embodied-self

The experience of oneself as biologically alive, real, and continuous through the body, with direct participation in the world.

1 chapter across 1 book

The Divided Self (1960)R. D. Laing

CHAPTER IV The embodied and unembodied self Thus far I have tried to characterize some of the anxieties that are aspects of a basic ontological insecurity. These anxieties arise in this particular existential setting and are a function of this setting. When a person is secure in his own being, they do not arise with anything like the same force or persistence, since there is no occasion for them to arise and persist in this way. In the absence of such basic security, life must, nevertheless, go on. The question that one must now attempt to answer is what form of relation with himself is developed by the ontologically insecure person. I shall try to show how some such persons do not seem to have a sense of that basic unity which can abide through the most intense conflicts with oneself, but seem rather to have come to experience themselves as primarily split into a mind and a body. Usually they feel most closely identified with the ‘mind’. It is with certain of the consequences of this basic way in which one’s own being can become organized within itself that the remainder of this book will be principally concerned. This split will be seen as an attempt to deal with the basic underlying insecurity. In some cases it may be a means of effectively living with it or even an attempt to transcend it; but it is also liable to perpetuate the anxieties it is in some measure a defence against and it may provide the starting position for a line of development 67

This chapter explores the ontological insecurity underlying certain anxieties and how some individuals experience a fundamental split between the embodied self and the unembodied self. The embodied self is characterized by a direct, substantial connection with one's body and its vulnerabilities, while the unembodied self is detached from the body, observing and controlling it from a distance. The chapter introduces the idea that this split can be a defense against insecurity but may also perpetuate anxiety and potentially lead to psychosis, illustrated through a case example.