Everything is discursive opinion instead of direct experience. — A. R. Ammons

Everything is discursive opinion instead of direct experience.

Author: A. R. Ammons

Insight: We've all felt the gap between what we actually experience and what we end up talking about. You taste a meal and it's wonderful, but then you reach for words—"delicious," "fresh," "amazing"—and something gets lost. The words become a second-hand version of the real thing. Ammons is pointing at something deeper: we're so busy describing and debating everything that we forget to just be present with it. This matters more now than ever because we're constantly translating our lives into language, especially online. We experience something, then immediately narrate it, debate its meaning, or compare it to other opinions about it. The actual moment gets buried under layers of commentary. You're at a concert but thinking about how you'll describe it; you're upset but already deciding which story version of your upset you'll tell people. The direct experience—the rawness of just feeling it—becomes secondary to the opinion about it. The non-obvious part is that this isn't just about being more present, though that helps. It's also about recognizing that most of what we think we know about the world comes filtered through someone else's words, debate, or framework. We inherit opinions as if they were direct experiences. That gap between reality and description isn't something we can entirely close, but noticing it exists might be the first step to actually living through some moments rather than just narrating them.

Source: The Art of Poetry No. 73, The Paris Review, Summer 1996