It is possible to concentrate on the idea that the people’s mind is responsible for the human’s attitude to the reality and to his or her perception of time, space, and the form of being because these categories are the results of the mind’s work.
Thus, people’s relations with the world depend on the peculiarities of this or that person’s mind and understanding of one’s role in the whole world.
Differentiating between identity and relational logics, it is important to operate the notions of time, space, and being and discuss them in detail with references to Virginia Woolf’s vision of the person’s mind and its possibilities in this context. Can people follow the principles of only identity logic or only relational logic?
The variety of the life situations and the reactions of the human mind to them can support the idea that there are no persistent followers of this or that pattern of behaviour, actions, and attitude because of the diversity of the variants and influential conditions.
In spite of the fact identity logic is based on the definite stableness of considerations and ideas, it is impossible to speak about one identity for the majority of situations and at all the life stages. From this point, relational logic is more flexible for defining the people’s behaviours.
Thus, the man is often different in his attitude to time, space, and even being, and this peculiarity can be discussed with references to Woolf’s considerations.
The opposition of the human’s dependence on his or her identity or relations has its origins in the power of the mind. Is a person stable from the point of identity and form of being? According to Woolf, the answer is ‘no’ because the mind “seems to have no single state of being” (Woolf, 1989, p. 97).
That is why it is significant to focus on the variety of persons’ forms of being which can be realised in relation to different people and different situations. What forms of being can people acquire because of the work of their mind? What are the mind’s relations with the persons in the street?
Are they the part of the whole picture of the world along with the person who observes them through the window? The mind “can separate itself from the people in the street, for example, and think of itself as apart from them” (Woolf, 1989, p. 97).
Separation and division of the world into ‘I’ and ‘the other people’ is the principle associated with the vision of the being according to the person’s identity.
Can this perspective be discussed as the only one for describing the possibilities of the mind in its relation to the world? Even being separated from the public with the help of a window and observing the other people from the distance, the mind often breaks these boundaries and acts according to the open relations with the world and persons in it.
The mind “can think with other people spontaneously” (Woolf, 1989, p. 97). In this case, people focus on the relational being instead of the defined one. Humans develop varieties of their identities while being involved in relations with the world and persons in it.
Thus, the notions of independence and identity are changed with the concept of closeness to the whole. As a result, not only the form of being is influenced but also the space which expands its boundaries in relation to the crowd is affected.
If the defined and relational beings can be changed under the impact of definite conditions and situations, what factor can influence the concept of time? The mind “can think back through its fathers or through its mothers” (Woolf, 1989, p. 97).
Thus, the mind can exist in the flow of the past, presence, and future where the past is the part of the presence, and the presence forms the future. Thinking back, it is possible to support the chain of times without references to its chronological character. From this point, the perception of time can be discussed as the perception of the eternal and dependent chain.
Fluency is in a kind of the continuity, and it is the way to determine the time from the relational perspective. Nevertheless, the perception of time also depends on the surroundings. The impossibility of the constant fluency of time for the mind is accentuated with emphasising the fact that actions can be spontaneous and sudden.
In this case, suddenness can result in “a sudden splitting off of consciousness” (Woolf, 1989, p. 97). This fact allows further focusing on the duality of the person’s mind and its perceptions. Consciousness which is the basics for understanding and explaining of the people’s actions can be split off, changing the perceptions of being, time, and space.
This principle can work for everyone, including writers and women-writers who “being the natural inheritor of that civilization” can become “alien and critical” when looking at it from the distance (Woolf, 1989, p. 97).
This opposition accentuates the duality of the mind’s perception and conclusion. The ‘natural inheritor of that civilization’ acts according to the principles of the relational logic, being the part of the whole.
The moment when a person, especially a writer, becomes distant from his or her surroundings and critical about them is associated with the identity logic with focusing on differentiating between this person and the other people. Does Woolf concentrate on one vision of the person and his mind?
The author provides the readers with the point of view according to which she accentuates two possible ways of discussing the question at a time. The sense of difference is emphasised by the fact that “the mind is always altering its focus”, and it can discuss the world from “different perspectives” (Woolf, 1989, p. 97).
It is possible to see the world processes from a distance or be actively involved in its development, to perceive the time as the line or as the circle or chain, to think of the space as full of boundaries or as infinite.
All the variants can be close to different people in various situations in spite of their vision of their own identity because the people’s mind can change the focus and perspectives from which the world and people can be perceived.
Reference
Woolf, V. (1989). A Room of One’s Own. USA: Mariner Books.