The key to happiness

Do you have a passion? We’ve all heard since we were kids that we had to “find our passion”. It could be a sport like dance, or something more scholarly like maths, or just reading fantasy books. But as we grew up, it changed: people began to tell us about finding a job we like, having an objective to aim at — to put it simply, find our path in life. An entire ecosystem made of a myriad of self-development books, seminars like TedTalks and podcasts was developed and designed to help us in our frantic search for a passion, a vocation — in brief, a clear purpose in life. And this is becoming a topic of interest. The problem is, if there is so much content and curiosity about this subject, it would mean that a lot of people haven’t found their passion yet. And having a passion seems to be a prerequisite for happiness: after all, how could you be happy if nothing motivates you to get out of bed? On the opposite, being enthusiastic about the job you are going to do every day appears to be an ideal first step towards everyone’s Holy Grail, happiness.

              Everyday, more people partake in the quest for happiness. They read self-help books, watch a hundred TedTalks, and question themselves in order to re-examine their life experience until now. This is especially true of those who are about to graduate high school, or those who are going to finish their postgraduate studies — like me. We feel a specific pressure telling us that we should already aim for a job, and it makes sense for some people. But let’s not forget what the abundance of self-development content about passions reveals to us: a majority of people do not have a clear objective in life, something they know they would absolutely love to do for the rest of their lives. This is not only true for high school and university students, but also people who are already working.

              In the end, few people have the chance to know early what their vocation is. Most of us feel like we will wander aimlessly through life. Does that mean that we have no chance of finding happiness? According to the famous psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, it doesn’t. We can be happy even while doing a job that isn’t a vocation. If you think about it, it involves transforming our actual job, or more specifically changing the way we perceive the undertaking of our tasks. To Csikszentmihalyi, the key to this job crafting and indirectly to happiness is a concept called “flow”. What is flow? Thanks to ChatGPT, I know that Csikszentmihalyi defines flow as a “state of optimal experience that people can achieve when they are fully engaged in an activity. It is characterized by a feeling of intense focus, deep involvement, and enjoyment in the task at hand. Flow occurs when the challenges of an activity match a person’s skills, and they are able to fully immerse themselves in the experience without being distracted by external factors. In this state, people often lose track of time and may even forget about their surroundings, as their attention is fully absorbed in the activity.”

              For those who know a little bit about meditation, flow is similar to an experience of mindfulness. You are present in the moment, to the point where you forget everything around you. In his book Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, Csikszentmihalyi uses the example of a climber totally focused on his goal: reaching the top. But how could we do this in a more mundane setting, like an office? After all, flow seems particularly well suited for a physical activity. In fact, what comes to my mind when I try to think about the optimal experience of flow is… sex. Indeed, sex is —or should be— a prime example of how to be completely there, in the moment, hypersensitive and focused on each new sensation. It is hard to imagine the same intensity in an intellectual pursuit, interesting though it may be. Nevertheless, it is possible. Look at chess players, or avid readers, or passionate mathematicians. And more than randomly happening, it can also be provoked. In fact, it should be provoked! We should all try to reach this state of intense concentration in all our activities. After all, if you listen to spiritual leaders, most of them will tell you that mindfulness is the key to tranquillity and happiness. Flow also boosts your productivity and creativity in the first step of a virtuous circle: you become more productive, which is very satisfying, so you are happy, which makes your work enjoyable, which encourages you to engage even more in it, etc. Finally, it helps our attention span ; indeed, thanks to all the scrolling we do on social media and our frenetic consumerism, it has never been shorter.

              But how to induce flow in our everyday lives? For flow to occur, we need “the challenges of an activity” that “match a person’s skills”. We have to be stimulated, either physically or intellectually. But what about those who have jobs considered monotonous and tedious? For example, think about a factory worker who goes through the exact same motions every day, for years on end. How could they find enjoyment in this kind of task? Well, you’d be surprised at how creative human nature can be. Csikszentmihalyi describes this very situation in Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience: among other things, he talks about a worker whose day consists in constantly repeating the same motions. You notice no visible difference with his colleagues. Yet, if you take the time to talk to them, it would strike you: the way each of them perceives their work is like night and day. Most of the workers endure what they have to do like they would endure the rain if they found themselves stuck outside during a downpour. But this particular person saw his job as a constant challenge: each bolt to screw was an opportunity to do better, move faster. The specific way he apprehended his job kept him from boredom. More than that, it kept him intellectually sharp. After all, he had to reinvent himself with each bolt, devise a strategy to do better each time; in the end, he found a purpose in the challenges he kept on giving himself.

              If you deem the last example a little extreme, I understand. Finding a purpose in a factory seems far-fetched. Above all, I do not want to imply that factory work is easy or fun since we are aware of the dangers it implies, physical but also mental — through a debilitating and depressing effect. But it is precisely the negative reputation of factory work that makes this example so striking. I think that it may be why Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi decided to write about it: it shows that even in a very difficult or dull job, reinventing the way we perceive it, for example through exciting challenges, makes all the difference. The virtuous circle it leads to can even bring you to find yourself a purpose, therefore making the job a fulfilling one. Only when you reach this stage you realize that you may not have found your passion, but you created it: when you keep your interest alive by trying to see your work from another angle every time, your skills are constantly sharpened by new challenges, and finally, thanks to all of this, you discovered a purpose that gives meaning to all your tasks, and turned your job into a passion.

As a soon-to-be-graduating student, that reassures me; in fact, it gets me excited about my future job. For all of us who did not choose a designated path growing up, not being passionate about our work does not mean we have lost all chances of ever being happy. It means we have the opportunity to turn our work into something else, something more. And trying to induce moments of flow into our daily tasks changes more than the way we work; it changes our attitude towards life. Indeed, for flow to happen, you have to keep an open mind about new possibilities and question everything — from the way you work to the habits you have (for example, watching TV every night). We stop being passive bystanders in our own lives, and we become actors. It can be hard; we may be tempted to go back to the easy way we lived before; but it is so fulfilling. In the end, flow is more than simple moments in the day, it is a way of life. And I do not know if there is a miraculous key to happiness, but having such a mindset seems like a good first step.