every player, based on wins, losses, and overall skill level. This makes the world of online chess a very awesome place to conduct scientific research, because there is a lot of data about individual performance being accumulated on a daily basis. Rather than bringing chess players into a psychology lab, the online gaming environment can become the psychology lab. Which is exactly what a handful of researchers have done.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi is a VERY well known psychology researcher who coined the idea of flow. He theorized that people are happiest when they are in a state of flow, and then investigated all the elements of flow. The flow state happens when someone is fully immersed and engaged in what they are doing, and they lose track of time. There are actually nine specific components of flow:

- There are clear goals identified for the activity
- A high degree of concentration is required
- There is a loss of self-consciousness
- One’s experience of time is altered
- There is direct and immediate feedback regarding performance
- There’s a balance between ability level and challenge
- The person has a sense of control over the activity
- The activity is intrinsically rewarding
- There’s a lack of awareness of bodily needs (hunger, sleep, etc.)

I’ve personally discovered that surfing is the area where I experience flow the most often. My goal is very clear: catch the wave and stay standing up on the surfboard. I have to really concentrate to catch the wave at just the right time at the right speed. Then I have to concentrate to find the right position on the wave. I definitely lose any sense of self-consciousness. My sense of time is clearly altered – riding a wave for fifteen seconds can feel like twenty minutes. If I fail at the task, I know it immediately as I crash and go tumbling into the wave. I have control over how I position my body and the surfboard. I also lose awareness of bodily needs such as food and meals. In other words, surfing in a guaranteed method for me to experience flow. When I first read about flow, it provided a complete explanation for why I love surfing so much, and why some people quit their jobs to become a poor homeless sunburnt surf bum.

The bottom line is that most human beings all like to be in flow, and people are generally happiest and most productive in a state of flow. Who wouldn’t want more flow in their life?

What’s important to know is that in order to achieve a flow state, a balance must be struck between the challenge of the task and the skill of the performer. If the task is too easy the person will be bored or apathetic. If the task is too difficult, the person will be frustrated. So the skill level and the level of the challenge must be well matched. When that match is made well, the person experiences flow and life is good.

It’s probably best to think about this related to sports. Think of yourself skiing down a hill. If you are a skier, there are certain runs you go down that really challenge you just the right amount so you have to concentrate and your senses are heightened. If the hill is too easy, you coast down without much challenge. If the hill is too hard, you will probably crash and burn. But when the hill is JUST the right amount of difficulty, you have to concentrate and focus. Then when you conquer the hill, you feel a strong sense of exhilaration. That is flow.

Back to the research about chess. In the experimental laboratory known as online chess, the researchers decided to survey chess players immediately after each of their games, to determine how happy and satisfied they were with the chess game they had just completed. Over some period of time (days or weeks) they collected all this survey data and analyzed it, along with all the player rankings and scores.

You could theorize the chess players were happiest after they won their chess game. But you would be wrong. The chess players were consistently happiest after they had finished playing an opponent 5-10% better than they were, as measured by overall player ranking. Regardless of whether they won or lost, they enjoyed the game the most when their opponent was just slightly better than them. Why? Because that presented the most energizing and engaging challenge, and that amount of challenge was consistently satisfying. That amount of challenge created a state of flow.

This research then, provides evidence for the fact that we need the right amount of challenge to experience flow and happiness in our life. When I am surfing, I need to find waves that are not too small, but not too large. Because even if I crash after taking on a tough wave, I’ll still feel satisfaction and happiness from the challenge. And with every crash, I’m continuing to get better and improve my surfing skills. In other words, there’s also a probable correlation between learning and happiness.

This research makes me wonder, where in your life are you pushing yourself to a 5-10% challenge? Where are you feeling energized from the stretch? Are you feeling bored and complacent from being too comfortable? Or overwhelmed by too much challenge?

My hope for you today is that you have some area in your life where you are experiencing flow, some area where you are feeling just the right amount of challenge to promote your own growth, your own learning and your own happiness.

You don’t have to go surfing or place chess online. These are just two examples and there are a million other opportunities for you to find flow.

But don’t settle for comfort and complacency when something more satisfying is possible. Just go find flow wherever you find it.

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