🔗 Share this article

I have just returned from a jog. I’m amazed to state those words. I believe it might have been a decade since I last did so. However It came to my attention that I have slightly high cholesterol, and I’ve been advised to do sweaty exercise frequently.

It’s the initial instance in living memory that the driving force to be active has been my physical health. When I was younger, I ran because I aimed to be thinner. At times I ran to manage my anxiety – I was merely escaping from those feelings, without confronting it. On other occasions, I jogged because I wanted to improve at running. It signified the definition to me at that time to create a better life.

Jogging with altered intent now got me thinking about the ways I’ve interacted with my physical self throughout my life and how this is changing as I transition from early adulthood to middle age. It seems unlikely I’ve honored my physical form, not deep down. I’ve appreciated it solely for its roles and the aims it provided: trying to attract others; dodging sentiments; completing a speedier 5km. Up to now, I hadn’t realized that my body is me, it is my life, as opposed to something that produces results.

A great deal has been written through history about the division of mind and body – which you will be relieved to know, I’m not going to precis here. What I’ve found most compelling is the Freudian perspective that mind and body are naturally unified from the beginning, because bodily growth demands mental growth and conversely. The infant’s bodily experiences – like the bodily feeling of hunger – drive the brain to build the skill to recognise hunger as a sensation that is alleviated by eating; and the mental reassurance and fulfillment consistently provided by meal after meal supports the infant’s psyche in the same way the nutrition nourishes them corporally. Likewise psychological experiences – like the urge to rise and reach for something, and the resolve to attempt repeatedly – are why and how the body develops power. Since infancy, our physical and mental selves are intertwined in shared growth as integrated as a spiral.

However I have noticed, during therapy with my analyst, that my mind and body can be in a different kind of relationship – a more separated and more exploitative. My consciousness might utilize my physique to retain and display aspects that my psyche views unacceptable or intolerable. During therapy it emerged how exist specific feelings that I worry are too much for me; in place of sensing them psychologically, I subconsciously push them into my body, where they remain as bodily signs.

I previously experienced this with indigestion – not connected to my diet, but represented a type of bodily backlash of the harsher emotions I failed to handle mentally. This wasn’t a conscious choice, but once it was raised into my consciousness by my analyst, and my dread and vulnerability and anger and panic were experienced and expressed verbally in place of converted to physical sensation, it resolved. It’s uncommon for me from stomach problems now.

The most severe episode I experienced this terrible acid reflux, I failed to rest for many nights straight. It seemed I was forfeiting my mental stability. I visited to the GP, who scheduled multiple diagnostic procedures, but no issues were found corporally problematic. It turned out to be an alternate medic who told me that the origin might be mental. My therapist did not disagree. I was shocked, but I recognized it to be true.

When a patient is suffering a bodily issue, they can be offended if told that it could have a psychological cause. They might feel as invalidation, hearing that their symptom is imagined. Naturally it’s a real phenomenon – people can have their pain discounted or misdiagnosed. But in some cases it might be that the physical symptoms are real – certainly – and the source is psychological, the inner mind employing the physical self to convey certain suffering or rage or any feeling the conscious self is unable to bear. At times, we might assume our emotions only has value when it is expressed through the body. We continually disrespect our mental states personally, as a society and as a culture; for what reason would we tolerate the terrible killing-off of mental health treatments on the NHS?

Personal insights have revealed that a better life cannot be created when we are stuck without realization in modes of connection, within ourselves and with others, that stem from disrespect, exploitation and dealings. Such patterns are often easier to recognize “out there” in wider society. It’s perhaps less comfortable to think about how they got out there, and to recognise these patterns inside us and among loved ones, in the dynamics of our minds.

But persistence pays off. Upon wearing my trainers once more after such a long decade, heading out without aiming for physical improvement, or to eliminate a sensation, or to surpass a personal best, {it