The Surface and the Depth
What is in an experience?
Please see the following link for the current series of extracts and commentaries from William James’ essay, The Energies of Men:1
There is a kind of accusation in the last extract from William James, The Energies of Men, when he says that "Most of us continue living unnecessarily near our surface." Living near the surface seems to produce diluted energy and to be less efficient, both in production at the time of needing it, and the refreshment of energy supplies during rest and sleep. Both time and energy are wasted.
Making it personal, how would such living near the surface be expressed in terms of my life? Maybe something like this: There is little depth to my living, as I stay mostly within comfortable habits and inertias of various kinds, in both the physical and the psychological arenas. There is an unconscious automatism that usually rules the roost rather than being, as it should be, a servant of a more conscious part of me, and which frequently squanders and misdirects energy. This occurs most obviously in habits of negativity and laziness.
And when the first "layers," (as James puts it) of energy are used up, I largely do not persist through the obstruction to the access of energy, even though it may be needed for what I wish to do. And this is even though I both embrace the principle of working through to a "second wind" or further, and have multiple experiences of it, which second wind, once gained, makes all the prior effort to get to that place more than worthwhile. It seems that there is a certain forgetfulness going on, and that the surface does not know the depth.
Intensity of experience is dependent on how I use and access certain kinds of energy, indeed, how I transform energy. How can I remember more, that is, with the whole of myself and not just the mind, that there is a greater depth to experience than I usually allow in my day to day life?
William James - The Energies of Men, Moffat, Yard & Company (New York), 1914.
“When will you begin that long journey into yourself?” Rumi