Once upon a time in my NYC corporate girlie days, I stumbled upon a little hack for getting a ton of work done fast. I did not have a name for it and I kept it a secret for the longest time. It’s not because I wanted to gate-keep, it’s because I thought it was wrong that this is what it took to get things done.
I had a colleague in the Atlanta office that I was working on a project with and one day I called her to run through a status update. It turned out there was a fairly long list of open items, and rather than divvy them up and get off the phone, we divvied them up and stayed on the phone. This was before Zoom, so we were on a good old-fashioned landline, and rather than hang up, we just got to work. We didn’t talk, but every 30 minutes or so, we would do a little check-in. It worked so effectively that when it was time to hop off, we agreed to do it again the next day, and the next.
The results were like magic! We worked a couple of hours a day like this to get that project across the finish line, and I am telling you: never have I ever gotten so much done with such ease. It felt like we entered into some magic portal where time slowed down and our ability to get things done sped up.
The Portal Has a Name
It turns out we did stumble upon a portal, and the portal has a name.
We created an environment where it was very easy to get into the zone. And once we were in the zone, we were on fire! Clear, focused, confident, energized, and knocking things out as if time stood still.
Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi spent decades studying what he called the optimal experience. It’s that feeling of being your best while doing your best, and he called it flow.
For flow to happen, a few things need to be true. The task has to be challenging enough to hold your full attention, but not so hard that it triggers panic. You need a clear goal. And you need immediate feedback so your brain knows it’s on the right track. When those conditions are met, the inner critic goes quiet, the never-ending to-do list stops running in the background, and you access a version of you that is not just capable of doing the thing but actually does the thing, and with ease and delight.
It sounds like magic, but it’s also backed by science. It turns out that in flow state, the brain releases a cocktail of neurochemicals that make you feel amazing. Not just dopamine, but serotonin and endorphins, and two others that, when combined, offer the most rewarding brain state you can enter. Which means flow is not just good for getting stuff done; it feels incredible.
In a nutshell: Flow is when your best work comes from your easiest hours.
It’s Not As Elusive As You Might Think
Most people talking about flow will convince you that it’s elusive, that there are 9 conditions to accessing it, that it’s the thing of elite athletes and top performers, and that it can be quite hard to access.
But I’ve experienced the opposite. On the contrary, I think it’s quite accessible. My lived experience from hanging out on a phone call with a colleague was that it actually can be quite easy. What we stumbled upon on that project was a thing called body-doubling, and if you ask me, it’s the cheat code to the magic portal of flow state.
Body-doubling is when you work alongside someone else, not in a traditional sense, but just being in the same virtual space at the same time while you each do your own thing. The presence of another person creates just enough social accountability that clarity comes quickly, distractions fade, focus drops in, and the portal opens.
These days, it can take a Herculean effort to focus on a single thing. Not because we aren’t capable, just because there is so much competing for our attention. And where your attention goes, your energy flows. Body-doubling is how you take back your attention and get your energy flowing for matters most right now.
Entering into the Portal
The only thing better than body-doubling with one other person, is body-doubling with more. I call it a co-hort, and I’ve been doing it every week for the past year. Every Friday, we hop on Zoom, connect on what we are clear on, and collectively enter the portal.
Very simply: we do focused blocks of deep work together, each working on our own thing. But it’s more fun than just that. There are dance breaks, there’s show and tell, and the option to linger longer for the afterparty. And the cherry on top is that you leave on an absolute high!
But don’t take my word for it, try it for yourself! You can experience this on your own anytime by scheduling a zoom focus session with a friend or, even better, friends (plural). If you’re curious about my Friday Sessions, you’re invited. Click here to let me know you’re coming and get access to the zoom link to join.
And if you are ready to go all in and make this a 21 project, that’s exactly what I’ll be doing starting Monday, June 8. I’m calling it the Daily Dose, and you find those details here.
Flow state to a glow state!
