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I recently came back from jogging. It’s surprising to write this fact. It seems it might have been many years since I last did so. Yet I recently discovered that my tests indicate slightly high cholesterol, and doctors suggested to perform intense workouts regularly.

This is the first time in living memory that the reason to exercise has been my bodily well-being. During earlier years, I jogged because I desired to slim down. I also jogged to cure feelings of anxiety – I was just running away from the worry, without confronting it. On other occasions, I ran because I sought to get better in running. This was the definition to me at that time to develop a superior lifestyle.

Exercising with new motivation now got me thinking about the approaches I’ve connected with my body throughout my life and how this is changing as I transition from early adulthood to middle age. I don’t think I’ve honored my physical form, not truly. I’ve appreciated it just for its roles and the objectives it provided: aiming to appeal; dodging sentiments; achieving a quicker 5K run. Previously, I hadn’t realized that my body is me, it is my life, rather than something that produces results.

A great deal has been explored for ages about the split between body and mind – a topic it’s comforting to know, I’m not going to precis in this piece. What has struck me most intriguing is the Freudian perspective that mental and physical selves are innately connected from birth, because physical maturation requires psychological development and the reverse is true. A baby’s corporeal feelings – like the corporeal experience of hunger – propel the brain to cultivate the ability to identify hunger as a sensation that can be sated by nourishment; and the mental reassurance and contentment repeatedly brought by repeated nourishment supports the infant’s psyche similar to the nutrition sustains them corporally. So too psychological experiences – like the desire to rise and attain a goal, and the determination to persist through effort – are the reason and method physical strength increases. Since infancy, mind and body are interconnected in reciprocal evolution as integrated as a double helix.

However It’s become clear, in sessions with my psychoanalyst, that my mind and body might experience an alternate dynamic – a more separated and more exploitative. My psyche might utilize my body to retain and display aspects that my mind views unacceptable or intolerable. In analysis we’ve become aware how there are particular emotional states that I am afraid are too much for me; in place of feeling these mentally, I subconsciously force them to my physical self, becoming trapped as corporeal issues.

I previously experienced digestive discomfort – which had nothing to do with what I’d eaten, but acted as a type of corporeal reaction of the harsher emotions I failed to handle in my mind. It wasn’t a deliberate decision, but after it was introduced to my attention by my analyst, and my dread and insecurity and rage and terror became palpable and put into words instead of transformed into bodily feelings, it vanished. It’s uncommon for me from stomach problems currently.

The toughest period I had this intense reflux, I failed to rest for many nights straight. It seemed I was losing my mental stability. I consulted to the GP, who scheduled various scans and tests, but everything was physically wrong. It turned out to be an alternate medic who suggested that the root could be psychological. My psychoanalyst agreed. I was shocked, but I also felt it was correct.

When a patient is suffering a bodily issue, they can be offended if told that it could have a mental root. It can seem this as being disrespected, hearing that their condition is fabricated. And of course such cases occur – some face their suffering dismissed or misdiagnosed. But in some cases it could be that the bodily signs exist – certainly – and the cause is psychological, the subconscious employing the physique to express emotional hurt or rage or whatever emotion awareness fails to handle. Sometimes, we might assume our experience is only valid if manifested through the body. We continually disrespect our minds on a personal level, collectively and within our culture; for what reason do we accept the shocking reduction of psychodynamic psychotherapy on the NHS?

My experiences have revealed that an improved existence cannot be created when we are stuck unawares in modes of connection, within ourselves and with others, that are rooted in devaluation, use and exchange. These interactions are often easier to recognize “externally” in broader culture. It may be more challenging to think about where they come from, and to see these patterns personally and among loved ones, in the economy of our minds.

But it’s worth persevering. After donning my trainers once more post a long hiatus, heading out not to get a better body, or to get rid of a sensation, or to surpass a 5km time, {it