As a young engineering professional coming to the end of my degree Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s talk on creativity, fulfilment and flow introduced a useful model for assessing elements that contribute to pleasure and lasting satisfaction.

Money doesn’t matter: He illustrated that once income is slightly above the poverty line, further increases in income don’t contribute to further increases in well being or happiness. Rather increased pleasure and satisfaction come as a result of being involved in activities that are valued by the participant.

Skills & Challenges: The following diagram clearly indicates that flow is achieved when the participant has high skills to meet the high challenge that they are facing. Slightly lower skill level lead to arousal as the participant is stimulated to meet the challenges, while slightly lower challenges enables comfortable control to be achieved with the participants skill set. If challenges increases, while skill are not improved then this can lead to anxiety and worry. And if a person with high skills is unchallenged they will most likely be relaxed or board. Low skills & apathy results in the largest tragedy of all: apathy.

With this in mind I am continuing my search for a final year project in the renewable energy, energy efficiency and clean green technology sectors. Areas that I feel have the potential to make huge contributions to environmental and social well being. I am lucky as an engineer that I have the good fortune of my income being above the threshold of significance to personal well being. In addition, I am putting particular focus on companies that can challenge me and build my skill level.

If you would like to see the full talk head over to Technology Entertainment Design Talks (TED) or watch the embedded video below.

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Posted on November 9th, 2008 :: Filed under Education, Life, Technology
Tags :: creativity, engineering, fulfilment, happiness, innovation, job, management, TED, young professional

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