| June 11th 1999 |
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| I had a great discussion
with Eileen my new supervisor this week. We were talking about working with
clients how have multiple sclerosis and chronic fatigue which got us onto
mind/body. I am in the middle of reading both "Mapping the Mind" by Ruth Carter and "Mind, Language and Society" by John Searle. "Mapping" is very much about brain architecture and its effects whereas MLS is more about mental functioning. A comment in MLS struck me as very interesting. Searle said that African friends of his don't have the concept of the "mind/body split". In fact there is no way to describe that concept in their language. Couple this with watching Channel 4's documentary about "phantom" limbs and I had a new, well new for me, insight about mind and body. The accepted wisdom is that mind and body have separate existences, thanks to our friend Rene Descartes (Cartesian Dualism), and so therefore there has to be an "interface" a place or a construction where the mind can communicate with the body - the brain. Rather like this:
Imagine that the mind and body are but two extremes of a continuum. At one end we have our unconscious mind and at the other we have our physical self. Along this continuum travels our conscious mind, rattling along from end to end trying to make sense of it all. Rather like this:
In this model there is no defined separation of mind from body. The two expressions that we observe are the extremes - our physical self at one end and our mental, dare I say spiritual self at the other. Rather like the Foundation in Issac Asimov's books the supposed other ends of ourselves (physical and mental) actually occupy the same space, the same place, and are expressions of the same unity. Which suggests that death is simply a move out of the continuum to another one or something altogether different. In the same way that the residents of Flatland couldn't see objects when they ascended to the vertical so we cannot see people when they transfer ie die. I was talking to a friend just today about this and he was saying how his neuropathy was causing tingling and pain in his lower legs. When I asked him he was dealing with this he said that he was fighting the pain. Right along the lines that Renee and others have set for us - a physical body and non-physical mind. Two parts forever separate. I described the above model to him and asked him how it would be if he welcomed in the pain as another part of himself that was simply providing information. Mind and body being parts of the same system - indivisible. He considered this for a bit. It was a new concept for him. After a few minutes he said that the pain dimished a bit and that it was no longer so important - he was very surprised. He had been taught to fight pain, keep it out, deny it and "be strong". It very rarely works. Experiencing pain, discomfort, fear, joy etc. as part of ourselves helps me get a lot more out of them. I'll ask my friend again in a few days how his pain is. |
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