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I recently came back from a run. I’m amazed to write that statement. I believe it was likely ten years since my last. But I recently discovered that I have elevated cholesterol, and the recommendation was to do sweaty exercise frequently.

It’s the initial instance in living memory that the reason to be active has been my physical health. During earlier years, I exercised because I wanted to lose weight. I also jogged to manage my anxiety – It was an avoidance tactic from the worry, instead of dealing with it. At other times, I exercised because I aimed to enhance in running. That represented the definition to me at that time to create an improved existence.

Exercising with new motivation now sparked reflection about the approaches I’ve related with my physical self during my years and its transformation as I progress from youth to midlife. It seems unlikely I’ve valued my own body, not fundamentally. I’ve appreciated it only for its roles and the aims it provided: aiming to appeal; avoiding feelings; completing a speedier 5K run. Until today, I’ve not understood that my body represents me, it is my existence, as opposed to something that produces results.

Much has been written for ages about the division involving physical and mental aspects – which you will be relieved to know, I’ll avoid detailing in this piece. What resonated most fascinating is the Freudian perspective that consciousness and physique are developmentally integrated right from the start, because bodily growth necessitates emotional evolution and the reverse is true. The infant’s corporeal feelings – such as the corporeal experience of hunger – drive consciousness to build the capacity to recognise hunger as a feeling that can be sated by nourishment; and the psychological solace and contentment consistently provided by repeated nourishment supports the infant’s psyche similar to the nutrition fuels them corporally. Likewise emotional occurrences – like the wish to rise and attain a goal, and the persistence to persist through effort – are the cause and means the body develops power. Since infancy, our physical and mental selves are interconnected in mutual development as connected as a double helix.

However I’ve observed, in treatment with my analyst, that my consciousness and physique can be in a distinct connection – one less integrated and somewhat abusive. My consciousness may employ my physical self to retain and express elements that my psyche deems unwanted or unacceptable. In analysis we’ve become aware how there are particular emotional states that I fear are too much for me; rather than experiencing them psychologically, I unconsciously push them to my physical self, becoming trapped as bodily signs.

I previously experienced this with indigestion – which had nothing to do with my diet, but acted as a form of corporeal reaction of the more acidic feelings I was unable to process psychologically. It wasn’t a conscious choice, but once it was raised to my attention through therapy, and my fear and insecurity and frustration and terror became palpable and expressed verbally instead of converted to physical sensation, it resolved. I rarely suffer from stomach problems now.

The toughest period I had this intense reflux, I was unable to sleep for several nights in a row. It seemed I was losing my mental stability. I consulted my doctor, who organised all sorts of examinations and assessments, but there was nothing physically wrong. It was a different physician who suggested that the cause might be psychological. My therapist concurred. I was stunned, but I recognized it was correct.

Whenever someone experiences a corporeal problem, they can be offended if told that it may have a mental root. They can experience like disrespect, hearing that their illness is fabricated. And of course that does happen – some face their symptoms dismissed or misdiagnosed. Yet occasionally it might be that the physical symptoms are real – no question – and the source is mental, the inner mind using the physical self to express emotional hurt or rage or whichever sentiment the mind cannot tolerate. Sometimes, we might assume our feelings only has value if manifested as bodily symptoms. We continually disrespect our psychological well-being as individuals, in social contexts and as a culture; why else can we allow the shocking reduction of psychological therapies in public healthcare?

Life lessons have revealed that a better life is unattainable while caught unconsciously in modes of connection, within ourselves and socially, that are rooted in devaluation, exploitation and transaction. These interactions tend to be simpler to spot “externally” in broader culture. It may be more challenging to consider where they come from, and to identify these shapes personally and in intimate connections, in the dynamics of our mental lives.

However it’s worth persevering. Upon wearing my trainers again following many years, venturing out without aiming for a better body, or to escape a sensation, or to surpass a personal best, {it