Body-House
Photos and words by Leonie Sinden-David
Stepping between granite rocks and mussel shells that lace the waving line of the land, my feet find solace in the give of wet sand. The stream that runs past my front door and into the sea meets me here, between the stones. The familiar slosh of waves reminds me of my stomach room. The whipping of air that catches me between sinking sand is not unlike the gasp of my throat room. What if I were to think of my body in this way as if it were a house, filled with rooms. Perhaps our understanding of place and our sense of at-home-ness can be jostled by our spending time in these rooms. Looking out through the windows of ‘I’, our body house becomes a specialised tool for listening and learning about the spaces we inhabit and how we intend to inhabit them.
Positioning the concept of a house within the body-space allows for our emotional landscape to become more tangible. This sequence of rooms and corridors, connecting different spaces of feeling, grants us the opportunity to formulate a complete picture of how we relate to our internal world. In turn, this creates a new relationship with the space we inhabit and suggests how we can move through it with intention. Coming to know the body house can be equated with an ecology-centred body-mindfulness.
Our experience within the ‘four walls’ of our body-house, sketches the patterns with which we intend to approach the wider geometries of space. In perceiving how the micro and macro are always intrinsically mirrored and interrelated, it could be suggested that a considered and sustainable approach to our body-house will have a positive effect on our outward environment.
Stepping inside, we hand ourselves the building blocks and begin to construct this internal house. We are building fabric of journeying narrative that weaves together to create sensical space. This space, however, is constantly shifting and changing. In ‘For Space’, Dorreen Masey describes space as “Always in the process of being made. It is never finished; never closed” (Massey, 2005: 9). In performing this ritual of walking our internal rooms and corridors, we start to conceive of a story that can be told over and over again, each time slightly changed. It’s in the body house that we can understand the tensions of space. To crawl inside the stomach room and tease apart the rope that has become tangled there, and to perhaps sit a while and listen, allows us to become far more careful with how we tend to our body-home.
My body, however, does not sit alone, but rather within the wider parameters of space. The body house then has a responsibility to its habitat and fellow inhabitants. The space around us also holds a form of tension, much like a delicately woven tapestry. For this tapestry to be woven into the finest landscape, we have to hold the threads just so, careful not to drop them or pull too harshly. This is a journey of reciprocity between my body-house, your body-house and the space we call home. We understand the worth of this journey, and in doing so, both the intimate world of ‘I’ and the social of ‘we’, find their balance. The houses then become a village, each understanding its place as part of the whole.
As my feet meet the sandy floor and the sea air whips through the rooms of my lungs, the journey seems so familiar to me. The rooms that make up this body-house, have come to know the geometries of the space in which they perambulate so well, that the borders between ‘I’ and the space around me have become blurred. Perhaps if we walk through the body-house connecting these internal rooms with a conscious effort to be thoughtful, then how we explore the outside space can become more intentional.
This ecology-centred body mindfulness, allows the body to become more acutely attuned with its surroundings which in turn imparts a sense of local intimacy. The position of the body within space acts “As an agent from the outside that transforms the material within, that brings nutrients to the digestion of our personal, individual experience.” (Bottoms & Goulish, 2007: 215). Our experiences within our body house then, actively influence how we make relationships with space. In positioning the notion of a house within the body space, we provide an entry point to walk into the body and anchor mindfulness through imagination. I, our body and the environment can be attuned for our whole well being and the well being of the whole space.
