Emotional States
The Pathways describe the emotional quality of contact with tension in any given moment.
They are not stages, levels, or routes toward a destination.
Movement between them is irregular, non-linear, and never completed.
The Three Core Pathways
- The Recognition Line
Tension is noticed but not yet engaged.
Two truths are held without urgency to act. - The Engagement Line
Tension is active and insistent.
Attention stays with friction, whether it changes or not. - The Responsive Line
A brief shift in the texture of pressure.
A fragile change in relationship, not a resolution.
Pathways do not replace one another.
They coexist as different textures of the same underlying tension.
No state is superior.
Remaining in one is not failure.