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I recently came back from jogging. It’s surprising to write that statement. I believe it might have been a decade since the previous time. But I found out recently that my tests indicate somewhat raised cholesterol, and I’ve been advised to engage in vigorous activity on a consistent basis.

It’s the initial instance in my life that the reason to exercise has been my bodily well-being. During earlier years, I ran because I wanted to slim down. At times I ran to manage feelings of anxiety – It was an avoidance tactic from the anxiety, instead of dealing with it. On other occasions, I jogged because I aimed to improve in running. This was the definition to me back then to build an improved existence.

Running for a different reason currently prompted contemplation about the approaches I’ve related with my physique throughout my life and how this is changing as I transition from being a young person to middle age. It seems unlikely I’ve honored my own body, not fundamentally. I’ve valued it just for its capabilities and the purposes it served me: aiming to appeal; escaping emotions; achieving a quicker five kilometers. Previously, I hadn’t realized that I am my body, it is my existence, instead of a tool for outcomes.

A lot has been discussed through history about the split between body and mind – which it’s reassuring to know, I’m not going to precis now. What has struck me most compelling is Freud’s understanding that mind and body are naturally unified from the beginning, because physical maturation demands emotional evolution and the reverse is true. A baby’s corporeal feelings – for example the corporeal experience of hunger – motivate consciousness to cultivate the skill to perceive hunger as a sensation that may be satisfied by a feed; and the mental reassurance and satisfaction repeatedly brought by repeated nourishment feeds the infant’s psyche just as the food sustains them physically. So too psychological experiences – like the desire to rise and reach for something, and the resolve to attempt repeatedly – are the cause and means the body develops power. Since infancy, mind and body are intertwined in reciprocal evolution as integrated as a spiral.

However I’ve observed, in sessions with my analyst, that my mind and body might experience a distinct connection – one less integrated and increasingly manipulative. My psyche can use my physical self to store and manifest things that my psyche considers undesirable or intolerable. In my sessions it emerged that there are particular emotional states that I worry I can’t handle; rather than feeling these in my mind, I unintentionally push them into my body, becoming trapped as physical symptoms.

I used to get this as indigestion – unrelated to my diet, but acted as a type of physical reflux of the more acidic feelings I failed to handle psychologically. This wasn’t a deliberate decision, but once it was raised into my consciousness through therapy, and my anxiety and insecurity and frustration and alarm became palpable and expressed verbally instead of changed into corporeal symptoms, it disappeared. I rarely suffer with digestive issues today.

The most severe episode I endured this terrible acid reflux, I was unable to sleep for many nights straight. It seemed I was forfeiting my sanity. I consulted a general practitioner, who arranged various diagnostic procedures, but there was nothing medically abnormal. It was a different physician who informed me that the origin may be emotional. My psychoanalyst agreed. I was shocked, but I also knew it was accurate.

When a patient endures a bodily issue, it can be upsetting at the suggestion that there might be an emotional origin. They can experience like disrespect, the idea that their symptom is fabricated. And of course such cases occur – individuals may experience their symptoms ignored or wrongly assessed. Yet occasionally it might be that the corporeal issues are real – without doubt – and the origin is psychological, the unconscious utilizing the physical self to convey certain suffering or rage or any feeling awareness cannot tolerate. At times, we may believe our emotions is only valid only through expression through the body. We persistently neglect our minds on a personal level, collectively and culturally; why else can we allow the appalling elimination of psychodynamic psychotherapy on the NHS?

My experiences have revealed that a better life cannot be created if we remain trapped without realization in ways of relating, within ourselves and socially, that stem from devaluation, manipulation and exchange. Such patterns tend to be simpler to spot “out there” in broader culture. It’s perhaps harder to think about their origins, and to see these patterns within ourselves and in intimate connections, in the economy of our mental lives.

But persistence pays off. Upon wearing my jogging shoes again following many years, heading out not to get physical improvement, or to get rid of a sensation, or to beat a personal best, {it