Explorations of Becoming in Time - Some philosophical ranting

Becoming is Deleuze’s version of pure and empty time (Stagoll, 2005). Meaning that time is purely perceptual, not real. Empty of the tangible realness that we pretend exists because otherwise we might get lost between where we are ‘supposed’ to go, where we have been told to go, and who we have been told to be. The mind is the private place, the backstage of our becoming. We process our thoughts and emotions as they respond to our contexts. “Think. Think fast. As I systematically searched the rolodex in my mind for possible courses of action…Time slowed down. My face flushed hot with stress and relief and time surged forward again.” This ordinary affect by a classmate is an example of how time is manipulated according to our experience in a particular moment. Our perception of time going fast or slow is only apparent when we need to consider our next course of action and how quickly this decision is expected to be made. In some conditions of our experience, such as in the example above, we are forced to act quickly, to choose an action, and time moves accordingly. When we move fast, so does time. This is why becoming-different is its own time, the real time in which changes occur (Stagoll, 2005). The ordinary can happen before the mind can think. Little experiences of shock, recognition, confusion, and déjà vu pepper the most ordinary practices and moves. Sometimes you have to pause to catch up with where you are (Stewart, 2007). As discussed previously, becoming happens in-between events and is the difference that allows us to act in the first place. This happens without our perception of it; we cannot pre-conceive our own becoming. Therefore, real time only exists in the present moment of our production.

When I realized that I would never be still, not in the true sense, I realized that stillness is simply my perception of time at any given moment relative to my experience. In our definition of time, it is impossible to stop, but is it possible to go slower? Faster? “A still life is a static state filled with vibratory motion, or resonance. A quivering in the stability of a category or a trajectory, it gives the ordinary the charge of an unfolding. Or a simple stopping” (Stewart, 2007, p. 19). Writing ordinary affects is an experience of time suspended. Making the reality of how we create the illusion of time in our lives even more visceral, magnified.

The creation of time, standardized for the convenience of productivity and efficiency, is not real or pure in this sense. Working with people is best done in the space between things, which is a zone of indeterminacy that is pure potential. Deep within this space of liberatory potential reside the unrecuperated alternatives to all that comprises the empire of now (Skott-Myher, 2008). Time from the post-foundational perspective becomes restrictive and burdensome to what we could accomplish if we were not so preoccupied with the past or the future. Time in the way that we ‘use’ it is a continual reminder of what we have not done, and what still needs to be done. It will not be the last time. You will do it again, again, again. To achieve the goal that has no end means ceasing to be what you are in order to become what you cannot be. The goal is a limit approached, never reached; what is important is the process. (Massumi as cited in Jackson, 2010). What is important then, is now, the space in-between. What would happen if we were to come from this place as professionals? From a place of uncertainty and ambiguity? I would have always assumed that it would result in chaos and nothing really getting done. I am no longer so certain of that.