Attentiveness

Meeting the unfamiliar

An imagined exploration

You have come for the grand view and keep checking the binoculars. Then, beside your knee, a worn date on the bench catches your eye. You crouch to read it. The place has left a small human trace beneath the scenery you expected. The lookout has a footnote, and this time you stay long enough to notice it.

Attentiveness gives considerate notice to what merits it, including what does not advertise itself. Exploration can become a search for confirmation of the spectacular thing you came to find. Letting a modest detail interrupt that search enlarges the encounter. Notice carefully before making a story: a date prompts a question; it does not supply an entire history.

Attentiveness: finding the balance

Attention needs judgment about relevance and privacy. Being observant does not grant a right to inspect everything.

Attentiveness gives…

A richer account of the place you are actually in.

What Attentiveness makes possible

You can notice signs of prior use, maintenance and change, then ask better questions about the people and processes behind them.

Attentiveness in ordinary life

A familiar street

Notice one public detail you usually pass and distinguish observation from inference.

A conversation

Attend to the speaker’s point rather than preparing your impressive reply.

Nearby virtues, different work

Curiosity

Curiosity pursues the question; Attentiveness notices what gives it substance.

Discernment

Discernment tests interpretation; Attentiveness makes relevant detail available.

Attentiveness and its counterfeits

Collecting details is a counterfeit of Attentiveness when accumulation replaces regard for what matters.

Intrusion is a counterfeit of Attentiveness: examine private behavior merely because you can. Considerate notice respects boundaries.

How to cultivate Attentiveness

• Lower the expectation of what must be interesting.
• Describe one detail before explaining it.
• Ask what else you need to understand its significance.

Try it today

On a familiar permitted route, notice one public detail you have overlooked. Write a plain description and a question, keeping them separate.

Stay aware of your surroundings; do not stop in a hazardous place or inspect private people, property or records.

Questions worth returning to

• What did my expected subject make me overlook?
• Which details matter to someone besides me?

Keep the practice proportionate

These pages offer ideas for reflection and character practice, not professional advice. Choose practices suited to your circumstances and abilities. You may adapt, pause, or skip an exercise; putting yourself or someone else at risk is not proof of virtue.

Quotations and further reading

Seven readings, one for each day. All remain available here. Historical arguments and fictional dialogue are identified in their source notes.

1. Among the singularities of this place the two rocky hollow lanes, the one to Alton, and the other to the forest, deserve our attention.

   Gilbert White · The Natural History of Selborne
   Letter V
   Gilbert White · Project Gutenberg #1408; captured English text; print edition not identified in capture

   White begins with specific nearby features. The rest of the paragraph contains dated gender stereotypes; the useful example here is noticing the local detail.

2. I am alarmed when it happens that I have walked a mile into the woods bodily, without getting there in spirit.

   Henry David Thoreau · Walking
   Main text
   Henry David Thoreau · Project Gutenberg #1022; captured English text; print edition not identified in capture

   Physical arrival need not bring attention with it. The expected view can keep a visitor from encountering what is actually nearby.

3. It depends chiefly on an acquaintance with the individual parts of each view.

   Charles Darwin · The Voyage of the Beagle
   CHAPTER XXI — MAURITIUS TO ENGLAND
   Charles Darwin · Project Gutenberg #944; captured English text; print edition not identified in capture

   “It” refers to the growing pleasure of comparing scenery. Knowledge of particular parts can enlarge appreciation of the whole.

4. I was never tired of going and watching those Igalwa villagers, nor were, I think, the Igalwa villagers ever tired of observing me.

   Mary H. Kingsley · Travels in West Africa
   CHAPTER VI. LEMBARENE.
   Mary H. Kingsley · Project Gutenberg #5891; captured English text

   Kingsley acknowledges that observation goes both ways. Her speculation about others’ interest does not establish consent or excuse intrusive watching.

5. Insects were exceedingly abundant and very interesting, and every day furnished scores of new and curious forms.

   Alfred Russel Wallace · The Malay Archipelago, Volume I
   CHAPTER II. SINGAPORE.
   Alfred Russel Wallace · Project Gutenberg #2530; captured English text; print edition not identified in capture

   The repeated visit has different details to notice. The page values observation in place rather than turning the historical collector’s activity into an exercise.

6. A most paradoxical mixture of sound and silence pervades the shady parts of the wood.

   Charles Darwin · The Voyage of the Beagle
   CHAPTER I — ST. JAGO—CAPE DE VERD ISLANDS
   Charles Darwin · Project Gutenberg #944; captured English text; print edition not identified in capture

   Darwin pauses over an apparently contradictory sensory impression. The unfamiliar can be a relation among familiar details, not only an impressive new object.

7. It breeds in us a strong suspicion of whatever is beyond the barriers we have built, and everything has to fight hard for its entrance into our recognition.

   Rabindranath Tagore · Sadhana: The Realisation of Life
   I
   Rabindranath Tagore · 1916 text; Project Gutenberg #6842; author’s preface credits translation assistance
   English presentation of Bengali discourses; preface credits passages translated by Satish Chandra Roy and Ajit Kumar Chakravarti, and Realisation in Action by Surendra Nath Tagore; individual passage translator not identified.

   Tagore is discussing mental divisions created by enclosing walls. Prepared categories can prevent a nearby detail from receiving attention.

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