How Flow Enhances Decision Making
At any given moment, there are an infinite number of choices to act or not act.42 The process of choice is a conscious bifurcation—or point of departure—from the conditions an individual is experiencing. This is the point at which awareness and action merge. Fragmentation within the individual arises when you make reactive choices as a result of inattention to feelings and lack of attention to actions.43 Choice is determined by the totality of significance in the moment. How we choose includes both explicit and tacit knowledge.44 The emphasis on continuous training in the firefighter culture is based on minimizing reactive choices.45
Size-up: Creative Suspension of Choice
In his book, Gentle Action: Bringing Creative Change to a Turbulent World, David Peat presents a concept he calls “creative suspension,” which is a “voluntary act, on the part of an individual or organization, to suspend, if only for a moment...