The Inner World Has A Surprising Amount of Detail

We don't have words for most of our experience

The inner world is largely unmapped.

Wrath, hatred, love, pity, desire, recognition, joy, pain: all these are names indicating extreme conditions; the milder and middle stages, and even more particularly the ever active lower stages, escape our attention, and yet it is they which weave the warp and woof of our character and destiny.

Daybreak

Our emotional life has a surprising amount of detail. The few emotional concepts we possess are coarse tools. States that feel neutral possess their own fine tones and forces. Forces that may, in conjunction with our decisions, shape our lives in ways we do not realize.

This is related to one of Nietzsche’s core views: our lives are propelled by drives, drives that we’re not fully aware of.

Sometimes this is easier to see in other people. You may have had the experience where you know the other person’s mental states more than they do (or at some of it). “Don’t tell me how I feel” – well why not? Sometimes it’s obvious. You can also see it in our own lives when we realize the extraordinary effectiveness of triggers. Bring to mind our behavioral patterns that immediately follow after eating, looking at social media, walking in the sun, talking with him or her…

Perhaps this supports skepticism for exploring extreme conscious states. Picture the “psychonaut” who explores psychedelic experiences as a way to know the mind–but they haven’t even explored ordinary life! This move, to go to the extreme, is similar to the newbie of a given skill who is drawn to the expert level right away – when they would be better served mastering the basics. Perhaps this is why many psychonauts are burnt.

We should respect mundane consciousness. There’s a lot here.

At the same time, simply knowing how we feel at a given time isn’t going to be that useful. Even detailed self awareness may not help much, unless it is linked to the external world. Knowledge about the self is just knowledge about one entity among trillions after all.

So, I’m not trying to argue for the idea that “we should come to know the details of our inner world” and I don’t think that’s what Nietzsche’s quote suggests either. There’s likely an 80/20 rule here as with everything else. Knowing 20% of our most important emotional states may be easy and good enough. The thought I’m wrestling with is that some of that essential 20% is subtle and currently evades our attention.

To get a handle on it (and avoid getting stuck in one’s head), exploration of our conscious life should be done with inquiry into our behavior and environment too. Think of Nietzsche on nutrition, climate, and place as examples –things that impinge on our consciousness, energy, and behavior.