Concept

πρόληψις

Prolepsis

Predisposition — the habitual biases that shape your inner life

Prolepsis refers to the habitual biases and tendencies that shape how you perceive and respond to experience — the pre-existing patterns that a thought exploits when it arrives. Two people receive the same provocation (prosbole), but one engages with it and the other doesn't. The difference is prolepsis: the habitual tendencies that make you more vulnerable to certain patterns than others.

Understanding prolepsis helps explain why different people struggle with different logismoi. Your particular predispositions — shaped by temperament, history, and habit — determine which thought-patterns find the easiest entrance. Self-knowledge in the tradition includes knowing your own predispositions so you can watch for the patterns most likely to capture you.

Key Figures

Related Practices