paying attention

“I think, therefore I am”, is a famous quote, spare and efficient, positive and weighty. Nevertheless, just existing is becoming an ever more tenuous concept, and just by itself doesn’t count for that much. It would be better to say, “I’m paying attention, therefore I am here.” That’s a concept with traction, the first stone on a path that leads somewhere. As living organisms it’s what we were made to do, but it isn’t always easy. Babies resist sleep, some do, as near as we can tell because they don’t want the lights to go out. We’d pay attention all the time, ourselves, if it wasn’t all so boring.

Our dilemma is fairly simple. We’ve inherited a survival program hard-wired – an antiquated operating system balking at modern applications. It’s primary feature, so-called habituation, dictates that any information which doesn’t lead directly to eating, fornication, or our possible immediate demise is constantly pushed toward the back of the line in our heads. We become civilized when we learn how to work around it, in varying degrees. We sublimate and substitute, but it never goes away. Repetitive anything without tangible reward or punishment on the spot tends to lose focus, colors fade, other thoughts crowd in – it’s hard to pay attention.

Just the same, we like paying attention. It gives us pleasure. Bored people around the planet fill up their leisure flirting with danger, just to “feel alive”. Returnees from the world’s combat zones suffer rueful nostalgia for the smell of anything in the morning like over there. Closer to home, many of us enjoy travel, mainly because seeing something never seen before offers the simple joy of using the equipment we came with. Still, there's only so much we can do. Louder gadgets just seem to amplify the problem, pounding evolution's finely-tuned senses back into our heads, as next morning bleakness attests.

Art is about paying attention. There are more elaborate theories, but this one rules them all. Whatever style or school, whatever time period, art’s main function is to focus and condition the attention of the viewer. As every other possession begins to fade with familiarity, a successful work of art compels attention, becoming more of a presence in a room, in a home, in a lifetime, the longer it’s owned. Beyond that, owning and living with original art also makes the blue of the morning sky more pronounced, the sound of birds more distinct, and makes good food taste better – all that comes with just paying attention.