Conference quark::mennotes-v1

    Wil,
    
    I think there is a lot of truth in what you said.  Anyone who has ever
    danced or seen Leonard Bernstein conducting Tristan can testify to
    that.  Related facial expression and bodily gesture and motion enhances 
    the related emotion and vise versa.
    
    However, I think the theory about obese people is a bit far fetched.  I
    mean it all depends on the metaphor of "filled with grief", so wallah
    the body gets big with the "filling".  Does that mean if the common
    English metaphor had been "empty of happiness" or "loss of love", the 
    same body will get thin by "emptying"?
    
    Eugene
                                        

    RE: .1
    
    Yeah, that's what I mean that one person cannot make
    a prediction of what will happen to someone when disaster
    strikes, nor can one look at an obese person or a very thin
    person and have any idea of what is causing their condition.
    
    But the person who has the condition can benefit by looking
    into his own psyche for the clue to his own condition, and 
    not spending a lot of money and time and effort on surface
    level fixes.   It takes a "faith in the process" kind of
    jump to believe that your body is a manifestation of your
    psyche and if you want to change your body, you have to change
    your psyche.  But I believe in it.
    
    I have been to a number of Robert Bly workshops since the
    summer of 1988, and it seems to me that Bly is gaining
    weight.  Other men agree with my observation.  Only Bly
    can know why, and I don't have the faintest idea of what
    he is "doing about it" if anything.
    
    But I have heard Bly talk a lot about the king archetype
    and how the king must be very strong and secure, because
    a lot of projections come his way from both friends and
    enemies.  Bly talks in metaphors and likens the projections
    to spears, arrows.  I was very angry at him in one workshop.
    At one point, he happened to invite the room full of 
    people (men and women) to get on their
    feet and to wander around letting their bodies mime their
    feelings.  I wandered around the room, carefully drawing
    a number of imaginary arrows on an imaginary bow and sending
    them into Robert Bly!  (I have since regretted this very much.)
    
    Bly has since achieved a kind of king-like stature with a
    lot of people (40 weeks on the top of the best-seller list
    for a poet/writer who previously published many books whose 
    printings numbered a few thousand).  I know of and have seen
    heated arguments at gatherings of men between Bly and some
    man in the audience, where it
    was evident to all that were present that the guy was working
    out old, old stuff around his own father (or other authority
    figure) and using Bly as the target of his anger.  That is
    evident with the men who are willing to let their psyches
    hang out there.  There are probably hundreds who have sent
    psychic arrows his way, as I did, without ever telling him about
    it.  (Bly and I did have a public, verbal confrontation at the same
    conference and later resolved it one on one, so I have a good
    feeling about that encounter.)
    
    In any case, he has a kind of king-like stature and a lot
    of metaphorical or psychic stuff is coming at him all the
    time.  Well, he needs to be defensive or he will get
    clobbered by all this anger.  He needs to have what we
    commonly call a "thick skin."  And at the same time he
    is a poet, who is someone with a great sensitivity, so
    it is not as though he has spent his life dealing with
    conflict and being "tough."
    
    I have no problem imagining that his weight gain is his
    psychic defensiveness manifested in his body.  Someone
    else may attribute it to eating patterns of being on the
    road a lot.  To which I would counter, that being on the
    road a lot is very stressful, with constant change in the
    environment, so that one needs to guard one's core, one's
    essence, so that it not get depleted.  One needs to build
    a little buffer against the constant newness.  The body
    might well represent that as an extra layer of fat.  The body
    may NEED to gain weight on the road and eating a rich 
    dessert may not be a lack of will-power, it is the body
    going after what it needs at the command of the psyche.
    
    Wil

    Excellent observations, Wil -- another, impish thought occurred to me:
    He's gaining weight because his book's selling so well he can finally
    *afford* to eat well!  
    
    Actually, I lean much more strongly towards your idea of adding bulk
    as "psychic armor."
    
    					andrew

    To get over grief I figure I had a number of choices, alcohol, drugs,
    religon and many more. I consciously chose exercise, not to
    extremes but to a different level then I have ever been at. It
    has been six months now since I started and I'm still at it. It
    worked for me.
    
    			-Jim-

    RE: .4
    
    I've done that and found that it worked for me too, Jim.
    
    I try to hit tennis balls against a backboard as often
    as I can these days.  I get the ball going, hitting it
    harder and harder, and moving faster and faster.  The
    concentration on the ball and moving to meet it is a
    clarifying experience.  It's a whole body experience,
    legs, arms, bending, twisting, reaching, and a very
    satisfying sound as the racket hits the ball and the
    ball hits the backboard.
    
    When I am having a bad time, it feels to me like my
    head is "filling up", as if it is under pressure.
    As if too much of my blood is up in my head.  But
    when I come away from the tennis backboard after
    an hour of hard playing, my blood is all in the right
    places, and my head feels clear.  I can go back to
    having sad feelings without feeling like my head is
    going to explode.
    
    Rowing on a rowing machine has the same effect.
    
    It's as though my body wanted to express something
    and I gave it the opportunity to do it.
    
    Oh, I'm suddenly getting some insight here.  My
    psyche is exhausted when I am in these bad times.
    My body needs to express that exhaustion.  And
    expressing it is clarifying.
    
    I have a woman friend who swims in the same way.
    Friday evenings, after work, she has to swim for
    an hour, churning up  and down the pool, then she
    feels good.
    
    Wil

    
    Food is often a way of creating a barrier also, not only "storing" or
    stuffing grief.  
    
    Food/fat is a way of creating a barrier to intimacy and sexual attention. 
    Food is also a tool of control ("if I control nothing else in my life I
    control at least what goes into my mouth" - this applies for anorexics
    a great deal).
    
    I am a believer in the mind/body connection (after having read Joan
    Borysenko's "minding the body, mending the mind").  And if you ever
    read Desmond Morris' "Manwatching" or "The naked ape" it's obvious that
    our bodies convey a great deal about how we feel and what we think.
    
    I feel that if fat is a method of dealing with grief, it does not deal
    wtih it openly.  Fat could also be said to be dealing with anger.  But
    instead of releasing these things, it "bottles them up".  It is
    agression turned inwards and numbed with the tranquilizing affects of
    too much food, the soothing of food that we were perhaps once told was
    love in an indirect way ("you're such a good boy, have another piece of
    apple pie").  
    
    What you eat when something is eating you is very vital - finding out
    why you eat can help you understand what is going on behind the scenes,
    in your head, in your heart.  
    
    The expression of small gestures as a way of transmitting psychological
    barriers or problems is interesting.  Neuro-linguistic programming
    suggests that if we smile we will be happy (in highly oversimplified
    terms) and I think this takes advantage of the connections between the
    mind and the body.  The "paths" for our emotions and muscle movements
    are so intricately linked that often we do not even realize that we
    clench our fists or knit our brows.  Posture is often another key for
    emotional expression.
    
    It is very difficult sometimes to express emotion, and to have someone
    who is available and able to decipher the clues they can read and
    enable a person to unravel what is going on inside them (especially if
    there is some barrier to understanding it - like denial) sounds really
    valuable.
    
    -Jody
    

My recent experience might serve as a good example to support this
idea.  I have put on a significant amount of weight since the illness
and death of my wife a year and a half ago.  I attributed it to the
fact that my new fiancee is an excellent cook, but perhaps there is
more at work here.  I also find I need more sleep.

I'd ask for a book title, but I'd probably fall asleep on page 3...

Ben

    I have a friend (man, ~50) whose father died a few months
    ago.  I haven't noticed any changes in my friend, but I
    met his mother recently.  She seemed to me to be a very
    attractive woman, in her 70s, I suppose.
    
    Later, in conversation with my friend, I learned that his
    mother had lost a lot of weight since his father died.
    His mother used to be overweight, and is now what I would
    guess is her ideal weight.
    
    I haven't the faintest idea of what that represents.  But
    I ask myself the question, "What is this woman's body
    expressing about her psyche's new condition following the
    death of her husband?"  Of course, I don't have the
    answer, and would not try to guess it.  But I'm sure there
    is a connection.
    
    Wil

    The concept of food as a defense or response, based on some
    psychological need, is pretty standard stuff.  But the leap to a
    *physiological* connection unrelated to what is consumed and the known
    ways bodies react to foods?  That seems a bit far-fetched.
    
    After all, we know a lot, for example, about metabolism: that kids who
    eat junk food and are fat young, have large fat cells throughout life
    as a result, and so are both prone to lifelong obesity, and have more
    difficulty losing weight than those who got fat later and simply have
    too *many* fat cells.  We know also that most people who get older gain
    weight -- unless they adjust eating and exercise -- because their
    metabolisms slow down.  Etc.
    
    This is not to discount the pyschological aspects of food and eating.
    On the contrary, it is to be skeptical of a vague kind of pop pschology
    that could obscure simpler or more realistic understandings of our
    bodies and how they relate to our pscyches.
    
    Kit  

    I, too, believe in the mind/body connection...  I have also recently
    had some acupuncture treatment, and read a few books on the subject,
    and, Wil, you might be interested to know that there is a GREAT deal of
    synergy between the thoughts in .0 and standard acupunture theory.
    
    Basically, acupunture (or acupressure, or even massage) deals with the
    imbalance of bodily energy.  I had treatment for neck and shoulder pain
    that resulted from falling on icy cement stairs months earlier.  It was
    explained to me that your body stores energy in your muscle tissues; and 
    things such as stress can cause too much energy to be created.  Also,
    stress energy tends to collect in the weakest areas of your body's
    muscular system.  Acupunture involves treating these energy imbalances
    (in my case, releasing the excess energy that was stored in my weakened
    muscle tissues, that was the result of too much stress).
    
    To me, it seems like this is very similar to .0, that speaks of
    'psychic' energy being stored (and displayed) in body language...  The
    treatment of 'releasing' this energy is of course analogous to the
    acupuncturist inserting needles in the affected muscle tissues...
    
    I wonder if some day we can truly understand our minds and bodies
    enough that we can all treat ourselves with simple, basic techniques
    such as meditation, simple massage, and therapy such as this...
    
    Dave 

    RE: .9
    
    Kit, I thought I was careful to say that there is 
    no denying the link between food, metabolism, and weight.
    I don't think Mindell is saying that the body can gain
    weight without it taking in more energy than it puts
    out.  Weight gain or weight loss is not "dreamed up"
    without an adjustment to the food/exercise/metabolism
    system to make it possible.
    
    The question is: why is the body taking in more food,
    or why is it expending less energy, or why is the food
    that is being taken not being used as efficiently as
    before?
    
    Mindell is saying the body is responding to (mirroring,
    or dreaming, or fighting) the psyche, that's all. 
    
                      Wil

Re: .11 
     Wil, with respect to your point below:
    
>    The question is: why is the body taking in more food,
>    or why is it expending less energy, or why is the food
>    that is being taken not being used as efficiently as
>    before?
    
    
    Isn't the answer simply that:
    
    1. the body is taking in more food because
       the person is feeding him or herself more
    
    2. the body is expending less energy because "lifestyle" (yuck) has
       changed (amount of exercise, types of food, etc) 
    
    3. Food is not being used as efficiently because, for example,
       metabolism has slowed (standard, with age)
    
     Etc.
    
    Now, as to what motivates the person to do this (particularly the first
    two items), psychology has much to say.  Why denigrate the straight
    forward and obvious answer, and replace with the esoteric and fanciful?
    
    Kit

    RE: .12
        
    > Isn't the answer simply that:
    
    > 1. the body is taking in more food because
    >    the person is feeding him or herself more
    
    > 2. the body is expending less energy because "lifestyle" (yuck) has
    >    changed (amount of exercise, types of food, etc) 
    
    > 3. Food is not being used as efficiently because, for example,
    >    metabolism has slowed (standard, with age)
    
    > Now, as to what motivates the person to do this (particularly the first
    > two items), psychology has much to say.  Why denigrate the straight
    > forward and obvious answer, and replace with the esoteric and fanciful?
    
    It may simply be semantics, Kit, but I think we don't see the
    links between body, psyche and mind the same way. Here's my take
    on the different ways that we see the links:
    
    I am saying that there is an UNconscious link between the psyche
    and the body, that the mind may know nothing about, and even if
    it does know about it, it may not be able to change it.
    
    I think that you are saying that 
    
         1) the person consciously eats more or less, possibly
            because s/he is motivated by the psyche to do that.
         2) the person consciously changes lifestyle (without
            changing eating habits) possibly because s/he is 
            motivated by the psyche to do that.
         3) the person's metabolism slows with age (because the
            mechanism is wearing out?)
    
    I think you are saying that the first two are the result of
    the mind's decision, urged on by the psyche in some cases, 
    and the third is a result of the wearing out of the body.
    
    Does that sound right to you?
    
    Wil

    
    I very strongly feel there are impetuses (impeti?) behind weight loss
    and gain that have little to do with physical food intake and exercise.
    
    I feel that there is another component to weight loss and gain that
    many people don't take into account - attitude.  If there is something
    you are getting from being the weight you are, or if your psyche will
    obtain something it needs from gaining or losing weight, that is what
    you will do.
    
    Obviously if you eat 14 pizzas a day you'll gain weight and if you eat
    3 water chestnuts a day you will lose weight.  But go beyond the
    obvious.
    
    Your body knows more than you think it does.  I think that's why
    visualization is very powerful in changing your health, and your life. 
    If you can envision it, you can open all the gates inside to enable you
    to become whatever you wish (be it lighter, stronger, healthier, more
    free of cancer, etc.).  There was a seminar I took at HCHP called "ways
    to wellness" which used many different techniques, including
    visualization, to reduce dis-ease in the body (whatever that dis-ease
    was, compulsion, panic attacks, cancer, chronic pain, etc....).
    
    -Jody
    

    There is entire note file where you can see people working to make
    the perfect body. Many folks do not have the subliminal message that
    their carrying emotional baggage with them. Many just enjoy working out
    and making inprovements on what 'God' has given them. 
    
    A statement from 'Pumping Iron' Arnold S. remarked something to a
    statement of that if you were to take a bunch of men from all walks of
    life and strip them to their skivies and place them in a room, you
    would not know the rich men from the poor. You would notice the
    sucessful man from the others for he has a good physic, has a good
    attutide about him that might be found with those with the sucess of
    money. But they would not have a farthing to their name. Interesting
    observation in leu of sucess and what your body is saying to you and
    the world. 
    
    The note file mentioned is:   SELECT::FLEX, it is about body building.
    It is about the struggles that the common man faces to become better
    than he is. Even Arnold started of in the iron game with a chicken
    brest chest as he made coments to in a book that I had read about him.
    
    
    George

    Wil --
    
    I think in many cases it is indeed an unconscious connection. My point
    is that whatever the mechanism (unconscious, conscious or a
    combination) or the motivation (the problem, emotion, viewpoint,
    whatever) that triggers the change in eating habits or lifestyle, the
    reason for the change is physiological and not mysterious. In
    describing this man's theories, you seem to be saying that there is
    some *direct* unconscious link between the psyche and the physiology,
    that a person can gain weight simply by a change in the psychological
    state, rather than by altered behavior that *results from* a change in
    that state.
    
    Kit

    I agree, Kit.         - Wil

re: .16
    
>    some *direct* unconscious link between the psyche and the physiology,
>    that a person can gain weight simply by a change in the psychological
>    state, rather than by altered behavior that *results from* a change in
>    that state.
    
    
    I think this is possible, actually.  I found myself losing weight once
    I was comfortable doing so only AFTER my mindset changed.  I had for a
    year or two been changing eating habits and working out, but it took
    the change in my psychological state to prepare my body (to give the
    green light) to weight loss.  Perhaps I was unconsciously eating a
    little less, or working out a little more, but it didn't feel that way
    to me.
    
    The mind is amazing and complex.
    
    -Jody
    
    

    
    
 >  you seem to be saying that there is
 >   some *direct* unconscious link between the psyche and the physiology,
 >   that a person can gain weight simply by a change in the psychological
 >   state, rather than by altered behavior that *results from* a change in
 >   that state.                    
    
     I too agree that this may be possible, going on what I've read.
    
    The effects that our minds (our self-talk, visualisation, conscious
    or unconscious) has *directly* on our real, physical body is
    only just beginning to be understood. I found the idea of thought
    influencing the physical world an alien idea at first as I was used to 
    thinking of my physical body as a "real" thing - measurable, touchable, 
    quantifiable - and thoughts as being somehow "unreal" - that is, not 
    having concrete effect because they couldn't be weighed and measured.
    
    It has been reported that people can lose weight by visualising
    switching their metabolismup to Turbo Rate. This produced physically
    measurable effects which showed that their basic tick-over level
    had gone up....
    
    I also take your point that these things can work indirectly.
    For example, if you visualise yourself looking wonderful and you
    affirm to yourself that you will only be attracted to foods that
    will move you towards that image then you will probably find yourself
    eating stuff that has less calories and that, too, will obviously
    speed you towards your goal.
    But there is a direct mental effect too. IMO.
    
    Btw, I have struggled for years with my weight. The reason was
    largely that, as I shed layers, I'd come up against the reasons why
    I'd put them on in the first place. That extra padding was serving
    me in a very real way, and as I never worked those issues I just
    used to put the weight back on - sabotage my own exercise programmes,
    binge, somehow get back to a more "comfortable" place.
    
    Only now have I stopped fighting myself about food, and I'm learning
    to love my body and appreciate the way it's coped and adapted to help and
    protect me from my personal pain.
    
    'gail