Sewing and flow
I like to listen to audiobooks while I sew, but my 1-book-a-month subscription to Audible can barely keep up with demand, even when I download 21-hour-long unabridged Trollope novels to get the most bang for my buck. (I highly recommend the ones read by Timothy West.) So I recently turned my attention to the fantastic series of podcasts available free from TED.
TED talks always cheer me up when I’m feeling a bit jaded about humanity’s prospects — they’re inspiring, informative and exciting. There are a lot of talks on the psychology of happiness, fulfillment and decision-making, which I find endlessly fascinating. One of the most useful concepts I’ve run across in reading up on the subject is flow.
If you’re not already familiar with the concept of flow, I recommend you watch or listen to this TED talk by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, who coined the term. It’s an excellent thumbnail introduction. Briefly, Csikszentmihalyi has found that human fulfillment — the good life — requires more than the accumulation of pleasures or material comforts; it also requires experiences of intense and creative engagement. He calls that engagement flow — total absorption in an activity that harnesses our skills.
Why do I sew? I’ve spent hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars on an activity that has never made me a penny and which I’m still not very good at. It’s slow, expensive and often frustrating, yet I return to it time and again. The answer is that it allows me to spend time in flow — or, as I call it, Craft Trance. Craft Trance is the state from which I awake, seam ripper in hand, to realize it’s after dark, I’m still wearing this morning’s pajamas and I have made two-thirds of a Regency day dress covered in poker hands. It’s strange that regularly spending time in such a state should keep me sane, but such is the case.
From Wikipedia (I’ve lent out my copy of Flow):
Csíkszentmihályi identifies the following nine factors as accompanying an experience of flow:
- Clear goals (expectations and rules are discernible and goals are attainable and align appropriately with one’s skill set and abilities). Moreover, the challenge level and skill level should both be high.
- Concentrating, a high degree of concentration on a limited field of attention (a person engaged in the activity will have the opportunity to focus and to delve deeply into it).
- A loss of the feeling of self-consciousness, the merging of action and awareness.
- Distorted sense of time, one’s subjective experience of time is altered.
- Direct and immediate feedback (successes and failures in the course of the activity are apparent, so that behavior can be adjusted as needed).
- Balance between ability level and challenge (the activity is neither too easy nor too difficult).
- A sense of personal control over the situation or activity.
- The activity is intrinsically rewarding, so there is an effortlessness of action.
- People become absorbed in their activity, and focus of awareness is narrowed down to the activity itself, action awareness merging.
Not all are needed for flow to be experienced.
The factor I find the most interesting at the moment is #5 — direct and immediate feedback. It explains why, for me, sewing and blogging is a magic combination. Sewing on its own can feel lonely and thankless, especially in a city with as few crafters as London, but by combining it with blogging, I’m making it into an activity that provides me with plenty of feedback. And, the craft blogging world being the defiantly kind and supportive place it is, that feedback is overwhelmingly positive and helpful. Which is another way of saying: thank you all for reading, and for leaving such wonderful comments.
Do you have a similar experience of crafting? What puts you in flow?
hi!!!
Have you tried your local library for audiobooks?I’ve managed to score quite a few that way.
This post was an intersting one for me on two accounts : the first one is that I’m a beginner in the sewing field, and I am according to Csikszentmihalyi’s typology in the “arousal” state, and I find sewing to be extremely exciting, because all the techniques you need to learn, the satisfaction you get when you are successful, and the feedback that the fabric itself is immediately giving to you, etc. ! But I also found it interesting because I’m a student in philosophy and I am currently working on the theme of the experience. The flow is a typical experience that I get from studying and making connections between things as different as this talk, this video which is of a kid laughing because he tears sheets of paper (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cXXm696UbKY&feature=fvst), and my own subject ^-^. The enligthning point Csikszentmihalyi makes here is that : in situations when things oppose some kind of resistance to your action, you both experience a reality, that you rather passively, receive, and on the other hand, the power you have over this same given reality (for instance, by the power of your thread and needle on a shpeless piece of fabric, or as this kid, who I believe is experiencing the flow ! to act on the shape of a sheet of paper, etc). It is I believe what makes it so overwhelming and rewarding at the same time and it is exactly what we call an “experience” !
Thanks and keep up the good work your doing on this blog,
Kiki
I studied philosophy too (along with literary studies), and I got a total high from wrangling ideas and making connections. It’s interesting, as you say, that the pleasure that comes from experiences of flow arises not just from our own powers but from the resistance of whatever it is we’re working with (fabric, music, text, the body) — from grappling with the world in an evenly matched contest. Sometimes I long for total, effortless mastery, but I wonder whether that wouldn’t destroy the magic.
My husband enjoys listening to TED talks, too. He also recommends Radio Lab for good intellectual stimulation in an audio form. For a long time I did not give myself time to get into the “flow” on a regular basis and my life (creative and otherwise) suffered for it. I try to set aside an hour each evening to sewing. I push the “sleep” button on my alarm clock radio and when it goes off, my time is up. I usually listen to National Public Radio or other music. I’ve listened to audio books in the past, too, but find that I cannot give my full attention to either the book or my sewing when I do. Love them for driving long distances, though.
Huh, who knew there was a name for it? I refer to it as my “crafting zen” time. Even if I am feeling challenged, I feel contentment while learning my way to the end result.
Great to have an intellectual explanation for the feeling of being lost in crafting! Jarvis Cocker’s Sunday Service on BBC 6 Music is my usual sewing soundtrack but great idea to listen to TED talks and audio books.
Weaving or writing does it for me. We call it a “creative high.” Many hours have been sacrificed to it and I would never ask for them back.
Sewing + audio/pod – what a brilliant idea. (I totally typed that as sewing + audio/pot which would be a terrible, terrible FAIL waiting to happen.)
I have the same most of the time when I’m crafting, I think the feeling of flow is addictive, so I distinctly don’t like it when I’m crafting and I don’t get it, normally when I’m crafting because I have to, rather than want to (making birthday presents on deadline for example).
I’m an Audible addict to and an iPlayer addict when I run out of audiobook, I like the TED talks to. Talking about Audible though, you sound like me, first thing I look at when deciding which download is how long it is (I’m currently listening to Stephen King’s Under the Dome, that’s 35 hours, although I’m not sure I’d recommend it yet, the narrator sounds as if he’s falling asleep, I sort of expect him to go any minutes “and blood was pumping everywhere zzzzzzzzzz”). What I would recommend is AS Byatt’s The Children’s Book, absolutely brilliant, beautifully narrated by a woman who does brilliant voices, it’s 30 hours long and I love how it’s part history, part novel and I adore how it talks about the craft movement in the early years of the 20th century (up to The Great War).
I totally agree about the non-joy of crafting to a deadline. Which is partly why I superstitiously avoid sewing for profit.
I’ll have to check the Byatt book out! The Stephen King novel you’re describing reminds me of Garth Marenghi’s introductions: “Blood!? Blood. Crimson copper-smelling blood, his blood. Blood. Blood. Blood…”
I love the feeling of getting lost within the craft. Usually I’ll put on music with a good beat, or even work while my husband’s watching a movie (best if it’s one I’ve seen before, or didn’t have much interest watching). I also like when I can see immediate results (or realize that I need to go to bed, as I’ve sewn the sleeve onto the body of a shirt the wrong way…. and this was my third attempt. Whoops!)
Lately since I have a toddler, I can’t just give into the muse at any time *wry smile* though there are times where I could use sewing therapy!