Tai Chi Kung Fu Chinese Martial Arts Practitioners: Are you in the zone?

Elite sports stars and world class musicians often say they were ‘in the zone’ during a game or performance. Every action is effortless and – more importantly – flawless. There’s no thought required; mind and body move as one. Obviously, these people would like to be in the zone every time they put their skills to use, but finding that harmony is difficult and seemingly unpredictable! Modern psychologists have been studying this phenomenon in an attempt to more reliably achieve it – not just for peak athletes, but also in the corporate world for business teams.

A fantastic goal to aim for, but is it possible for the rest of us mere mortals to achieve this state in our everyday lives when even highly trained experts can’t consistently attain it?

Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, a Hungarian psychology professor, has described the phenomenon as a state of ‘flow’. He suggests that people are happiest and function at their best when fully absorbed by a task. They lose their sense of time and often their sense of self because they are wholly involved with the activity at hand. This leads to greater performance without distraction.

This is a case where western science is only just beginning to catch up with eastern philosophy. Buddhists practice this as ‘mindfulness’. Taoists have long described it as ‘Wu Wei’, which loosely translates as ‘effortless action’. They believe that by following the Tao (the way of the universe), your activities become effortless. It is only when we strive against the natural course of a situation, or attempt to impose our conscious will upon it, that our actions require stress and strain.

This idea is difficult to put into words, so here’s an experiment to show what I believe it means. Consider breathing. Right now, as you’re reading this, think about your breathing. Think about how fast you’re breathing. Notice how your breath goes in and out? Your chest rises and falls? ...

And now realise that just by paying attention to your breathing, it’s no longer an unconscious process of your body: you stop inhaling and exhaling unless you make yourself to do it. You’ll find yourself unsure of just what speed you normally breathe at, or how deep you breathe.

Just by thinking about it, your brain has interfered with the natural state of your body and the fundamental act of breathing has become difficult. It is only when your mind moves on to other things that your body can take over and air will once again move in and out effortlessly.

Practitioners of Tai Chi and Kung Fu may recognise much of what I have written about the state of flow. Our martial arts encourage us to do more with less: to use the least effort required for the greatest action. If you are pushing or straining or in pain, you’re using too much effort. Comparethis with the classes where time passes without you realizing it, where your balance is unshakeable and you finish the session feeling refreshed. This is when you’re ‘in the zone’, or‘in a state of flow’ or experiencing ‘wu wei’.

Now you know what flow is, and you might have even identified times when you’ve experienced it yourself, how do we work towards achieving it more often? Drawing on Mihály Csíkszentmihályi’s work, he describes eight major components which encourage a state of flow to occur:

1. A challenging activity that requires skills suited to the ability of the participant
2. Clear goals
3. Direct feedback
4. Concentration on the task at hand
5. The sense of control
6. The loss of self-consciousness
7. The merging of action and awareness
8. The transformation of time

It is up to the tai chi or kung fu student to add points 4, 5, and 6 through their own attention. Set aside the distractions of the life outside the class and allow yourself to be wholly absorbed by what the instructor is teaching. Be aware of your body and mind and know that you are the only one capable of ensuring you improve. Don’t be worried about how you compare to other students, or whether you are ‘succeeding’ or ‘failing’: these are egotistical concerns that will leave you self-conscious and more concerned with how the other people in the class are moving, rather than on your own behaviour.

Item 7 often occurs because our minds are fully involved in the actions of our body in order to move through the drills and forms. Item 8 seems to be a by-product of the rest of the conditions and not something we can control.

So what does all of this mean? If you are fully involved with the study of tai chi or kung fu, your mind and body concentrating entirely on the task at hand, you are more likely to enter into a state of flow. Your martial art practice may become more effortless, more efficient, more skilful and even moresatisfying.

If you’re interested in finding out more about ‘Flow’, Mihály Csíkszentmihályi has written several books on the subject.

Thanks to Nicola Nye, Tai Chi student, Berwick, for this contribution

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