Have you ever been in the Zone (flow)? How long did it last? Can you make it happen again? Wait the Flow is another name for the Zone. Ever read or hear athletes talk about the magical day they hit three homeruns, or scored two-touchdowns back-to-back? In golf - In-the-Zone means scored birdies on every other hole; in tennis it feels like the racquet has a life of its own and seemingly acts without human intervention. Think Tiger Woods or Roger Federer. People who learn the Zone strategy are up to 38% more productive. They find pleasure in their work and relationships, and aspire to President or CEO. Executive Headhunters call them with firm offers. Yes, really. Ever hear of the 80/20 rule? It is attributed to an Italian economist, Vilfredo Pareto. In 1908 he wrote about the unequal distribution of wealth in his country; 20% of the population owned 80% of the property and means of production. Remember the 80/20 rule as The Vital Few and the Trivial Many. Check it out 20% of the salespeople produce 80% of the results. During course of your day, 20% of what you spend your time on really matters; 80% of your day is putting out fires, answering stupid (self-evident), questions, and reading useless reports and time-wasting memos. The King Professor Mihaly Czikszentmihalyi, while at the University of Chicago, wrote on the psychological phenomenon of flow a time when we lose track of the clock on the wall and become one with our goal. When he asked scholars about whether they ever float-away into what they are studying they responded with it is a current carrying them along for the ride. He invented the name Flow. In sports they call it the Zone. Did you know that the Flow of Consciousness is about 2,500 years old and an integral element of Buddhism? The secret is the duality of Self and the Object or Goal. People who overcome separation, and identify with what they are doing are in the Flow. In Zen archery - Be the arrow! The Professor offers eight essences leading to flow: a) Sharp goals where you know the rules and what to expect.
b) No distractions deep concentration and attention.
c) Loss of self-consciousness a merger with the objective.
d) Feedback that integrates your left and right brain specialties.
e) Personal control over the experience.
f) A link between the activity and our mastery of the subject. It self-gratifying, easy-as-pie, fun, and tickles our curiosity to know more.
g) It is a Treasure-Hunt and you smell the reward; like Lays Potato Chips, the desire for it is limitless. Speed Reading Since 1959 we have taught thousands of 12 year olds, high schoolers, and college students to 3x their reading and 2x their memory. The tools and strategies make it a cinch for lawyers, doctors, and even teachers to speed read. However only the Vital Few enter the Flow. Speed reading is a psychomotor skill that has a second level of skill. It is for the 20% who want complete mastery, and requires being In-The-flow. Supra-Reading becomes a right-brain dominant rhythm where mental pictures replace linear verbal feedback. Huh? Look, if you are satisfied with reading and remembering three books, articles and reports in the time others can hardly complete one, you have mastered speed reading. You will always have the competitive-advantage, and be in the Fast-Track compared to snailers. If you are among the Vital Few who wish to escalate your brain to read and comprehend up to two thousand words per minute you must learn the strategies of In-the-flow. The text you peruse becomes watching a mental-movie instead of thinking and analyzing one-word-at-a-time. Teaching In-The-Flow Distractions: In the beginning, any kind of music or ambient conversation is a break in-the-flow and destroys your focus. Later, you will enter Flow in ten seconds, and remain there for up to sixty-minutes. Use your Pacer: you underline the sentences moving left-to-right and right-to-left, moving vertically down the page. You are Skimming the Text. Your intent is to discover the Essence of ideas on the page. Remember, your left-brain captures words, while the right-brain uses Pattern-Recognition and Spatial-Skills to decode the ideas. Left-Brain is logical, sequential, rational, analytical, objective, and views the parts. Right-Brain is random, intuitive, holistic, synthesizing, subjective, parallel-processing, and views the whole. Clutter and Blocking Stream-of-consciousness, self-talk, and subvocalization, inhibit your right-brain skills of gathering-data, and being receptive to ideas. They clutter your mind by using up to 90% left-brain thinking and analyzing, and less than 10% of your right-brain skills. It is the speed-of-speech compared to the speed-of-sight; 200 wpm vs 2,000 wpm. Mental-Imagery If you are not seeing visualizations on the movie-screen of your mind, you are using your left-brain to read words linearly. When you are paying complete attention, focused, and concentrating on the ideas you access both your prefrontal cortex, and the Limbic System. The Limbic (Latin, for arc), includes: hippocampus, hypothalamus, amygdala, and the pituitary. They control memory, comprehension, and mental-imagery, and integrate both left-and right-hemispheres, through right-brain dominance. Endwords Supra-Speed reading requires undivided attention on the text and a quieting of your mind. These behaviors raise your vibrational frequency level to attract your subconscious mind; it creates a balance between tension (eustress), and relaxation. In-the-Flow triggers both your Sympathetic and Parasympathetic Nervous Systems. It is way different than snailing your reading style of choice since 3rd grade. If you get the following explanation you are truly brilliant: You must produce desire, a burning-desire to know, remember, and learn because it permits you to enter the mental state known as - In-the-Flow. Emotion creates motivation and controls attention, while concentration is created by your will. It is all predicated on Mental-Imagery the creative-pictures on the movie-screen of your mind. Supra-Reading is absorbing ideas, not words, through association and visualization. Now get In-the-Flow. See ya, |
