Since the beginning of the lockdown (or Circuit Breaker as they call it in Singapore), I’ve been closely watching the more unquantifiable vectors arising out of the pandemic, particularly the psychological effects of isolation and social distancing on mental health, and how these measures to protect our mortality relates back to our physiology and our body when we are deprived of the most basic human need to socially engage – to see, touch, feel, laugh, share a meal, make eye contact, with other human beings. And there’s also the other polarity of those who are locked into one space with the same bodies day in and day out. While most family homes are safe spaces, some are cages of abuse.
We can’t look at the mind without also looking at the body as an integral piece. Most of our interactions outside of our immediate bubble are now screen-based and one-dimensional, our escape from reality is more screen time on social media, over Zoom drinks and Netflix binge. Our bodies relegated to being moving parts so as to carry our brain around. Some might even argue the body is the vulnerable conduit for transmission if we were to come too close to another.
The article I’ve appended is a valuable long read from the perspective of a psychologist in the UK. She examines the individual body, the corporate body, and the state body. If you’re interested in bodies as an inseparable part of our mind’s deepest reaches, perhaps you might dwell in her words and draw your own parallels.
Read here:
This post was originally posted on Yogawithdaphne.com on May 12th 2020
