What do mind-body therapies share?
Mehling and colleagues treat body awareness as a phenomenological, modifiable take on proprioception and interoception — the common ground of yoga, Feldenkrais, mindfulness and related practices.
Source
Body Awareness: a phenomenological inquiry into the common ground of mind-body therapies
Study at a glance
- Design
- Qualitative / archival — Phenomenological review plus interviews with leading mind–body practitioners on body awareness
- N
- Practitioner interviews and literature synthesis; exact interview N not primary in stored text
- Population
- Mind–body therapy traditions (yoga, Feldenkrais, mindfulness) and practitioner accounts
- Outcome
- Shared phenomenological understanding of body awareness as modifiable embodied self-awareness
Structured fields used in claim comparison tables when every cited study has a complete layer.
What they did
They review mind-body approaches that claim to enhance body awareness, distinguish the lived body from the objective body, and interview leading practitioners about a shared understanding of the term.
What they found
Body awareness is an inseparable aspect of embodied self-awareness in action. On the lived body it is often taken for granted or ‘absent’. Practitioners treat it as a key mechanism of benefit, modifiable by attention.
The limits
What it doesn't show
This is conceptual phenomenology plus practitioner testimony, not an RCT of yoga. It does not prove that enhancing awareness causes the clinical benefits.
Key terms
- Body awareness
- The phenomenological side of proprioception and interoception that can enter consciousness and be trained.
- Lived body
- The taken-for-granted body of unself-conscious action, often described as ‘absent’ until it breaks down.
- Objective body
- The body attended to as an object, as in examination or some therapeutic drills.
- Mind-body therapy
- Yoga, Tai Chi, Feldenkrais, Alexander, mindfulness, breath work, and related practices that claim to enhance awareness.
Flashcards
Research intelligence for this paper
See its role on concept claims, tensions it is part of, placement history, and related discoveries.
Quiz yourself
Common ground of these therapies?
Common questions
Is awareness the only goal of these therapies?
Not always the main objective, but it is often described as a key mechanism of benefit.
What is the common ground?
An embodied, enactive take on body awareness shared across practitioner traditions.
Lived vs objective body?
Lived body is taken for granted; objective body is noticed as an object.
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