The First Time I Experienced “Flow” in Calligraphy

I've heard about this happening with other calligraphers, but today was the first time it happened to me. I did a bit of research, and this state is called flow. It happens when you're so absorbed in an activity that your awareness of time and your surroundings temporarily fade into the background. 

My attention isn't wandering between what I'm doing, what I need to do later, or whether I'm doing it perfectly. I'm simply there with the activity. And that's exactly what happened while I was writing the letter "j." 

For a little while, I wasn't thinking about whether my upstroke was perfect. I wasn't studying every loop looking for something wrong. I wasn't thinking about how many practice sheets I had left or what letter I needed to learn next. I was just writing. Stroke  

Your eyes are following the movement of the pen. Your hand is repeating something it has practiced before. You're paying attention to pressure, spacing, shape and movement. There isn't much room left for everything else competing for your attention. 

What surprised me most was how peaceful it felt. As a newbie, so much of learning calligraphy has been about correcting myself. Too much space. Not enough space. Wrong angle. Too much pressure. Crooked stroke. Watch the lesson again. Try another sheet. 

But for those few minutes with the letter "j," I wasn't correcting myself.  I wasn't even really judging the letters. I was enjoying them.  And maybe that's another kind of progress we don't talk about enough. 

There comes a point when your hand begins to understand something that once required your full concentration. You're still paying attention, but you're no longer fighting every movement. The strokes begin to connect. The repetition develops a rhythm. Somewhere between concentrating and enjoying yourself, you realize: 

I'm not just practicing calligraphy anymore. I'm experiencing it.

I think that's why this moment meant so much to me. When I started learning calligraphy from absolute zero, I was so focused on whether I could learn to make beautiful letters. I never thought about what it might feel like when the act of writing itself became beautiful. 

Today, I got a little glimpse of that.