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James-ism #1 (On How We Involve Ourselves)

No matter how strong our habits of involvement are, each moment of involvement is a choice. - James Low

"Involvement" is the way we "involve ourselves" in what is happening. It refers to the manner in which we "show up." At every moment, we are showing up in some way. We are "involving ourselves" in what is happening, in each moment, moment after moment.

There is no choice to not show up. Even turning away or closing down are ways of showing up. 

Much of the time, we are not aware of how we are showing up (of how we are involving ourselves). Our behaviors and characterological patterns, deeply embedded as they are, carry themselves into each fresh instance of life. Those patterns transpose themselves onto and insert themselves into this never-before-experienced moment. 

We then end up showing up in familiar and predictable ways. "Oh, that is Trevor. That is what he does." But am I really doing it? Or is it doing me?

Beyond a lack of awareness of the manner of our involvement, much of us lack awareness that we choose the manner of our involvement. 

Even if I don't feel that I am making a conscious choice, that doesn't mean there isn't one. In retrospect, I might be inclined to argue that it (the manner in which I showed up/involved myself) happened to me. That it just sort of took over. But James, per the above quote, would challenge that notion.

He would argue that I did have a choice, regardless of whether I was aware of it or not. Following James, I don't get to hide behind my lack of awareness. I can try to take refuge in it (my lack of awareness) but I would only be pretending to. 

The momentum of our conditioned history is strong. There is strength in our behavioral patterns and characterological dispositions. And yet, faint though the thin ray of light that marks our choice may be, it persists. 

As we increase our ability to maintain awakened awareness throughout any given day, the gap that sits between stimulus and response and that represents our ability to choose our involvement will balloon and brighten. 

There is much more choice than initially meets the eye. Even inside our own heads, in the realm of our thoughts, we are constantly deciding what thoughts to pay attention to and how to relate to those thoughts and what to do with them. Even that process, subtle and near-constant, is active, in spite of superficial appearance. 



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