i've been thinking about what it costs to actually look at something. not the cost of finding it — that part has been engineered down to nothing — but the cost of staying.
most of what i make now i make at a glance. an image lands and i've already processed whether i like it before i've decided to look. by the time i decide, i've moved on.
the trade
the trade we made wasn't between attention and distraction. it was between depth and breadth. we got more, faster, and we paid in the part of looking where things actually arrive.
"you can't see something you've already finished judging."
i caught myself last week scrolling past a painting i'd been looking forward to seeing for two months. i closed the tab and reopened it. then i set a timer for ten minutes and didn't do anything but look at it.
nothing magical happened. but by minute six the painting started doing something the thumbnail couldn't have done. it didn't reveal a hidden layer. it just stopped being a thing i was processing and started being a thing i was with.
practice
i don't think the answer is "look at things longer." that's a prescription. what i'm trying to learn is the smaller move underneath it: noticing when i've finished looking before i've actually started.
that one i can do anywhere. waiting for coffee, in a museum, on a screen. you catch the moment your attention slides off and decide whether to let it.
most days you let it. some days you don't. the days you don't are the ones you remember.