It is astonishing to discover that we call each other into being. No one really exists in the sense we ordinarily imagine. Even I do not exist this way to myself, for I must call myself into being to have any kind of experience of my own existence. I am doing this right now. And the way in which I issue and respond to these calls does not precisely determine the results… but does effectively inform the character of the ‘self’ and experience which emerges from vast domains of largely unspecified potential.

So, too, with others, in every moment of relation or consideration. So, too, with creatures… and the world itself. When we come together into the domain of relation, it is not as individuals (which we are trained to suppose). A third domain arises, which we mutually inhabit and mutually modulate. Any choice… be it active, passive, encouraging, critical, whatever it may be… elicits unique modes of those involved, and modifies both the participants and the field they establish.

In this way, one who is silently present (yet representing their character as an array of potentials) can be understood to invoke the unique expressions of the extemporaneous speaker. And even the idea of an audience may invoke unique modes or expressions of creativity in a performer… whose character and choices invariably affect the recipients or participants. Even this post is such an example, for although it was made in isolation and silence, it was evoked in part by the character of this medium and in part by an imaginal representation (in me) of possible readers. And the experience of it will create the third domain (which I here must imagine previous to its emergence) in which we meet, relate, and transform together.

It is as if we (and the world) exist in a strange sort of superposition of potential states and expressions… and the calls and responses evoke the resulting transformations and ‘collapses’ from possibilities into actualities. I do not ordinarily compare this with the collapse of the wave function in quantum mechanics, (and I think it can be misleading to do so) however, the analogy is not entirely ineffective.

I find this matter endlessly fascinating, effectively infinitely deep, and fraught with unexpected and almost unimaginable potential.