An Introduction to Agency Enabling Ideas
So I am going to slowly build the walls around this thing that I am seeking, and the best way to do that is to start giving definition to the words I’m going to be playing around with. An image of hands, sifting through dry sand, brushing it away and grasping at something not fully visible, comes to mind. I think it is because I’ve been thinking about building sandcastles with my Dad and brother today.
Anyway, a quick definition: an “agency enabling idea” is something that you are exposed to that brings about a greater awareness. It doesn’t necessarily have to be an awareness of self, but rather, can be a sort of ‘wider-angle view’ of where you are, what you are doing, what your plans are, etc.. It could have an immediate impact, or it might be a component or prestructure to a higher level of awareness.
An example. Sometime during the last summers of high school, I gained a bit of fleeting agency that still comes back occasionally. Probably from a mix of listening to the World/Inferno Friendship Society‘s romantic, dangerous, transient lyrics and the intensity I felt spending warm days and late nights with friends, I remember standing at the guardrail of a neighborhood street laid against a steep incline sometime just before sunrise, and realizing that the way I felt was temporary. It wasn’t long before it would get cold again, it would be sooner that I would forget about being so aware of my situation and return to just living and reacting, and that further away, I would change drastically and may not recognize who I was. I did make a mental note to myself to remember the moment, and I still do. Actually, I’ve come to the same thoughts about once a year since then, taking note of the person I am at that moment, and realizing that I’ve changed and that I will continue to. A combination of chance events and encounters brought about conscious thinking for a couple of minutes. Because of that thinking though, I still occasionally come to a similar awareness. Experience brought on a concept that, now committed to memory, is triggered periodically. There is now an agency enabling memory, floating around in me, that is triggered during a train of thought. Sometimes it is invoked directly, as it is now, writing about it, and sometimes it is brought out unexpectedly.
I’ll think of other, broader and clearer examples later.