Many top athletes use techniques to increase the likelihood of achieving Flow in competitions where extraordinary performance is desired. Athletes in flow state have reported subtle or even dramatic changes in their perceptions of time and space.
Basketball legend Michael Jordan has noted these changes, describing the rim of the basket growing significantly larger during some of his best games. In this zone, he feels a consummate connection with his team, where the game unfolds with relative autonomy.
These moments include altered perceptions of the everyday world that go far beyond the simple euphoria of "runner's high" or addictions of the "adrenaline junkie", and into something deeper and more archetypical. A state that world-re noun scientist Joseph Campbell has aptly described as a "profound centeredness" that athletes reach when fully engaged with their sports.
Cognitive neuroscientist James Austin, M.D. has recently theorized that the flow state is a precursor to the more advanced, fully enveloping version of "Satori", or "Nirvana" as it is called in Zen Buddhism.
Buddhist monks undergo decades of disciplined training, much like elite athletes, but with exclusive emphasis on developing deep states of concentration. These states allow a documented neurological state called "de-synchronization", resulting in the radically different phenomenology of Nirvana.
Possibly the intense concentration that athletes develop through their training functions in a similar manner under the right conditions?
Recent advancements in medical imaging have made it possible to examine the physiological mechanisms behind these mental states in an attempt to gain insight into how they occur. Studies have noted significant changes in certain areas of the brain, including the "Orientation Association Area" that orients us within space. A specific gene has even been identified that is associated with spiritual experiences and is discussed in Dean H. Hamer's book "The God Gene."
But many questions still remain. Why do we possess within us the ability to have these experiences? Do they have a purpose? Are they just elaborate neurological illusions, or do they actually allow us to perceive the world in a more accurate way? Why can they be rare for some but more common for others?
These ideas form a central theme of "The Greater Meaning of Water."
