Cameron Norsworthy

In this next series, I will delve into my personal journey for writing the book, how to Find Flow. In partnership with Bonnier and Blink Publishing, I've distilled the last couple of decades of my research and practice into an accessible guide in the hope of open sourcing, much of the work that I do,
a series will start by unpacking the reasons why I created the book, what it means to me, and the hope I have for people that read it. Together with Kevin Norden off, we examine why flow has been so impactful in my life and why I continue to hold it as an essential ethos for my personal and professional development.
The series will then have episodes dedicated to the three main sections of the book, ready Steady Flow. It will examine how a flow mindset has helped people to approach the challenges in their life differently, stay focused under pressure, and invite more satisfaction into their lives. We will unpack each section of the book.
I will describe some interesting stories that brought each part to Genesis and lay out why each section is an essential part of the process towards finding flow. You will learn what it takes to intentionally invite flow into your life and how people are using the book practically every day. I hope you enjoy our inside look into the book, ‘How to find Flow’.

Kev: Cameron, you've coached over 10 world champions, built thriving businesses. You hold a PhD in flow psychology, and you're considered a leading scientist on Optima functioning. Yet you felt compelled to write this book. What conversations were you tired of not having?
Cameron: What conversations was I tired of not having? That's a mind bender in itself.
Kev: Mm-hmm.
Cameron: Um, I, I think it's. That flow matters, right? That flow central to that conversation that ordinarily so many conversations around human performance, optimal performance being our best navigate around how can I cope better? How can I grit through the difficulty better?
And having felt and understood another way to approach our challenges. For people not to consider flow within that conversation, for people not to prioritize that optimal state of functioning. Similar to I guess the frustrations positive psychology researchers might have had at a time when everything was based around traditional psychology trying to fix problems as opposed to looking at where do we want to be?
How do we want to feel and what, what are the recipes that get us there? So that was certainly a frustration, and whilst I was having that conversation with myself, myself and close others in areas of work and in areas of connecting with other people, flow wouldn't be mentioned.
And,
Kev: Hmm
Cameron: hence, uh, hence the source of a lot of my action.
Kev: Hmm. Where do you think that frustration comes from or where do you think that not focusing on that stems from rather.
Cameron: for myself, that frustration is both one of my life, my personal frustration of. Having to bear so much
anxiety and dread and frustration and stress and, then seeing other people live in a manner where they seem not to know that there's another choice. For my own personal life. Learning to talk in public has been extremely difficult. I used to stutter as a young child, and public speaking was also always problematic.
So even just casual social situations would be triggering for me and something that I'd want to avoid or I had to grit through, you know? And then when sporting circles and situations again, there was this, it, it gets difficult. The pressure's on. We've just gotta bear it and get through it and survive.
And having felt that for so long and then realizing actually that there is a completely new way of operating in that area. Knowing that, oh, how would my life be different? Or the, how would my experiential tapestry for my life be different if I had found that out earlier and seeing so many other people struggle.
And so many other people not enjoy their achievements and not enjoy what they're doing because they're enduring it as opposed to enjoying it
is is a real waste of life. And I guess I've been lucky enough to have quite a few life threatening situations where I'm repeatedly faced with how precious life is
So to see people being in automation, to see people surviving through the very little time they have on this planet seems, a waste and, and quite, quite, frustrating to watch.
Kev: You mentioned life threatening situations, and obviously that piqued my interest and it might be picking someone else's interest as well. Could you elaborate on that and what got you through those?
Cameron: I mean, one of them is detailed in my book in regards to being held at gunpoint in Brazil and what got me through those wasn't any smarts, wasn't me being. An intelligent or very capable human being. Rather, it was becoming more aware
and understanding that my internal world is very different from my external world.
The external situation wasn't great.
However, during that time, I'd handed over the keys of my consciousness to that situation. And, by reaching a state of despair and surrendering to the fact of what was happening, I suddenly realized that yes, the situation is happening, but I don't need to add friction to the situation.
I don't need to hand over my, what's happening in my subjective experience moment, moment
to these other people. And within that. An empowerment grew to then choose which thoughts I was listening to, and then that grew towards generating volition and feelings and, and narrative that I wanted to engage with, which then lent to behavior change in that situation, which got me out of it.
But having those moments where we are faced with life being very short. Very quickly, and I think pressure does this to a certain extent, very quickly. Our internal conflicts or doubts come to the surface, they rise. It's almost like squeezes all of our inner conflict to the surface and we either stress and panic and struggle with it, or hopefully we do that and we go through it.
And then on the other side, we see this space of liberation and freedom, from it and, then we start to realize, wow. Uh, I don't have to live with all of that. I don't have to live with all of that automation that's ordinarily fueling most of what I do. And I can look at things differently and I can choose a subjective experience in any given moment.
So that kind of awareness and realization got me through those moments, but often those moments are sort of thrusted upon us. Unless you're throwing yourself out of a plane for the first time, voluntarily.
Kev: What was it like being held at gunpoint?
Cameron: I mean, it's very. Looking back on it with the mindset that is funny. The first thing that comes to my mind is I think a very rich experience.
You know, in, in the, yeah. Where's why I'm laughing in the sense that there's just so much happening. It's so complex, right? There's fear, there's shame, there's, um.
Disempowerment, the feeling of autonomy feels stripped away,
Kev: Mm.
Cameron: injustice, um, anger, you know, rage, sadness, and, but at the same time there's this, if you were to box those into unhelpful feelings, there's this, wow. Isn't each millisecond. Important
isn't each. Each moment how I'm interpreting this person's facial expressions isn't that, you know, you become very, very present
Kev: Hmm.
Cameron: and life takes on a different lens.
And, and so there's this duality and complexities where all of these feelings and thoughts are happening at once and. You know, which is why, why I say rich, which most people might get confused with. So I
look back on
it,
Kev: us. If you can. Rich, wait. What? What makes it rich?
Cameron: The complexity,
Kev: Hmm.
Cameron: know, often we look at experiences as good or bad, positive as or negative. We try and create some kind of simple duality around it and often situations that bring up uncomfortable feelings we tend to avoid or see as bad experiences. But I, I think I've learned to, and again this is in hindsight with some of my experiences in life, but learn to see life as an experiences that exist on a paradigm from poor.
Too rich
and a poor experience for me would be one where I'm completely disconnected, where I'm completely shut off. And a rich experience. One is where I'm highly connected, highly engaged, and that may not always be super enjoyable. You know, doing trauma therapy, crying at someone's funeral. They're rich experiences that are hugely meaningful.
Kev: Mm-hmm.
Cameron: With a vast amount of complexity to it. And that's, that's a rich experience. That fulfills, not fulfills, but fills our consciousness up with a very rich experience. Not that we want to be in rich experiences that don't necessarily feel good all the time, but on the contrary, you know, we have rich experiences that feel fantastic, like laboring and smiling when your child does something and knowing there's been 10 years that's gone into that moment and the complexity there and they can feel magnificent, but having that richness to it,
is, is really rewarding. I think when we look back on our lives and certainly when we, I haven't got there yet, but when I speak to other people who are coming to the end of their lives and, and they're tracing back through their memories of what stand out. It's often these rich experiences that leave a deeper mark on our consciousness.
Kev: Hmm. Well, what comes to mind here for me is that it's not momentarily clear whether something becomes a good experience or not. It, it might change and morph in hindsight, even though it's a very challenging and in the moment, maybe a not so good experience. What do you think?
Cameron: Perhaps, and certainly was that for me on many occasions. But equally now. That I have a, my flame mindset on most of the time , I can be aware of a situation being very rich, even if it's
uncomfortable. You know, I can sit with family members where there's tension and there's awkwardness and everyone just wants to run away, but at the same time smile and go, this is pretty rich.
It's pretty interesting. Um, and I can have that kind of duality in that experience. So, yeah, bit of both.
Kev: Hmm. What got you into flow? Why is it so personal to you?
Cameron: I didn't realize it at a young age, but these flow experiences brought out. My richest and most meaningful moments. I used to play a lot of tennis when I was young and, destined to sort of be a tennis star, as other people would say.
I lived for those moments where I could just be on a court and things would happen effortlessly, and I would go to bed at night and close my eyes and, things that would go through my head were those shots that just played themselves and when I couldn't play tennis through injury.
And, you know, repeatedly three years of physio and all sorts of treatments had to make a decision that I couldn't, um, play tennis again. I went backpacking, a little bit depressed and in search of adventure and purpose and meaning, and, and came across this busker in a street in sco. And when walking up the street, I was pulled into the moment the music.
The note that this bus was playing and it was a very surreal experience. 'cause half of my brain was saying, no, I've gotta go up the street and I've got to go get some, I can't remember what it was, but I need to purchase something and then get back to the hostel 'cause I'm a bit tired. And, but then the other half of me was like, wow, look at this.
Look at this. This commitment from this guy, this music's insane.
And I was just pulled into the moment and I was sort of flipped between these two experiences. And the more and more I allowed myself, I'd get pulled into the gravity of the, uh, of what he was playing. And, looking at this person, I realized he had two amputated arms and was playing this harmonica with two stubs.
And I, I had been in a sort of a veil, I guess, of self pity and uh, of around, I can't play tennis 'cause my arms can't handle it. And, what, what is life giving me? And I was like, wow, if this guy can be in the top of his world, in his situation, I've got my whole life ahead of me,
you know, and it really opened my eyes and it also, what I left from that.
Moment was actually, that's, that's what I missed playing tennis. I didn't miss traveling out of a suitcase. I didn't miss hitting a thousand balls. Or what I missed was those magical moments where I'd be so deeply engaged in something that the moment would just occur and I would feel surprised by what my body had just done and that sort of deep commitment to an act.
And so I left there going, wow, that's. That's what I miss. And I'd never really thought about it outside tennis up until that point. So it's suddenly like mind blown. I was like, wow, okay. Where else can people have this experience? And, and, and so I. I'd start tried to read everything that I could around this space as to try and find something akin to what I was feeling and searching for, and came across Chisem High's work and, .
And, I'd always had, I guess, an affinity to both eastern and western philosophy and this idea of flow, what Xem High called this, this state of flow just seemed to give me a language. Uh, and the people reading it, I related to so much and it gave me a tribe to this feeling that I inherently knew was important and meaningful and rich.
But I had no words to describe it up until that point. And having it taken away from me in a scenario that I was so used to finding, it made me realize actually how important it's,
Kev: Mm.
Cameron: So that's what got my cerebral interest into it and got my heart behind it and my, desire to, to really explore it and really understand it.
And, um, and later on it became a. Profession for me, but, in those early times, just really want to recapture it and understand why was it, why, why is it so impactful in my life? You know? That's what initially got me into flow.
Kev: Yeah. Yeah. I'm, I'm sitting here with the feeling that I, I can really relate to that and I'm sure it's, it's not just me. It, it's something that connects to most people that have gone through some sort of, um. Losing the identity was something that gave you joy or pleasure or something that was really meaningful and rich to you, and then having to reorganize yourself and finding that it was something else altogether. For me, I, I had a similar experience with getting injured. I was a martial artist and still am, but I couldn't really do it anymore, and it had left some psychological challenges too, and I really was tied to the identity. And then just like you discovered that it was more the richness that this way of behaving and being could give me in life.
And so if you're listening in, maybe you can hear and relate to that in a way that there's something that for sure has been going on in your life that gives that meaningfulness, that gives that deep immersion, that just allows you to be more alive in a way.
Cameron: Yeah, it's a really interesting point you bring up there. 'cause often we, infer. That what we love about flow into that context. You know, you're talking about the identity and for me, I was a tennis player and actually it wasn't necessarily the identity of the tennis player that, that really, it was the, the ability to find flow in that context and that arena and that domain.
And I think once, like you've just pointed out, once, people can relate to that and identify, oh, it's actually that space of being in flow. It's really liberating.
Um, I mean, it's nice to feel part of something and identified to something, but it's really liberating to actually realize that I can get that in other places.
How cool is that?
Kev: Yeah. Why a book, how to Find Flow? What? What's special about this book?
Cameron: You'll have to read it and tell me yourself.
Kev: Yeah, but
that doesn't give us your perspective. Hey.
Cameron: After reading a lot of the early literature on flow, mainly from Chick semi high, but from others as well. You know, I was sort of awestruck and found. I found a language that could describe how I was feeling on the inside, but there wasn't anything that could really help me find it.
There wasn't anything that could help me. Tell me why I was so good at finding it at tennis in one moment and then so terrible at finding it three seconds later on the same court doing the same thing. For me, I always felt that that was. What an opportunity missed. And I was just flabbergast that no one else was doing it.
You know? I was just like, what? Why? How, because surely I'm wrong. Surely it's there. I just need to look more. Um, in terms of the western psychological language, there just wasn't, just wasn't there. And so that book. Is really a, a quest to help chart what I've learned, how I've been able to help others, some of the generic lessons that seem to help most people and to also try and make things a bit more accessible.
You know,
some, a lot of the text around flow is academic and difficult for a lot of people to read and. Hopefully there is quite a bit of science in it, but hopefully it's also made it more, more accessible, more tangible, more relatable, for people. So it, it gives a practical playbook with hopefully the scientific integrity around it, but in a way that people can digest it.
You know, flow, like I spent a lot of time in the athlete world and athletes, whether they know it or not, most people talk about it nowadays, but it's so important to them of getting into that place, getting into that zone. And, but they, most of them wouldn't read, a detailed academic text like they get through the first page and it would just be thrown away.
So to try and put something together that could reach that audience for me was, is really, really me meaningful.
Kev: Nice. Yeah. So tell us what, what was that journey like to write this book?
Cameron: It's been a very challenging one, and a very very long one. It's interesting, I listen to other podcasts and other stories of other authors, and everyone has their own, I guess, journey with it. But often I'm, hearing the same thing and for me it's been a long journey of editing.
And finding out what, what works, but also how to refine my message in a way that I can communicate, with the same intention of what I'm trying to say. I guess I haven't been blessed with the ability to be that articulate and you know, words, I grew up dyslexic and reading was always challenging and writing was always a bit challenging.
I found reading books or writing, even just writing emails that were sort of coherent, challenging, you know, I'd get other people, commentating on. I find your email really confusing. And then I'd reread it and I'd be like, oh yeah, it is, isn't it? But at the time of writing, at the time of writing, I thought it was a great email.
And then rereading it, I'm like, oh my God. Okay. That's, that's a bit blunt, or that's a bit this, or, um. And, so that whole journey of being able to communicate through words has been a huge journey for me. You know, and the
first rendition of this book was just like this, this vomit, this sort of verbal like diarrhea that just like landed on a page and
Kev: Hmm.
Cameron: was.
You know, from the collection of endless mornings and endless evenings that I'd have to write, I was sleep deprived with kids. But it just needed to come out.
And it came out, but it didn't make much sense, you know, and it wasn't coherent. And learning to kind of put that into a framework.
Was really challenging for me. And then finally when it made its way to a publisher, them saying, oh, it needs to be more scientific. So then I rewrote it to being very scientific. And then the feedback came, oh, it needs to be a bit more practical. So I was like, oh God,
Kev: What do you want?
Cameron: what do you want?
And then the feedback at a later date after. COVID and the kind of journalistic style of books sort of really started to hit home was needs to have more of your narrative in it.
And that was probably, again, one of my biggest challenges was putting my journey into the book.
And so learning to be okay with my stories, learning to, to, make my stories public.
Learning to have confidence and trust in what I've got to say.
And, the lessons that I really garnered from my time has been, um, it has been a huge growth for me, but a, a journey in, in the book itself of, I mean, that that narrative is sort of laid out in the book. The combination of all of that, I think is 10 years in the making really. So, um, it, it, it went through a few phases.
Kev: Yeah. Yeah. Something that comes to mind that you said earlier, right? You were very interested in. Eastern western philosophy, and you're dabbling in the practicality, but also very scientific. So you're almost walking through worlds here. Hey. So it seems to me that that challenge was almost like an exercise to integrate those seemingly opposing, ways of existing and making it into something that's digestible for.
Probably those both directions.
Cameron: Yeah, very, very much so. I've loved diving deep into the science of things such as a PhD or continuing to write journals in an academic way because it. There's so much rigor there and there's so much integrity to the words you're using and it really makes you double think, triple think as to what you're doing and how you're doing it and the work that's gone before you and to leave the literate world a better place than when you arrived.
And then there's also the practical side of things where. Working with myself as a Guinea pig, and then working with other people. The practicality is often very. Different than, you know, a, a great example of this is people were using mindfulness as a helpful tool, for decades, centuries, even before academically it became acceptable.
And so there's, there's this sort of practical world that might be looking at ideas, you know, such as embodied cognition, most athletes, uh, living and breathing, this idea of bodily attention. Academically, it takes decades before that comes into the jigsaw puzzle. And so there's, there's fruits from all these different worlds, just as there is from Eastern philosophy and Western philosophy, and often with life.
It the truth lies in, or not necessarily the truth. An advantage or an idealize in that complexity in the gray, in the interchange. And, I actually really enjoy that process. It's similar to the journey of the flow center, of bringing together academics and professionals and sort of two opposing cultures that are often at ends but I know that if you can bring those worlds together, something stronger comes out the top of it. And so sitting with that tension, sitting with that, complexity is really fruitful, in the long run if, if a bit annoying in the short term.
Kev: Embodied cognition. Take us through what, what that means. If you're not familiar either with the literature or if you've never heard the term, just to make it more tangible for us.
Cameron: But simply embodied cognition is this idea that our mind is not really separated from our body. Going back to Descartes, where. There was a, a time where they were completely separate and there was a different, philosophies of, how the mind works. And, but over time, just from the very simple task of lifting your shoulders to the sky, looking up, taking a few deep breaths, you know, I instantly feel lighter and more energized.
There's, there's such a, an undeniable link. As soon as we think there's a physiological reaction and, to separate them, we need to do at times to make things simple. And sometimes it can help communication, but that often comes at the cost of, not acknowledging embodied cognition.
And, um, and more and more we're learning that. This sensation, , we have more senses than we ever thought we had, right? We are now a senses, proprioception and pain and , we used to just think it was smell and touch and this whole sort of sensory experience that we're having in any given second plays a huge part in our ability to comprehend and the intelligence we are receiving and embody cognition really just.
I guess allows us to combine all of that into this one singular idea.
Kev: Cameron, what do you think is the biggest disconnect between how people think about flow and how you've come to realize it now throughout your practice?
Cameron: There's a, a few that come to mind. The first one that I, I, if you will allow me to elaborate on more than just one.
The first one that comes to mind is lots of people subsume flow with this idea of just go with the flow. And I sort of see flow being used out there in the world in so many different masks that it gets confusing and difficult for people to, I guess, really trust.
A pathway to flow or trust the idea of flow because it's, you know, even insurance companies are now trying to suggest if you come with us, you get more flow. It's,
Kev: to see how they do that.
Cameron: yeah, it's, banded about so much that, like the saying, just go with the flow in the better understanding of flow, you realize that. You know, flow is all about intuitive action. And to just go with the flow, we often have to neglect and minimize our intuitive action in order to, to prioritize other things.
Kev: Hmm.
Cameron: Along with that, there's this idea of flows just kind of. Being more relaxed, you know, man, hey, just, just chill out. Just, but actually flows this, deep state of presence and deep state of harmony, and keeping that deep state of harmony isn't just pure relaxation, right?
There's this sort of high degree of effortless control that comes with flow and, and that takes amazing cohesion and amazing cohering of all different aspects of our being to, to achieve. So. That sort of, that kind of disconnect between how flow is often perceived in the public domain and what flow is, I think is a big one.
The second one that I want to touch on is that a lot of people might think of. Who get past that first one and then move to this second one flows this optimal state. It's reserved for the elite. It's this sort of once in a lifetime experience that we might have and Oh, wow. You know, and, and we'd sort of put it on this pedestal as if it's something that we need to chase and that it's, it's, we've gotta strive, we've gotta do our 10,000 hours, we gotta, and it becomes this sort of floating ideal that.
Becomes very, um, we become disconnected from thinking that we can achieve it. It's a bit like people sitting at home at the TV watching people at the Olympics and then they end up never going to the gym 'cause they're like, well, I can never be like that. And there's this disparity between believing that we can actually achieve flow because we've held it as this elite state or reserve for the elite or something that's very difficult to achieve.
And actually realizing that flow is all about inner harmony. The pathway to that is actually unpacking the barriers that we put in place. And it's more about allowing flow rather than finding it and achieving it.
And once we can realize that we need to allow flow for it to occur.
But actually. Most of our physiology is working on the same principles that allow flow to exist. You know, so physiology's constantly optimizing our blood flow and we get a cut and everything's working in unison and integration and differentiation to get that cut healed. , So it's already innate with us, but we often don't allow it.
And I think having that, helping people to understand that it's so much more accessible and achievable. Than we might otherwise realize is a big disconnect. And then lastly, that there, I'm, I'm not sure it's really there anymore, but certainly when I was starting there was this sort of apprehension about fi, like intentionally finding flow.
It'd be like, no, you can't do that. That's, um. There was this, I guess an idea that the more you try to find flow, the further you get away from it.
And I, I can see where that premise is coming from in the sense of, you know, seeking an outcome goal. But there was also this, you know, who, who, who could be so grandiose to think that we could intentionally find flow and I think more, the more we believe that we.
Are worthy people, worthy of worthy experiences, then, then it's like, well, yeah, why not? Why can't
I allow myself to be in a greater sense of harmony? And, my experience, certainly is, and with working with others, is that when we do intentionally make changes to our mindset to find flow, to allow flow.
Then flow occurs more frequently in our life. You know, we, we value it more. The brain naturally wants to cr create it more. If we put an intention there, the mind and body will naturally cohere things towards that end. 'cause it's, it's a fantastic state. So, um, you know, one disconnect I've seen is people might have acknowledged flow in the past, but not wanted to intentionally seek it.
For fear, for reasons of fear, and I think, I think it's
really important,
Kev: Fear of what?
Cameron: Fear of their own light, fear of getting further away from it. You know, a lot of athlete circles would whisper about flow, but not want to talk about it in case they jinx it. Um.
You know, it's like this secret thing that just happens, and if I talk about it, then it, it, it won't happen. Because it's such an innate feeling.
It's an experience. It's not a sort of a cerebral thought. And when we get more cerebral about it, we get more into our thinking brain and, and we can get further away from it. So there's this, um, I think just sort of opening up the canvas and we can still be intentional towards finding flow.
And that doesn't mean it needs to become a moment to moment outcome. In what we're doing,

Thanks for listening. That concludes our first episode of An Inside Look into the book, how to Find Flow. Stay tuned as we explore some of the important messages of the book in the next episode.