thus also have its own particular blindness. But there is a slow and increasing understanding that the brain and body ‘proper’ are a functioning whole. In another article (Young, 2006), based on a talk at several conferences about Body-Psychotherapy, I use the illustration of the cockpit of an aeroplane. The cockpit does not fly the plane: it is the power of the engines and the shape of the wings that do this. But the plane could not fly without a functioning set of controls (and a pilot) in the cockpit. It is however the passengers in the body of the plane that experience the flight and give it a raison d’être for its existence. Anthropology: From an anthropological perspective, about 5 million years ago, we separated from the other primates, leaving them – for the large part – in the receding forests as the Pliocene drought tightened its 2 million-year grip on the planet. As a species, we went somewhere where we were safe from predators; where we lost most of our body hair; where we developed subcutaneous fat; where we had an excess of salt that needed to be got rid of through perspiration and tears; where there was a sufficient supply of special proteins and fats to develop our brain size by a phenomenal three-fold factor; and where there was a need to develop specialised forms of verbal communication. We almost certainly did all of these things up to our necks in warm shallow seas, probably in part of what is now Ethiopia: we became aquatic apes. (Morgan, 1990) From this gene pool, various generations of hominids emerged over the subsequent aeons into the African arena via the Great Rift Valley. These were: various forms of Australopithecus, then Homo habilis, Homo erectus, Homo ergaster, Homo heidelbergensis, Homo neanderthalensis, and so forth until eventually Homo sapiens emerged. (Young, 2005b) This evolutionary process had a huge impact on our embodiment. It is not just the different psychological developments like the fact that the larger brain requires a much longer, and thus a much more significant, parental relationship: there were various, very significant, sociological developments. Our relative physical vulnerability, and lack of physical armour or intrinsic forms of defence or attack (horns, hooves, claws, spines or stings) requires an increased reliance on our immediate social group. Our capacity for language and abstract thought enabled our society to develop a complexity unique amongst animal species. Our manual dexterity allows us to develop necessary tools and weapons, shelters, clothes, and means of food storage so that we become less dependent on, and also more separated from, our environment. Our enlarged cortical brains allow us to overcome or suffer temporary imbalances of our Autonomic Nervous Systems and so we can abuse this basic mammalian emergency response mechanism in ways that we now call ‘work’; and when we are ‘forced’ to sustain this abuse, we call it stress. Our ability to adapt ourselves to various different and extreme situations has allowed us to colonise the whole planet in an everincreasing swarm: some might see this as a plague. As we moved out of Africa and spread out across the planet, we separated and differentiated further. We developed different cultures and sub-species (races). In time, these later cultural differences were also ‘embodied’. In groups, I sometimes do a guided meditation that includes this evolutionary development and as a way of re-connecting with much earlier forms of development: basic forms that we carry in our embryological and genetic development. Cultural Images: From a cultural perspective, we view our bodies and other people’s bodies from the perspective of what we see as a ‘good’ shape; what is ‘attractive’; what markings or adornments are used; what skills are important; what clothes are worn; how the person holds and presents themselves; and what messages these send us about that person’s body. We also get a whole series of cultural messages from the way we use our bodies to communicate (body language), and the ways we make contact, which also differs from culture to culture. A Samoan lady is admired (as was the pre-historic concept of the female deity) for her size, for her female power, and for her fecundity. The Pre-Raphaelites changed the image of the desired female form from the previous Victorian rigid porcelain pantheon (a reaction to the earlier buxom Rubenesque nudes) to an elegant, effete femininity. Part of the influence of modern feminism gives our girl children the possibility to be active and powerful, like Pocahontas or Laura Croft. The ‘Goth’ look (viz: The Rocky Horror Show) became a cult icon for teenagers a few years ago and the traditional Hollywood female icon changes over the years from the days of back-and-white silent movies, through the voluptuousness of the 40s, contrasted with the prim 1950s social acceptability of Doris Day and Lucille Ball, energy & character vol.37 may 2009 39
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