Whether or not you’ve read Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s classic book Flow, our book-club-blog-hop is for you AND it starts today at professional life coach Kanesha Baynard’s website.

Flow‘s one of those classics that perhaps:

a) you’ve heard quoted so many times that you feel you’ve read it even if you haven’t,

b) you’ve MEANT to read!

b) or you DID read back in the day and vaguely remember the overall concept but not the details.

Either way, our blog hop is for you. Each week, a coach will cover one chapter, giving us:

• the big takeaway
• some wowza quotations/excerpts
• a brand new custom-designed tool you can use right away (“Youwork”)
• discussion questions

We’re lucky Kanesha is kicking us off with Chapter 1 because no one creates a tool like Kanesha — I think it’s because not only is she a world class coach but a crazy talented crafter. She gets making things.

In this week’s post, Kanesha she looks at the very definition of “flow” and how basically it allows us to rethink the very concept of “happiness.” Which — let’s face it — is a good thing to do anytime but especially if it’s proving elusive. One revolutionary quote she includes is:

“…the best moments in our lives are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times – although such experiences can also be enjoyable, if we have worked hard to attain them. The best moments usually occur when a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile. Optimal experience is thus something that we make happen.” [emphasis mine]

This is the good news.

And Kanesha offers up two tools to get us started in making it happen. Enjoy!

Click on the above image to visit Kanesh’a site.