# stay the course (persistence)

*Ordinarily means:* to keep to a chosen plan despite difficulty

Keeping walls where a past choice set them while costs rise, so that holding them reads as part of what the collective self is.

- Computed level: L16 (depth in the emergence graph, not abstraction)
- Status: published  ·  Domain: agency

## Emergence
**Emerges from:** [keep](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-keep.maintenance), [wall](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-wall.range-end), [past](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-past.temporal), [choice](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-choice.decision), [set](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-set.fix), [cost](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-cost.economic), [hold](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-hold.physical), [rise](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-rise.movement), [time](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-time.dimension), [read](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-read.information), [part](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-part.relation), [collective self](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-collective-self.shared), [identity](https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-identity.self)

**Through:** The earlier choice is taken into the narrative, so the walls it set become part of the self; reports that the course is costly are then read as tests of the self rather than as reasons to set new walls.

**Novel properties:**
- a choice promoted into identity
- costs read as tests
- changing course heard as ceasing to be the self

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*Canonical: https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-stay-the-course.persistence*  
*Structured data: https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-stay-the-course.persistence.json*  
*Every definition provably resolves to space, time, energy and pattern.*