Fear to Flow: Reclaiming Your Natural State
- Kim Meninger
- 14 hours ago
- 20 min read
In this episode of The Impostor Syndrome Files, we explore how flow states, those moments of effortless focus and peak performance, can help us reconnect with our true selves and quiet the inner critic. My guest this week is Tom Roberts, retired dentist, race car driver, Buddhist practitioner and author of the upcoming book From Fear to Flow.
Together, we examine what it really means to be in a flow state and why it's more accessible than most people think. Tom shares his personal journey of discovering flow through racing and Buddhist practice, and how that journey helped him reframe impostor syndrome as a form of ego protection. We also talk about why flow isn’t just for elite performers, it’s our natural state, how our ego and old narratives block access to flow and creativity and what racing taught Tom about fear, failure, and finding his own lane.
About My Guest
Tom Roberts is a retired dentist, race car driver, longtime Buddhist practitioner, and author of the upcoming book From Fear to Flow: Transcend the Ego and Discover the Life You Were Meant to Live.
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Connect with Tom:
Website: https://tomroberts.me
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Transcript
Kim Meninger
Welcome Tom it's so great to have you here today. I'd love to start by inviting you to tell us a little bit about yourself.
Tom Roberts
So thanks, Kim. It's, it's really nice of you to, to invite me to this I love this subject. You know, I, I was a dentist for 35 years, and I sold my practice in 2019 and gave myself some obviously, it was COVID came right after that, but I've raced cars for decades, off and on, and decided that I wanted to get better in my retirement. And so a friend of mine suggested I look I read a book by a guy named Mihály Csikszentmihalyi a long time to learn how to see his day properly, his book on flow states, and I didn't know anything about it. So I started reading this book and going, oh my god, this is exactly what I need, because it improves performance. I've also been a Buddhist for about 25-30 years, and I've been going to Nepal for that period of time, doing dentistry in a monastery over there. And as I started reading this book and started learning more and more about flow, I went, Wait a minute, this is really similar to Buddhism, and nobody's talking about it, alright? So what really is a flow state, and So, long story short, for the past four years, I've been writing a book. It's the book's called From Fear to Flow, and it basically is, what is flow? What gets in the way of flow, the ego, and then how to deal with that? So, you know, the impostor syndrome is just another name for the ego. And so, you know, your subject is fascinating to me. It's like I've been living this for four years, and at the same time, who am I to talk about this? I have no degree in psychology. I have no degree in neuroscience, and yet I'm diving into this thing and coming up with some ideas that have really, kind of changing the paradigm of what a flow state is, and so it's, it's been a fantastic journey, fascinating journey, sometimes a terrifying journey, because it's, it's really new stuff. And, you know, it trying to go off on my own a little bit and sort of redefine flow states and, and come up with a different model of what this thing is. You know, again, who am I to say this? And yet it's resonated with people. So it's been, like I said, a really fascinating journey.
Kim Meninger
So first of all, congratulations on learning how to pronounce his name. Because I…
Tom Roberts
I had to go online, there's a guy that actually does it. It's a 22nd thing. He's like, Yeah, it was, it was an interesting…
Kim Meninger
But I'd love to hear more, because I know that there are probably a lot of people listening who have different understandings of what is meant by flow in a flow state, and I'd love to hear your interpretation of that. What does that mean to you?
Tom Roberts
It's so it has been for 50 years. Csikszentmihalyi basically went out and did research on what made people happy, and interviewed hundreds, 1000s of people, and consistently heard from them that when I'm in this flow state, I feel like my life is he they didn't say flow state, because the name didn't exist. When I'm doing what I love, I feel like I'm flowing through life. And so he coined the term flow and it kind of stuck. Now he has his definition of what a flow state is. It's kind of this peak experience and but one of the really fascinating things about flow states is this term is called transient hypofrontality. It's a great cocktail party term literally means transient, obviously temporary. Hypo means down. Frontality means your frontal lobe shuts off. In other words, the part that in your brain that has your ego shuts off. So my flow state comes from racing cars, and it, you know, for years, I would get into this place and not know it and not know what it is and how to, you know, what do you do with it? But what is really interesting about it is that if the ego shuts off, from a Buddhist standpoint, the only thing that is left is you. So my conclusion is not that this flow state is some special place that only hyper athletes can get into or musicians or whatever, but we all get into it to some degree or another. And Chick Mihai actually said that in, in his book, that it is not some really special place. It has been kind of pumped up to be this great place that we have to strive to get to, but it really isn't. It's who we are. So that has been a bit of a paradigm shift in, in writing about it. It is if it's who we are. And again. Again, from a Buddhist standpoint, you're there right now, but stuff gets in the way, and that stuff is our ego. And our ego is a collection of thoughts habits to protect us from whatever it needs to protect us from. So it's and, you know, in the end, it isn't real. It's just a bunch of habits. So if you can overcome these habits, then naturally you're going to drop into this thing that we've labeled a flow state.
Kim Meninger
So I love that frame of, you know, the ego getting in the way. I think about that a lot. You mentioned impostor syndrome is just another name for ego. I think about that too of there are various manifestations of fear and self-protection that we all use in moments where we're feeling threatened or defensive of ourselves. And so I'm curious. I guess I have a couple of questions I'm thinking about as it relates to flow, because I think there are probably people who out, are out there now thinking, I've never been in that, or I'm not aware of having been in that. How do I find that state? Right? Would you say that there is a way in which, until it's brought to our attention, we don't realize that we're, we're capable of that, or that we've, we've engaged in that before, and that, you know, in order to find or more consistently get there, it's a matter of understanding, what are some of these barriers that get in the way?
Tom Roberts
You know, the first thing I ask people, obviously, I start, I've been doing nothing but flow stuff for the past four years, and learning about it and talking to people about it. And if I ask people, have you ever been in a flow state, they look at me like, I don't know. Don't know. Have you ever done anything where you looked up after a while and realized that hours had gone by and it doesn't you just go, where did the time go by? You're in a flow state. You're hyper-focused. Flow state is about focus, and the more you can focus on something, and it usually is something that we really enjoy doing. But you can get in a flow state. Washing the dishes. If you really want to get down and say, Okay, it's, it's squeaky clean light and really focus in flow comes from focus. So it so if you can nurture things, be it meditation, be it whatever it is that can improve your focus, your tendency to get into a flow state increases. And flow state is a spectrum. It's been written about as if it's almost an on-off switch, like I'm out of flow now I'm in flow. It's not quite like that. I think it's more of a spectrum, because when I raise cars, I can get into a flow state. And then if something comes our helmets have microphone or have microphones and earphones in them, so somebody can get on and say, you know, you're the next person you need to pass is 30 seconds ahead. And I start making a strategy for it. I come out of a certain type of flow state, but I'm in a different type of flow state, so it evolves. And so that's why I say it's on a spectrum. Just like focus is on a spectrum. Sometimes you can get distracted a little bit and be out of your focus. Flow state will decrease. It may shut off. You may not be in a flow state, but you know it's like, when is it on? When is it off? If you look at it more as a spectrum, then it makes more sense.
Kim Meninger
And is it something that, and I don't want to use the word should here, because it implies that there's one right way to do it, but is it? Is it something that we should aspire to experience more often? Does it make sense that we're not in flow 100% of the time?
Tom Roberts
So first of all, so there's a couple different ways of answering that question. One is to answer from the traditional sense of you know, flow, your performance productivity goes up in flow states. They've even done measurements where, supposedly, I don't know how you measure this, but productivity goes up five times. Now that's been something that has really sold flow to the corporate because, obviously, the corporates want everybody in a flow estate so they're more productive. Um, but yeah, it's, it's, you know, Csikszentmihalyi research showed that you are happier if you're in a flow state. Now, if you, if you take it from where I've been going with this is by saying flow state is your, your experience in your natural state, who you truly are, because your ego is at least partially shut off. Well, the only thing left is you. So of course, you're going to be happier because you're you, you know it's, it's the ego typically starts developing well when we're born, to some extent, because when you have a body, you have an ego, and an ego is, is. Basically protection of this, the I who I am, from you who are trying to get what I have, but it goes beyond that. So if you're a young kid, say you're in your five or six years old, and you're told you're stupid. In that age, you can't say, well, that's just your opinion. You have to believe what they tell you, because your survival depends on them. People say, Well, you know, we all want to get love from our parents. Reality is we want our parents to love us so they'll feed us. [Yes.] So it's an existential terror that we're going to die if we don't adapt to what they want us to be. That means we have to give up what we are and create something new to take its place, so that they'll be happy with us. Well, unfortunately, that new thing is our ego, and it's not authentic, and then we're always trying to be something that we're not well, that doesn't work. And we all do it. Everybody does. Everybody. I know that does it, except a few Tibetan llamas didn't. But you know, that's so rare, but if you start to understand the mechanics of it, then you can backtrack it, and the trick is to start catching the thoughts going through your head. So here I am writing a book on flow states, and throughout this process, even now, as I'm sitting here, I'm going to, Who are you to talk about this? You don't know what you're talking about. Well, I do have a certain perspective that I can offer to people. That's reality. And people are interested in talking to somebody who's been in a race car, because it's, it's really visceral flow state. So yeah, I have stuff to offer people, some people, not everybody. That's reality, but our brain says you have to be popular with everybody, and you have to be right on the money, and you have to be an expert, even when you're not an expert. [Yes.] So it's really destructive. It's real, but if you don't catch those thoughts, then you can't go, Wait a minute. Is that really true? [Mmm.] So it's the trick is, and this is where, you know, the, the practice of Buddhism. Buddhism is not a religion. It's a mind science. People think of us like, Oh, we're worshiping thing. No, we're trying to understand how this thing works. That's what Buddhism is. And so the trick is to become the witness, and you step back away from it and go, Okay, that's what this message is giving me. Is it true? And I mean, you can ask all kinds of questions, what does that do for me? What is that? What is it trying to protect me from I can give you an example. I was in a race two years ago at a track called spa in Belgium, and I'd been racing the United States for a couple of years with a group, and we decided to take it up a notch and go to this track called spa is one of the most famous tracks in the world, and it also has a series of corners called a rouge that is one of the most dangerous series of corners in the in the world. So I get there, and the place, the garage that we're in has four different cars. These are really high-end Porsches. And I'm looking around, and all these people are speaking German. I'm going, oh my god, I'm not in Kansas anymore. And I'm thinking, Well, these guys are, you know, I'm older, I'm an older driver. I'm fast for an older driver, but these guys are going to realize that I have no business being here. So I get in the car and I know how to get into flow state. I've been studying flow for years, and I know how to do this, but I get in the car trying to prove to them that I belong. That's ego, because if you're trying to prove to them you belong, you don't believe you belong, and you're trying to prove it wrong. I went out. This is practice. We had a 12-hour race coming up. This is just practice. And I stuffed the car into the wall, trying to prove to them that I belonged in doing so I validated my message that I don't belong. [Yes.] And so I went back into the pits, and the car wasn't badly damaged, fortunately. But everybody's saying, Oh, it's okay. Shake it off. It happens. But I'm sitting there going, What did you just do? You jeopardized an entire weekend where people have paid huge amounts of money to drive this car trying to prove that you belong. That's impostor syndrome in my, in my, you know, in racing, [absolutely] so, you know, long story short, I, I realized that I still had an entire race to run with these people. I had to shake it off, and I had to find something. So the next time I went out, I got to go back out and practice. I said, Okay, you know how to you haven't driven this car a lot, and you've driven this track a lot. Build into this like, you know how to do it, get into a flow state, because that's when you're going to be the fastest. In other words, being you, and building into this you're going to be the quickest. Stop trying. And I set the fastest lap time I did for the entire weekend. So proving to them that I did belong, but not trying to prove to them I belonged. [Yes, yeah.] That's a weird contradiction of, of this, this whole egoic thing, dealing with your ego, because the ego, in the end, is not your friend anymore. And people always say to me, Well, okay, I need to stop the ego. Good luck. You can't stop the ego. No, you guys witness it. If you try to stop it, you're using the ego to stop it so you just perpetuating it.
Kim Meninger
Yeah, and I always say that, you know, our ego is a feature, not a bug, right? It's not something we're, we're we should be trying to get away from or fix. You know, it's managing it because it's built into our DNA for the reasons that you talked about. It's keeping us alive. In many ways. It's keeping us alert, but it can overreact and it can interfere with other types of activities, so the awareness of when that's showing up and the choices that we make in response to it, I think, are what is most important.
Tom Roberts
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean, there was a very famous Tibetan, not, excuse me, not. Tibetan. He was a Zen monk that lived in the Bay Area. He's one of the first guys to bring Buddhism, a guy named Suzuki Roshi. And he was asked, How much ego do we need? And he said, enough. So you don't step out in front of a bus. Keep yourself safe. Now have the common sense to look where you're going, you know, to, to just common sense, but the stuff beyond that. We don't function from our ego, but we think our thoughts are who we are, not what we're thinking. So if you can start to undo that, you literally what are. You're uncovering and allowing who you truly are to re-emerge, and functioning from that place is not only more efficient, more productive, it's also more satisfying and way more creative. You want to be creative. I did a race, 25-hour race. There were four of us, and at two o'clock in the morning, you don't sleep when you do these big races, two o'clock in the morning, I'm walking around the paddock, and I realized I was still a dentist at the time, and I'm solving problems for my practice that I had not been able to figure out. They were dropping like that. And that's, that, that lasted for three days, that super creativity. You know, it's like if you look at Michael Jackson. He even said, I don't write my music. I download it. If you're going to do that, you have to be pretty clean and pretty open. So you know, it's like the ego. Yes, it's there to protect us. Unfortunately, it tries to protect us from things that don't exist as an adult.
Kim Meninger
Well, and can I ask you a question of so this is complicated, because a lot of people are in work environments where they feel like they have to prove themselves or they're going to lose their job. That's the perception. It may not be true, but that's the perception, right? So maybe it's a hyper-competitive environment, maybe you have a critical manager, maybe you've got a lot of really smart people around you, and there's that feeling of, I need to measure up to my colleagues, and we are never 100% expert in anything that we're doing. There's always learning that's involved. And so I wonder, How does learning fit into flow, given that it's inherently more clunky? It's like, you know, we're aware of what we don't know. And then when you add to the learning process, the self-doubt that comes with that, right? Is it simply a matter of noticing, like, what would you say in response to that?
Tom Roberts
I mean, it's okay. Let's say you take up a new thing. You're going to learn how to play tennis. So right now, you're an absolute rank beginner. You're obviously not going to get into a flow state. So as you practice and hit the ball against a wall or something like that, you start to build up some experience, and as you gain experience, then you can become more focused, you can become more engaged in what you're doing, and you can therefore drop into a flow state. So, you know, I, I did not come from corporate. I do understand the motivation of having to appear competent. But you also can't fake it. So, you know, I think, and you've, I think you talked about this in your TED talk as well, which was really excellent, by the way. I think that the idea of approaching this from a growth mindset. And being open and curious is the best approach. And being authentic. It's like, if you don't know something, say, Gosh, I don't know that. I need to check that out and learn. So the process of trying to fake it, I you know, I say fake it until you make it. That doesn't really work. It's like, be authentic. And if you don't know something, say, Gosh, I don't know that. I need to, I need to learn about that. I'm not sure. Am I answering your question?
Kim Meninger
You are because you're, you're making me think about this from two ways too, I think so there's the ego component that says you have to be perfect, and if you're not, then you know people are going to judge you, or you might. You're going to something horrible is going to happen, right? But that's in in some instances, maybe the environment is structured in such a way that that is not an unrealistic conclusion, where in others, that's a story we're telling ourselves. And so I think part of it is recognizing where your own mindset and the ego, as you describe it, is holding us back and where maybe we're just in the wrong environment. Maybe we are not set up for the kind of success that you're talking about, because we have sort of toxic forces that are preventing it from being possible to go into flow.
Tom Roberts
Yeah, and you know, and realize that it's really easy to sit here and say, well, then you should move and, I mean, that's probably what you should do, but [eventually, yes,] do it immediately. So it's like it. I think one of the most important things is that, are the thoughts going through your head kind? If they're not, then they're not your thoughts. For starters, somebody else gave them to you. You know, we don't come up with negative you know, kids don't fall down and, and go, I want to I can't believe I just fell down with an idiot. They get back up, and they do it again and again and again and again. Without beating themselves up, we learn to beat ourselves up. So if we are beating ourselves up, it isn't our thoughts. Most of the thoughts that we have came from somebody else. There's someone else's opinion. Basically, now, as a kid, like we I said, you have to accept the opinion, because you're young and you have to rely on these people to survive. As an adult, you don't have to, but you still have to catch them. And you know, are we going to stay on autopilot and keep doing this to ourselves? I think mindset is huge. If you have a growth mindset, you know, it's about curiosity and learning and, and growing and never really arriving. I think you know, perfectionism is a negative. It comes from negativity. It comes from a belief that you are not valuable and that you have to so overcompensate, and the only way of doing that is to be the, you know, perfect. It's impossible. It doesn't exist. To be competent, to be improving. Yeah, that's all very realistic and very kind. I think it really has to start there. So I think if we're we need again to start turning inward and going, okay, Is what I'm telling myself a kind thing to say. Would I say that to my friend? Would I say that to my sibling? Up we beat ourselves up like crazy.
Kim Meninger
Yes, yeah. I think that's a really interesting way to say it too, that they're not our own thoughts.
Tom Roberts
Oh, they're absolutely not, you know, their opinions. Yeah, just what's your opinions? And unfortunately, we, we equate our thoughts to who we are instead of what we're thinking. If you, if you watch a thought, and this is Buddhist stuff, it comes, it exists, it goes, if you don't grab it, but we grab it, and then we make a whole story around it. And if we start to back up. So one of my things growing up was whether or not I was competent. That was something that was handed to me by one of my parents and basically saying that I wasn't. So I realized that through racing, which is one of the great crucibles, because it's got immediate feedback, is that I was battling this idea that I wasn't and constantly trying to prove it wrong. Well, that's a filter that you're working through that does not help. It seems like it does, because it makes me try harder. But you don't excel at what you're doing by trying. You excel by allowing and opening it comes from such a different place, and that's when creativity can blossom. So, you know, I think again to, to start stepping back and listening to what the thoughts, the messages that we're giving ourselves. You know, we can find ourselves in a bad situation, corporate situation, and it's it can be toxic. But we're such a part of it that we aren't don't realize that this is not healthy for us. You start stepping back, and you start going, Wait a minute, that person is really not being very nice to me. Do I want to stay in this environment? Once you bring awareness into it, then you start having a higher bar for how you interact with people, and you start taking better care for of yourself, and then the new things start showing up that allow you to do that. It's this weird, magical things that, that happens. And you know, I hate to keep going back to flow. Flow is a problematic word in some ways, but just to your natural being is it's an evolution of finding who you truly are and allowing that to be expressed and having the guts to do it. That is not an easy path. You have to go through the fear and terror that you are trying to avoid by creating this new persona. But the reward is you get yourself back.
Kim Meninger
Well in in what you're describing, too, and this varies from individual to individual, is that, from the day you are born, there are influencers around you that are trying to shape you into something else.
Tom Roberts
Oh, absolutely. Just watch advertising. [Yes, exactly.] We wonder would be the Marlboro Man smoke this and you'll be
Kim Meninger
Yes, and our parents values are imposed upon us and in societal norms around what's appropriate and what isn't. And so it's really hard to even figure out at the core of everything, who am I? Right? What is my the essence of who I am and my unexpressed self? And I think that's probably the, another important element of the work, before you can even start to shift out of the ego to really kind of think about, Well, who would I be without my ego? And I don't know that people have had a lot of experience.
Tom Roberts
Beauty of this is you don't have to figure it out. It'll just, it's like, remove the obstacle, and it naturally comes out because it's there right now, in all of us, it doesn't go away. It just gets covered up, uncover it, and all of a sudden, there it is. And it, it sometimes I look at, at what's emerging, go, wow, that's really cool. I can't believe that's who I truly am, but it's, I mean, the process has just been incredibly rewarding. I just, I can't even express how cool it is to start rediscovering who I truly am.
Kim Meninger
And so you, you mentioned that you have your own struggles when it comes to writing a book of who am I to write the book? How do you, practically speaking, manage that and continue to stay focused on the book?
Tom Roberts
I think with writing a book, you just have to keep doing it. If you know, there were many times I just wanted to stop because it's so frustrating sometimes, and then you make these little breakthroughs, and go, Oh, that makes sense. And you just keep going and in like anything creative is, it's an evolution. It's not, it's not all of a sudden you start painting a great painting, or writing a great piece of music. It's an evolution. Beethoven's early stuff compared to his late stuff. I mean, he, he transformed himself and he became deaf, but he still wrote his greatest music at the end of his life. I mean, just incredible pieces. So it's like it's a process. It's not all of a sudden. You need to be an expert. I mean, my book will come out here in a few months, and I have no doubt a year later I'm going to want to change it, because I've evolved reality of things. It's like, trust the process. Don't give up. And the hard times come as you're starting to change. And it's not comfortable sometimes, stick with it, get through it, trust the process.
Kim Meninger
Yeah, I think that's a really great reminder too, that being uncomfortable is kind of part of the process, right? Yeah, well, gosh, I love this conversation, Tom. I think you bring such an important angle to the whole conversation around impostor syndrome and what gets in our way. And I'm eager for your book to come out. Where can people find you if they're interested in following you and staying connected to your work?
Tom Roberts
Evolving right now. Tom Roberts dot me, is my website, and go on and learn a few things. And again, this is we're all kind of putting this together because the book hasn't come out yet, but it comes out in January, so there'll be launch announcements and all kinds. It's for the, when the book finally comes out.
Kim Meninger
Excellent. Well, I'll make sure that the website is in the show notes, for anybody who wants to stay up to date on when that is happening. And thank you so much for being here and for the work that you're doing.
Tom Roberts
Thank you so much for giving me the time, Kim, it's been great.
