The first part of the reading summarized the techniques and importance of freeing one’s consciousness from the domination of social controls and biological impulses. The second part of the reading is more relevant about the ways to control consciousness in order to maintain the flow state. Flow state refers to the state where one is so immersed in his or her tasks so that external attention or even self consciousness becomes irrelevant. The practitioner is so self-motivated to do the work that he or she constantly gains satisfaction from it.
I feel that what I said in class about increasing the assigned work time between daily making assignments is actually intended to maintain good flow for me even if I did not know this concept before hand. Flow is a balance between complexity and skills. For example, if my vision for creative assignments are complex, my limit in skills may require the time to be lengthened to reduce anxiety. Another surprising yet reasonable connection the authors made was religious rituals as tasks to maintain flow. Since religion are the earliest agent to create order and higher causes in our consciousness, the rituals should be intuitively remedial for mental health. Generally speaking, the author, as well as me, believes finding enjoyment in any task given is essential to maintain a good mental health and high productivity.