on of
ideas. Taking an attitude is by no means identical with being conscious
of one's attitude. The former is spontaneous, naive, and simple. It is
a sign of whole-souled relationship between a person and what he is
dealing with. The latter is not of necessity abnormal. It is sometimes
the easiest way of correcting a false method of approach, and of
improving the effectiveness of the means one is employing,--as golf
players, piano players, public speakers, etc., have occasionally to give
especial attention to their position and movements. But this need
is occasional and temporary. When it is effectual a person thinks of
himself in terms of what is to be done, as one means among others of the
realization of an end--as in the case of a tennis player practicing to
get the "feel" of a stroke. In abnormal cases, one thinks of himself not
as part of the agencies of execution, but as a separate object--as when
the player strikes an attitude thinking of the impression it will make
upon spectators, or is worried because of the impression he fears his
movements give rise to.

Confidence is a good name for what is intended by the term directness.
It should not be confused, however, with self-confidence which may be a
form of self-consciousness--or of "cheek." Confidence is not a name for
what one thinks or feels about his attitude it is not reflex. It denotes
the straightforwardness with which one goes at what he has to do.
It denotes not conscious trust in the efficacy of one's powers but
unconscious faith in the possibilities of the situation. It signifies
rising to the needs of the situation. We have already pointed out (See
p. 169) the objections to making students emphatically aware of the fact
that they are studying or learning. Just in the degree in which they
are induced by the conditions to be so aware, they are not studying
and learning. They are in a divided and complicated attitude. Whatever
methods of a teacher call a pupil's attention off from what he has to
do and transfer it to his own attitude towards what he is doing impair
directness of concern and action. Persisted in, the pupil acquires a
permanent tendency to fumble, to gaze about aimlessly, to look for some
clew of action beside that which the subject matter supplies. Dependence
upon extraneous suggestions and directions, a state of foggy confusion,
take the place of that sureness with which children (and grown-up people
who have not been sophisticated by "