The experience of every human being is made up of
different "dimensions" of awareness.
Each dimension is a medium by which the human experiences the
world. The dimension of our senses give
us input from the physical realm - we look at the colors of a sunset, hear
emergency sirens in the distance, feel a cramp when we exercise right after
eating. The dimension of thinking helps
interpret, categorize, and symbolize what we are experiencing. Thinking helps us clarify the meaning of
things in relation to ourselves, to our experience. "If I don't do this paper tonight, it'll
be a pain to do tomorrow", "This job pays more, but I would enjoy working
for that agency", "We need to figure out a business plan, I
propose...". The emotional
dimension tells us what value something has in relation to us. When we don't care about the outcome of a
situation, it is obvious that the outcome doesn't hold much importance for us. But when we do care, when we are angered at
one result and pleased by another, obviously the outcome of this situation held
importance. A proper balance of
development and attention to all these dimensions is needed to best understand
our experience; they all provide valid, essential information that can help us
guide our lives. I do believe we have
more dimensions, but mentioning these will do for now.
In our culture there is an emphasis on the value of the
thinking dimension. Our social structure
requires us to develop this part of our being both to make enough money to live
comfortably and to be respected. Those
of us who by nature spend a lot of time paying attention to this dimension end
up over-developing our rational side while ignoring our other sides. Those who are more right-brain, more
emotional and intuitive, doubt the validity of the part of their being they
find most natural to live in and express.
They limit how much they develop the part in which the majority of their
potential lies. And those in the middle
eventually become more rational as they are encouraged to live more and more in
this part of themselves. In general, the
left-brain rational side grows more and more, while the other dimensions of our
awareness are ignored and their capabilities atrophy.
Now, the right-brain emotional side is the part that
connects us to our organism. The
dimension by which we feel helps us get in touch with our emotional and
physical sensations. The better we are
able to feel the more of an awareness we have of the physical part of
ourselves. If we balance the time we
spend between our rational selves and our emotional selves we can know what our
organism needs, and then use our rational parts to help get what it needs.
However, because so many people over-develop the rational
part and leave the emotional part undeveloped, they have the capability to
fulfill their needs but are without a clue of what those needs are! We know how to make moves in our lives but
are not connected to the source that tells us what moves to make. Our biology intends for us, for our
moment-to-moment conscious experience, to be more connected to the physical
organism. But because we spend so much
time in the thinking realm we do not take time to pay attention to our
physicality. We do not spend time
developing a connection to our bodies.
This lack of connection to the physical body causes us to
ignore important signs. We do not
realize when our body is telling us we are working too hard, not getting enough
sleep, not eating well or exercising enough.
We prioritize fulfilling obligations set by society over caring for our
organism. We skip breakfast but still
get coffee to keep up with our work, we spend hours in front of a computer with
poor posture and little movement, we ignore signs that we are getting
sick. All of these smaller factors add
up to make for poor physical health.
Poor physical health causes stress and poorer emotional health. And without physical and emotional health we
have no kind of foundation for our mental and spiritual health.
I would argue that this lack of connection goes a step
further. Our body and its senses are our
closest link with the physical, natural world outside. We experience the natural world through our
body. Given this, not developing
attention to our physical and emotional being severs our connection to the
natural world. This cuts off a vital
source of emotional and spiritual rejuvenation.
The human being evolved in nature - nature has been the greater context,
the greater medium, in which we came to be what we are. Humans evolved paying attention to nature -
in fact, for the overwhelming majority of the time humans have been on earth
they had nothing to pay attention to except nature! If we are cut off from the part of our being
which pays attention to, which appreciates nature, then we cannot make contact
with that which has guided our evolution for our entire history. I believe that this severely stunts our
progress in whatever kind of evolution nature is trying to guide us toward
next.
In this I find the importance of ecopsychology. I think if we can figure out how to
re-connect our psychology to our biology, and from there consciously better our
biology's ability to "tune in" to the natural world, we can find
steps to take in our lives that will help us evolve personally and
collectively. I have no doubt nature is
trying to give us signals as to how humans need to start living if they are to
avoid extinguishing themselves. It's
time to start listening to those signals and to start living in accordance with
them.
