Steven Kotler is an American author and journalist, born in 1967, known for his work on flow and peak human performance. He is executive director of the Flow Research Collective, and his books include Abundance, The Rise of Superman, Stealing Fire, The Art of Impossible and Gnar Country.
Brian Rose has interviewed Kotler twice on London Real, in 2018 and 2023. They talked about what flow is and how to reach it, the Flow Genome Project, and his 2023 book Gnar Country on ageing and staying at your best for longer.
His core idea is that flow is a skill people can train. Both interviews are listed below with a short summary.
Find Your Flow State (2018). The clearest introduction to his work on flow and how to use it.
Kotler argues that flow, the state of complete absorption in which people perform at their best, is not luck. In 2018 he said it has known triggers that anyone can learn to use.
Speaking in 2023, he said research over the past decade shows people can sustain high performance much later in life than once believed, with the right mindset and training.
Kotler argues that some brain changes in the second half of life are beneficial and, if cultivated, can bring new levels of wisdom, creativity and empathy, even as physical skills slowly decline.
In Gnar Country he presents ageing as a reason to spend more time on meaningful pursuits, not less, which for him meant learning a demanding new form of skiing.
Steven Kotler is an American author and journalist, born in 1967, known for his writing on flow and peak performance. He is executive director of the Flow Research Collective and his books include The Rise of Superman, Stealing Fire and The Art of Impossible.
In 2018 Kotler explained what flow is and how to reach it more often. In 2023 he talked about his book Gnar Country, ageing and how to keep performing at a high level later in life.
Start with Find Your Flow State from 2018 for his core ideas on flow. Then watch Gnar Country from 2023 for how he applies them to getting older.
Twice: Find Your Flow State in December 2018 and Gnar Country in February 2023.
Flow is the state of total absorption in a task, when focus is high, time seems to change and performance improves. Kotler has spent much of his career writing about how flow works and how people can reach it more often.
Gnar Country, published in 2023, follows Kotler as he learns park skiing in his fifties to test whether peak performance is possible later in life. He argues that with the right training people can keep improving far longer than expected.
Official site: stevenkotler.com
Join 6 million+ followers & subscribers. Full-length interviews with world-class guests, straight to your inbox every week.
We take your privacy seriously. We will never sell your information.
Chat
