For me, it’s being completely focused on a task. To the extent that the task occupies all of my short-term memory, leaving nothing for anything else distracting.
This is, I think, why it’s annoying to be disturbed while in the flow state. The whole house of cards falls down when a disturbance occurs (example: the phone rings) while in flow—something necessarily gets tossed out of short-term memory to accommodate the interruption.
For me, it’s being completely focused on a task. To the extent that the task occupies all of my short-term memory, leaving nothing for anything else distracting.
This is, I think, why it’s annoying to be disturbed while in the flow state. The whole house of cards falls down when a disturbance occurs (example: the phone rings) while in flow—something necessarily gets tossed out of short-term memory to accommodate the interruption.