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I’m reading Flow, the Psychology of Optimal Experience, and I’m diggin’ it. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (don’t even try to pronounce that) explores the state when our bodies are generating what he calls optimal psychic energy to achieve our goals.  To explain the idea he breaks down the beauty of complexity by stating flow requires complexity, not simplicity.

“Complexity is the result of two broad psychological processes: differentiation and integration.  Differentiation implies a movement toward uniqueness, towards separating oneself from others.  Integration refers to its opposite: a union with other people, with ideas and entities beyond the self.  A complex self is one that succeeds in combining these opposite tendencies.”

Mihaly uses the idea of a engine.  In order to work, each part is highly differentiated but only works effectively in union with the other parts.  Alone each part is useless to a large extent.  It’s limited if it operates exclusively in differentiation.  But if its differentiation is appreciated in union with the other parts, it shines.

“A self that is only differentiated-not integrated-may attain great individual accomplishments, but risks being mired in self-centered egotism.  By the same token, a person whose self is based exclusively on integration will be connected and secure, but lack autonomous individuality.  Only when a person invests equal amounts of psychic energy in these TWO processes and avoids both selfishness and conformity is the self likely to reflect complexity.”

What I think he’s suggesting is that complexity is the highest form of community because it is only possible when autonomous individual parts feel comfortable enough to just be who they are in a gathering of people.  I started thinking about what that would look for things like marriage, business partnerships and church.  In many ways this is only possible in the space of intentional grace, where people are comfortable in their own skin but are comfortable with other people’s skin too.

Blows my mind.