The move away from thinking about being, to perceiving and understanding the act.
To be is to be less identifiable, less visible (more in the shadows, more potential than actual) than it is to act.
One can be, and be quite content, alone and in silence; or one can be as equally content with much inner upheaval - and both of those states can be mistaken or go simply unnoticed by the other.
The other doesn’t necessarily know about your state of being - your inner worlds as they change and develop - if your being is not accentuated by an act.
Being in its pure state hinders perception and understanding. It comes from and returns to a state of purity - and states of purity conceal if they are not accompanied by words, significatory behaviour, perceivable acts.
You can be a lot or be a little - and neither of those adequately reveals what you are if few things are said or done.
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It is easier to recognise the act than it is the state of being.
The act reveals what is happening, either directly or indirectly. The direct act is there for all to see, witness - to perceive and to understand.
Of course much can be missed or go unseen, or be present and seen but be misunderstood. But the direct act wills its way towards understanding, towards a recognition by the other - if not now and not by many, then potentially later and by at least a few.
The potentiality of understanding is inherent in the act itself. The act gives rise to it, enables it, brings it forth - renders it available for the other within its essence: the fundamentals of the act.
The less direct act also reveals, perhaps at a psychological level, at a level which isn’t necessarily open as such to being revealed. But it is still shown, it still becomes significant, through the action that speaks its name.
Indirect actions may be intended or not, but they are significant and they can become revelatory.
You may not mean to be expressive, to say or do something, but once it is said and done, you have delivered something that can be interpreted by an other.
The good thing, depending on your point of view, is that the delivered meaning into the world becomes significant about your act, but not conclusively about you.
You are not identical to your acts, not in the long run, because what is said and done can be unsaid and undone - or rather, new things can be said and done that negate, supersede or contradict the previous act.
The act isn’t finished, it isn’t pure and totalising. The act instead opens up, becomes, points towards other potentialities - other things that can be stated, shown, intended or willed.
***
The act contains a certain amount of energy that being may also have (and may even have more of), but only the act tends towards a state of continuous energy.
Continuous energy is a type of dialogue, an interaction between a self and an other, that brings meaning into being.
This meaning can be true or untrue, sincere or insincere, on point or beside the point. But it is also full of potential, for another other to grasp and understand - and as such, the act-as-energy tends towards a richer understanding, because it is part of the larger field of significance.
To be is to live; to act is to live meaningfully.
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