In this groundbreaking book, New York Times–bestselling author Steven Kotler decodes the mystery of ultimate human performance. Drawing on over a decade of research and first-hand interviews with dozens of top action and adventure sports athletes such as big–wave legend Laird Hamilton, big–mountain snowboarder Jeremy Jones, and skateboarding pioneer Danny Way, Kotler explores the frontier science of “flow,” an optimal state of consciousness where we perform and feel our best.

Building a bridge between the extreme and the mainstream, The Rise of Superman explains how these athletes are using flow to do the impossible and how we can use this information to radically accelerate our performance in our own lives.

At its core, this is a book about profound possibility, what is actually possible for our species, and where—if anywhere—our limits lie.

STEVEN KOTLER is an award-winning journalist and the best-selling author of Abundance and A Small Furry Prayer. He has written for the New York TimesMagazine, Wired, GQ, and NationalGeographic. Kotler is the cofounder of the Flow Genome Project.