Dialogues Across Time

I feel we are at the corner of something revolutionary and yet evolutionarily necessitated. Some psychologists acknowledge only the past century as a time for our field when it has been alive and well, but giving credit to the late Charles Darwin means first acknowledging the agencies that formed out of novel curiosity, which would eventually call the field home. Psychology evolves, sometimes quickly, but the questions at its core remain the same.

What shapes our emotions? How does attention build our experience? And not least importantly, how do the layers of the self fit together in a coherent yet adaptive whole?

Are we the structures that make up our minds, or the functions of them themselves?

Standing at the dawn of this new curious debate, as it were— Titchener and James.

William James, who is often called one of the founders of modern psychology, is one of those minds whose work still carries an echo throughout many of today’s therapeutic models. His 1884 paper on emotion and continued work on consciousness and adaptive mental function, influenced by Darwin, laid the groundwork that we now see reflected in approaches like Eye Movement Desensitisation Reprocessing and Internal Family Systems therapies.

I wanted to explore how James might engage with a few more contemporary questions. So (using ChatGPT as the language model it is), I imagined sitting across from him during his years teaching at Harvard, where he mentored Mary Whiton Calkins, the first female president of the American Psychological Association. Through a series of questions, I invite him (and you) into a conversation to clarify and expand on the concepts that shaped the early landscape of psychological thought.

What follows is a dialogue in a series of dialogues across time. It is a conversation between foundational theory and modern practice.

A Conversation With William James

Question 1

I: Professor James, some modern interpretations claim that your theory of emotion treats feelings as mere labels applied to bodily reactions. How would you clarify your intended meaning in “What Is an Emotion?” (1884)?

WJ: “Calling emotion ‘secondary’ never meant it was superficial. My claim was that emotion arises from perceiving the body in a state of readiness. The bodily shift is not a preface but part of the emotion itself. Consciousness feels fear or grief because it recognizes the organism in a changed condition. Experience is one continuous stream; meaning, sensation, and bodily action cannot truly be separated. The mistake is thinking I reduced emotion to a removable label. I saw emotional feeling as the form consciousness takes when it becomes aware of bodily change.”

Rationale: This reflects James’s original argument: emotional experience is inseparable from the physiological patterns that accompany it. In The Principles of Psychology (1890), he reinforces that experience flows continuously, not in discrete categories, and that emotion is woven into this ongoing stream.

I: Modern therapies like EMDR use rhythmic, guided attention while people recall difficult experiences. From your perspective, how might structured shifts in attention shape consciousness and emotion?

WJ:“Attention shapes the current of the mind. The stream of consciousness is always moving, reorganizing itself around whatever we attend to. If attention is guided in rhythmic or patterned ways, especially while the body remains physiologically regulated, the stream may indeed reorder itself. Past disturbances could loosen their grasp. This aligns with my view that emotions arise from bodily states and that modifying those states or the focus of awareness will naturally reshape feeling and thought.”

Rationale: James wrote extensively about attention as an active, adaptive function. His perspective fits comfortably with the mechanisms targeted by EMDR: redirecting awareness in a structured manner to change one’s internal experience.

I: Contemporary models such as Internal Family Systems describe consciousness as made of “parts” — inner subpersonalities with distinct emotions and beliefs. How might that relate to your conception of consciousness as a continuous stream?

WJ:“I never claimed the stream was uniform. It is full of currents, whirlpools, and recurring patterns. Recognizing these internal variations as ‘parts’ can be invaluable. Observing these states clearly — not fighting or suppressing them — allows the individual to integrate competing tendencies. This supports coherent action and self-understanding. In this sense, identifying internal parts is compatible with a functional view: mental processes exist to help the organism adapt.”

Rationale: James acknowledged the mind’s multiplicity even within its unity. His framing harmonizes with IFS’s emphasis on compassionate awareness of diverse internal states.

Conclusion

William James’s work continues to resonate because he understood psychology as a living, adaptive process. His insights remind us that:

• Emotion is inseparable from bodily experience
• Attention reorganizes the flow of consciousness
• Internal complexity is not a flaw, but part of how the mind adapts

Titchener sought to break consciousness into elements; James sought to understand its motion, its purpose, and its function. Both were mapping different layers of the same terrain. When we place James’s ideas alongside modern practices, from EMDR’s guided attention to IFS’s recognition of internal multiplicity, we see a continuity of purpose. Helping people understand their own experience in ways that allow greater coherence, regulation, and agency. This dialogue isn’t just a historical reflection. It points toward a wider truth: the mind has always been a system in motion. Understanding its layers, functions, and adaptive patterns isn’t just academically interesting. It's a path to more humane, effective psychological care today in every space!