News Of Difference

News of difference is the only news we ever receive.

It’s the fundamental feature of perception, the ability to notice what is different.

Without this capacity for discernment we cannot learn. We’re left in a monotonous haze. One moment, then one day, then one weeks blurs into and blends with the next.

It is only our capacity for discernment that gives us a sense of living — not merely existing.

We must cultivate this quality within ourselves if we wish to live more fully.

Again, the body gives clues.

We find this ability to detect differences at the most basic functioning of the nervous system. We perceive changes in stimuli: the cool relative to heat, the shadow relative to light, the hunger relative to satiety. The contrasting sensory experiences inform our actions moment-by-moment.

How do I know what to do without this news of difference?

What guides my action if not the gap between?

We yearn for reconciliation with the world around us, the bridging of what is and what could be. Life after all is a series of unmet needs and unfulfilled desires. Lancelot Whyte in his book “The Unconscious Before Freud” describes the neurobiological role of awareness as removing the very source of itself.

The itch begs to be scratched.

The hunger wants to be sated.

The thirst demands quenching.

It is only ever through contrast that we know anything.

Perhaps these words too differ from how you would convey the ideas. How so? What’s the nature of the difference? If you’re able to articulate what fits (is similar) and what doesn’t (is different), then you’re able to develop a much more robust understanding of the thing in question.

Consider your visual depth of field. Each eye perceives the world from a different vantage point. Each is afforded information that the other is blind to. And through the integration of those two focal points we are able to create a greater depth of field.

We need differences in order to learn, grow, and develop.

We need news of differences in order to experience anything at all.

When life is made up of more of the same, it ceases to merit the name we give it. Life isn’t made of humdrum monotony. It cannot exist in a vacuum or an echo chamber. Life must rub up against itself, the friction giving news of difference. Through the reconciliation of those differences we’re able to become more than what we were.

At this point I’ve lost track of whether I’m talking about sensory-motor processes and neurological function or day-to-day relationships.

Perhaps they’re not so different.

Perhaps there’s a pattern that does in fact connect these seemingly different phenomena.

That would seem to confirm the necessity of discernment. If we can find the connections between disparate ideas and disparate people, we can make something greater.

Again, I hope that you chew this up and spit out what is distasteful. I hope you are able to find a means within yourself of understanding it in a new way, one more true for you.

Originally appeared on The Ecosomatics Institute Blog