As I sat in traffic one recent evening, a tiny blue car plastered with bumper stickers pulled up beside me. One sticker claiming, "We sometimes lose ourselves in the same places we find ourselves" caught my eye, but I was too distracted to think much about it. Vehicles were stacked bumper-to-bumper, and the radio warned that most major roads were at a similar standstill. I resigned myself to a long commute, switched off the radio, and hit play on the audiobook I had downloaded on my phone.

Over an hour later, I pulled into my driveway feeling calm and refreshed. How was this possible? I had just slogged through heavy traffic on rainy Tuesday night! But my mind was on the book I'd been listening to; full of intrigue, humor, and deception. I remembered very little about my drive home. I had completely lost myself in the story, yet found myself, focused and energized, at the same time. Voila! The message from the bumper sticker came back to me in a rush, "We sometimes lose ourselves in the same places we find ourselves."

I thought more about the notion of being so engaged in something that time seems to fly. I wanted to understand its connection to teaching and learning. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1990), a psychologist and researcher, has studied this phenomenon and developed the idea or notion of "flow." He created a model that depicts a state of flow, when one is completely absorbed in an activity for the sake of the activity itself. He describes this feeling as being "in the zone" or "in the groove." When this happens, individuals are alert, focused, productive and enjoy what they are doing. According to his model, to achieve a state of flow, the challenge level of an activity and the skill level the person brings to it must both be relatively high. If the challenge is too high, people can become anxious. If the challenge or skill level is too low, they can become apathetic or bored. When challenge and skill level are in balance, people experience flow; they concentrate and are content. They are engrossed, and they learn.

Activities that create flow vary with individual interests and strengths. I wonder if NPD practitioners recognize when flow occurs or if it is it taken for granted. If we understand what puts us "in the zone," maybe we can create these situations for others, too. I informally queried some colleagues about their own flow experiences. I asked when they felt most energized and focused-when did they lose track of time, forget about snacking, ignore social media, and disregard normal distractions? Most pondered the question for several seconds; some really had to give it some thought. Answers ranged from building a new program to cooking, writing, solving a complex problem, cycling, studying, teaching a favorite class, and, yes, reading a great book.

Can we identify our own flow activities? If so, can we carve out time for the activities that energize us and channel our interests and strengths? Is this something we can help our learners do as they grow in their roles? If they are being over- or underchallenged, there may be skills we can help develop, allowing them to reach a new zone or state of professional flow. Flow leads to learning, which then leads to growth. NPD practitioners are in a prime position to influence both of these, as according to the conceptual model of NPD practice; learning and growth are the outputs or goals of our practice. Recognizing and reaching for a state of flow in our own practice, when possible, might help us help others.

Along the lines of practice and professional flow, this issue of JNPD includes a new column, dedicated to the new NPD Scope and Standards (Harper & Maloney, 2016). The new standards reflect how the specialty is growing and changing. As individuals, teams and departments stretch to meet the changes, I hope they engage in meaningful activities where they lose themselves and find themselves all over again. I hope they reach a state of flow. Without the traffic!

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