In the previous post I talked on the difference between horizontal and vertical experience. In quick recap horizontal experience is an addition of the quantity of things we’ve experienced such as a new fact or a meal we’re trying for the first time. Vertical experience has more to do with a more in depth knowledge or experience of something that fascinates us. In sum a person who has a proclivity for horizontal experience will be a well rounded jack of all trades, while a person drawn to vertical experience will be more likely to excel or be an expert in a given field such as virtuoso pianist or ancient Etruscan art.
The post also highlighted the fact that at every moment we are choosing to learn or experience something new or to become increasingly familiar or masterful over something we’ve already been exposed to. All of us lie somewhere on the continuum between the perpetual student and taster of the new to the obsessive and driven master of a specific discipline. Just as most of us seek and cultivate finding a life partner who we know and know us with unparalleled intimacy it does not prevent us from meeting new people and forming varied levels of intimacy with all of them.
Horizontal and vertical ways of seeking and internalizing events is not the only dimensions of human experience. In this post we’ll take a look at other dimensions of our daily life which we often take for granted. Human experience is not flat, but rather very complex and full of potential fullness and richness. Even the most rudimentary and mundane experience has such amazing potential.
As your eyes are scanning this page a number of components are making up your current and present experience. First your eyes are moving from left to right as your read the words that make up this sentence. Some words maybe you recognized instantly but some longer words or unfamiliar ones may have actually caused you to pay attention to each letter. The ability to read and understand a paragraph, a sentence and sometimes even a word takes time.
The being in the present which is so often stated as a goal by spiritualists and psychologists is not a literal expectation. Being “totally in the moment” which is often the stated goal of these disciplines when we reflect on the life of actual experience becomes inaccurate at best and misleading and deceptive at worst. Being totally present in the moment would be a flat experience, and a flat experience even if possible would not be very desirable.
The reading of a paragraph or even a sentence would not be possible without our ability to retain information from from one moment to the next. A sentence is a series of words and a paragraph is a series of sentences. Only my ability to live in time and retain one snapshot and connect to the next snapshot makes experience possible. The meaning of the post is put together over time by your reading of letters, than words, sentences and paragraphs. When reading a novel or textbook or skills of retention are paramount to us having the “experience” of the book and our being able to learn, grow or be moved by what it said.
Even the simplest experience has a depth and fattness to it. Our experiences are not flat but rather they require a certain thickness for them to become a perceptual event or experience. Our past and our sense of personal history make meaningful experience possible. The only way you can read these words on this page at this given moment is by the fact that you can recall and remember them. When I look around my room I’m not seeing the objects for a first time. I am not discovering or creating them, my current experience of them is made possible by my ability to recognize them. Literally, recognize means to re-cognize, to think again. So my ability to be “in the moment” is highly dependent on my ability to draw on my past. Each new experience is immediately put into context while further extending my knowledge in a horizontal or vertical manner as discussed in the previous post.
Yet, even the experience of seeing my room, house or yard is rarely a single momentary experience. Seldom is the entire room or yard taken in on one look. Seldom is an entire perception captured by my field of vision. Usually, I have to turn my head or take a number of snapshots to truly see my room or yard. Not only does this take time but also sheds light on how thick our experience of things are.
When I look about the room I see objects such as my writing table, chair and sofa, but do I really see these thinttgs. When I look now at my sofa, I only see a portion of the sofa. Though in the moment of my immediate experience I only see the front right half of the sofa I know its my sofa, I assume and know that it has a backside and a bottom though they are currently not part of my present perception.
Almost everything and everyone we know, we know from a variety of perspectives. It is important to note that not only do we imagine or fill our what we actually see with what we previously knowledge and perceptions, but that our knowledge of most increases by the number of different perspectives we have of that object or person.
In the last post I discussed how at each moment we choose to either learn something new (horizontal) or more in depth (vertical) now I want to add two more choices we make fairly often in our experiences. When we perceive or think about something we care choosing from what perspective to see it. In general we can say we are either getting a closer look at something or seeing something from a larger viewpoint. Getting a closer view is seeing something microscopically while the larger perspective is seeing something telescopically.
Just as our society has a tendency to view vertical knowledge as being superior to horizontal knowledge, so to our society has a tendency to value microscopic knowledge over telescopic.Yet, the truth of the matter is that just as I argued in the last post life is made richer and more meaningful by both horizontal and vertical knowledge so to is our intimacy of the world increased with both telescopic as well as microscopic perspectives.
The bias is that the closer you get to something the more you dig into it and break it down, the more intimate and knowledgeable you become over the thing your investigating. If you desire to become more intimate with someone you should desire to know their every thought and become as close to them as possible. If you want to know a tree you should get up close to it, smell it, touch it and look at every nuance of its bark and leaves and examine its cells under a microscope if you can.
Yet, in actuality my knowledge and intimacy is increased by the sheer number of perspectives and ways in which I know and experience the person or object under consideration. Just think of how much more familiar and intimate our experience of the planet earth has become due to the photos of the earth taken from space. Likewise some of my most powerful insights I gained into how my son thought and felt were gained when I watched him on a playing field or at a great distance in a social milieu.
The experience of being part of a stadium crowd can be quite intense, yet that intensity and experience can become even greater if you happen to leave the event early and hear the roar of the crowd from the parking lot. Each perspective has its own value and can add to the richness and meaning of an event or experience. The importance and value of seeing things from many perspectives is a central theme in my book Exploring Intimacy which can be read in its entirety in the words section lf this site.
Though this post is longer than I like, I feel compelled to recognize one more dimension of human experience before I close. The future is just as vital to the meaning and fullness of human experience as is our past. The future is part of that thickness of human experience that makes meaning and richness possible. First so many of the decisions I make regarding what to next in life is based on my ability to plan. Planning is essential in allowing me to maximize and guide my experience. Not only is planning crucial to giving my life a sense of meaning and direction, but without it, a sense of quality would be hard to come by.
The future dimension in experience isn’t only exemplified by planning but also in our ability to anticipate. Anticipation is a crucial component in both our safety and enjoyment. Whether one is driving a car or talking to an angry person our ability to read the situation and anticipate what could come next is essential to our safety and success in both tasks. Biochemical studies demonstrate how anticipation maximizes pleasure while minimizes pain. The body of a person who sees a punch coming secretes chemicals which will blunt the pain of the coming strike. The pleasure and enjoyment of a good meal and sexual orgasm have likewise been shown to be increased by the persons anticipation of the event. That is why great chefs spend time on food presentation and good lovers on setting atmosphere and appreciation for the power of fore play.
Our sense of self, history and the future all provide our lives with so much richness and significance. The thickness of human experience is truly something to appreciate and cultivate.
We do our selves a disservice when we take the beauty and magic of our experience for granted. I also feel we do ourselves a disservice when we look at our ego as a problem or something to overcome, or when we try improve our lives by “living in the moment” or being “present”.
Jim Guido