We've all heard the phrase, "There's a time for work, and there's a time for play." That little piece of advice has implications inherent within it that just don't jive with all the observations I've ever made into the realm of human peak performance.
Peak performance can be defined as that state of mind from which we achieve maximum payoff with least investment. It's a "FLOW" state. Our conditioning leads us to believe that what's happening in that state is "too good to be true", or "shouldn't be this easy."
Most of us look at this image and make the assumption that this woman must be on vacation (I much prefer the term on Holiday). If she's laying around floating in the sea on a Monday afternoon, she's either on Holiday, independently wealthy or lazy and out of her mind. The irony is, that she is creating the ideal peak performance state. She's activating creative genius here. Peace. Stillness. Needlessness. Lightness. Pleasure. Freedom. Serenity. Joy. Rightness. Timelessness. These are the characteristics of the minds of the masters who create miracles consistently, with effortless ease.
When we are operating from a state of coherence, effortlessness and lightness of being, we're in the zone. It may at other times appear to others (that can't know what state of mind we're in by simply observing us from the outside) that we're "working" our butts off, but that isn't the case at all. In fact it's just the opposite.
It may appear that the climber and the high jumper are "working" or struggling to achieve the desired outcomes. But if these athletes are in the zone (and I'm quite certain they are, for he is a world class climber, and she's clearing that bar by a mile and knows it!), then they're fundamentally in the same state as the woman floating in the sea.
The worst implied message inherent with the "a time for work and a time for play" message is that it's intelligent and advisable to sacrifice the light-heartedness (play state) in order to achieve what you desire.
WRONG!!!!
If we're really interested in creating miracles, there's actually no time for "work", but rather only time for play. In this context, "work" refers to the survival mentality. Most of us have been conditioned to believe me must try to survive in this life, where resources are scarce. So we need to "work hard." "No pain; no gain!" Oooof.
