Today’s post is another quite in-depth one. It’s not particularly long compared to Indie Filmmakers” href=”https://filmlifestyle.com/guide-indie-filmmakers/” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener” data-lasso-id=”1269″>some other recent posts, but we’re going to go deep down the rabbit hole again.

We’ve talked about flow state before and how this can benefit us as business people. I’ll be talking about that again today, as well as touching on some other thoughts and ideas.

As always, I’ll give you some practical Action Steps at the end. Those will help you put this stuff in practice.

Getting Into Flow

You know that feeling when everything is just working exceptionally well for you? You feel in-tune with your environment and like nothing can break your focus? You seem to achieve great things one after the other and missteps and errors just don’t seem to occur.

How good does that feel?

Well, a man called Mihály Csíkszentmihályi came up with a way of describing this. I know, I can’t pronounce his name either, but he’s an awesome guy!

He called it Flow State.

Flow State, also known in sport’s circles as “being in the zone,” is that feeling I described above. This is where you’re completely immersed in energized focus and you do your best work.

Maybe you’re on set and everything’s going well. Maybe you’re working on a screenplay. Maybe you’re on a wedding shoot. Whatever it is, we all know that feeling well.

And we all want to experience it more.

We can achieve more of the Flow State by doing this:

  • Focusing completely and utterly on the task at hand. Yes, this takes practice. If you practice concentrated and undisturbed practice regularly, you’ll eventually get better and better at achieving Flow State. This is something I’ve been working on and I can now do many years of focused work if I’m not disturbed.
  • Clearly setting goals. If you want to achieve something, you need to know what it will look like and how it will feel when you achieve that goal. Being clear and well-defined with your goals is another great way of reaching Flow State more often.
  • Develop your skills to a high level. People of immense skill and mastering in an area are more likely to meet head-on with Flow State more often. This is because the extent of practice that is required for mastering requires extreme focus. As we learned above, practicing focus leads to more chance of achieving Flow State.

Seeing Through The Matrix

Once we start to regularly attain the Flow State and we’re living in the moment when we’re out, we get treated to an incredible VIP experience – we get given a ticket inside the Matrix of Business Dynamics.

In this day and age,, it almost seems a bit cliche to use an allusion to The Matrix, but it’s the best I’ve got right now.

You may have heard of social dynamics. Well, Business Dynamics are very similar, and it’s from that phrase that I coin Business Dynamics.

You see, all around us, business dynamics are at play every moment of every day. Not just at the bars and clubs, and not merely in the area of dating and relationships. Business dynamics operate on all levels in which humans interact.

   

The majority of people out there in the world are governed by business dynamics without even being aware of them.

Just like with social dynamics, the worst of these people are held in indentured servitude to them – these are the folks who vainly consume and flaunt wealth and fake beauty in order to gain acceptance into social groups that they feel they don’t ordinarily belong to.

Think of wannabes of all kinds – starlet actresses in Los Angeles, the arrogant wannabe singers on YouTube, or the vacuous “stars” of MTV reality tv shows.

Your Own VIP Party

That title sounds kinda vacuous in itself at first glance, but I mean it in the most ironic of ways.

In order to gain an upper hand in business and life, you need to join the “VIP party” of business dynamics.

And, the good news is, just by me telling you about it, you’re granted a VIP pass to the exclusive club. You see, just the knowledge that these conventions exist is enough to grant someone access to its treasures. It’s all a little like Fight Club.

Knowledge, after all, is power.

It’s a secret, but it’s a secret that respects those who have the power to navigate it – to those people, it accepts them with open arms, as it knows they’ve paid their dues.

For now, before we go deeper into the rabbit hole, you need only know that you are a member and that with membership comes Your Voice, Your Market And Elevate Your Career In Filmmaking” href=”https://filmlifestyle.com/find-voice-market-elevate-career-filmmaking/” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener” data-lasso-id=”1277″>great responsibility.

The power to see through the conditioning and programming inherent in people all over the world is such that you should be respectful of just how potent the knowledge is. It may be words, but words have the power to move men and change worlds.

Act In The Moment

Another of the keys to getting into Flow State is acting in the moment. I didn’t mention it at the start of the article, because it was important to read the rest and I wanted to save this final point for the exercise section below.

What is acting in the moment, you ask? Try this exercise below and you will actually experience acting in the moment and all the great things it can bring.

  • For this exercise, you will spend the next week acting in the moment.
  • Get outside of your head. Wherever you are (work, at home, around friends, at parties, around family, amongst strangers), practice just being where you are.
  • Take everything in – see the sights, inhale the smells (be careful!) and taste the tastes.
  • Do this for a week and keep a journal of your progress, listing all the awesome experiences that you have along the way.

A Bit About Confidence

I just wanted to mention some points about Confidence, as Acting in the Moment is often confused with confidence. They’ll be related, of course.

People who have confidence in a certain area are normally great in their favored environment. They’re accustomed to the reactions they get at work, it’s predictable and safe. This is environmental confidence.

Environmental confidence is best summed up by imaging somebody you’ve worked with in the past. At work, he’s incredibly confident, knows exactly what to say and do and seems unstoppable. But then you take him out to a party and he…doesn’t know where to put himself.

At work, he knows exactly what to do. He’s well practiced, experienced and he’s made it his domain over time. At the party, he’s thrown into a situation outside of his control.

All Round Confidence, on the other hand, is a kind of confidence that isn’t predicated on being in any particular environment. People who display All Round Confidence are confident in any situation.

All Round Confidence is developed by consistently challenging yourself and putting yourself in a position to grow and improve.

Confidence comes to the person who’s willing to push themselves, to get out there and try new things. You have to do things you’ve never done, in order to get a result that you’ve never gotten. This means getting out of your comfort zone.

If you want to achieve All Round Confidence, you must develop an unshakeable conviction as to who you are and what you deserve out of life. As well as knowing what you want, you must also know what you deserve.

Of course, you’re going to come up against problems and struggles. Life is full of pressures – pressures to do a certain thing, act a certain way or believe a certain thing. Don’t be fooled by the temptation to be drawn in by these pressures and allow other people to decide how your life is going to be.

People are interested to hear exactly what you think is interesting. It’s true. They aren’t interested in what you think will impress them.

Once you get to a point where you have the confidence to express your personality authentically, from a position of value and strength of character, you will achieve great things.

I hope you’re doing great with your goals and knocking down brick walls wherever you find them. Thanks for reading!