A systems view of biological health

Section 1: Introduction

3 : The Body-Mind

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"Body-mind" is a phrase I have ended up using because there is no adequate word in common usage to express this idea.

There is a consciousness pervading all levels of our organic body – well, many consciousnesses, many layers of collective consciousness that are intimately bound up with physiology and anatomy. Cells are conscious. Small agglomerations of cells have a collective consciousness that is "more than the sum of its parts". As do organs, muscles, limbs, end so on. This complex, somewhat hierarchical, fractal melange of sentience and physical biology leaks into the sphere of conscious awareness as emotions, interoceptive experiences, intuition, reactivity, mood, and sensory information. It even forms some part of what is usually thought of as identity in the form of physical "presence".

Many people have described the body-mind. After experimenting with psychedelics, Aldous Huxley used the term "Mind at Large" to describe everything we are subliminally aware of in any one moment, and recognised this was too much information to use in the day-to-day necessities of surviving:

And it’s a two-way street. The layer of cognitive and quasi-conscious Mind clearly organises the whole organ-ism into action. But the more cognitive end of consciousness - that is usually thought of as will, resolve, presence of mind, thoughts, imagination, awareness - also leaks back down into and is continuous with the body-mind. Jung’s "unconscious" is in some ways close to the idea of a "body-mind". But it is normally thought of as "psychology", and therefore not usually packaged with the anatomy and physiology or innate biological intelligence. The collective unconscious also has somatic aspects and effects, which are recognised in the ideas of transference and counter-transference, and alluded to in the inseparability of observer and observed found in the Upanishads and quantum physics.

It is not possible to separate out the body (or body-mind) and cognitive ("conscious") mind because there is and never has been a clear division. Sentience, perception, attention, memory, anticipation and other qualitative "mental" activities and states evolved from the very beginnings of Life - in parallel with and as an integrated aspect of biological anatomy and physiology.

Health requires that this body-mind is fully integrated within itself and also uninterruptedly through into the layers of cognitive and rational mental space that are widely considered to be definitive of "human-ness". This kind of integration requires a compassionate (as opposed to a dysfunctional, dominant, colonial, or anxious etc.) relationship with the body - a compassionate relationship between the cognitive mind and the Body-Mind.

You will also see the term "Living world" used frequently - which is an extension of the Body-Mind to include everything... The Living world includes everything - all humans, animals, plants, insects, bacteria, rocks, water, air - the whole glorious collection of Life and (particularly) consciousness which we grew out of and as part of, within which we are and always have been inextricably embedded. The Living world is reflected in the ordering and processes of the Body-Mind because the two are the same. To quote Francisco Varela - it is all simultaneously Not-One and Not-Two.