The Mind Body Control.

This time I have no choice. My body has taken control.

What do you see as the stronger identity: the mind or the body? The mind is the thinking vessel, the storyteller and predictor. The body is the sensing being, feeling its way through softness and strength. But which one will be destroyed first? Both.

Yes, the mind will fail. Yes, the body will fail. Both are equally tragic. When one goes, the other often follows in quick succession because we are mind and body. We are one.

We spend a considerable amount of time training the body. From gym junkies and muscle Marys to stretchy yogis and happy runners, the narrative that movement is an elixir for life has never been louder than it is today. High-end fashion stores have been replaced by activewear retailers. We shop in lycra instead of jeans and no longer dress up for air travel but more like we’re heading to a workout.

The freedom of activewear gives the body a sense of movement and possibility, even if we’re simply wearing it while strolling down the street. If we can trick the mind into the look, then surely, we’re halfway there. Wear fit, think fit, therefore I am fit. Maybe.

But despite the action of movement and the pursuit of strength, the body will eventually let you know who’s in charge. You can push it too far, overtrain, overwork, overstretch. Or worse, your body may begin turning on itself from the inside, presenting imbalance through illness, virus or disease, just when you thought you had control. We don’t.

The mind, on the other hand, is far more complicated. We can train it through learning and observation, yet it often carries its own narrative, one that can bring us to our knees while the body remains strong. Even when we think we are not thinking, the mind is working overtime behind the scenes, creating stories and scenarios that can either lift us up or pull us down.

And then the mind can turn on itself. Imbalances in the brain’s circuitry can lead to confusion, and with that, the body often follows. This is perhaps the cruellest part of the mind’s influence over the body.

At all times, signals are travelling up and down the body. From head to toe and toe to head, it is a freeway operating twenty-four hours a day. Sometimes something disrupts the flow. There is congestion, hurdles and eruptions of chaos determined to interrupt our state of being. We are human beings first and human doings second, but when our ability to do is compromised, the body has taken control.

And perhaps that is the real lesson. The mind and body are not competing identities but connected partners, each shaping and influencing the other. When one speaks, the other listens. When one suffers, the other responds. So, the question is not which is stronger, but how closely are we paying attention to the conversation between them.