What if it’s both ? - Thoughts on Somatic Practices

The Illusion of Optimization and the Product-Performance Trap

I browse cognitive behavioral therapy apps on the App Store and am dismayed to realize once again that I am a product, that we have all become the wallet-products of a performance and optimization economy that seeks to engineer every aspect of existence for seamlessness.

This state of affairs aligns with what Byung-Chul Han described in 2015 as The Burnout Society1, an era where individuals are compelled to self-exploit under the guise of autonomy and personal optimization. In this logic, even psychological care becomes a market structured around efficiency, where emotions and attention disorders are treated as bugs to fix rather than signals of a systemic reality.

A World Without Truth, Dominated by Hyper-Optimization

It makes me smile to recall how I was a few years ago: too insecure to voice anything non-consensual, yet more rigid in my values and certainties. Today, my artistic blur full of compromises seems more pragmatic, but it still sometimes prevents me from taking action.

Jean Baudrillard wrote in 1981's Simulacra and Simulation2 that we have entered an era where truth is no longer a criterion of value, replaced by simulacra and hyper-realities. The post-liberal era is one where hyper-optimization is an omnipresent reflex, and no coherent discourse underpins collective reality. Naomi Klein, in The Shock Doctrine (2007)3, explains that disaster capitalism operates by maintaining a state of shock and precarity, making profound questioning difficult. And yet, it is still possible to slow down the Titanic.

Consciousness as the Starting Point of Personal Power

My adventures have shaped me, my trials have made me grow, and something within me knows it's time to speak, to act, to embody a living example, and to propagate the states of being I wish to see in others.

I chose to start from the immediate experience of consciousness because, in my view, that's where a person's power begins. Francisco Varela, in The Embodied Mind (1991)4, demonstrated that our consciousness is always situated in a body and in relation to the world. From that place, it becomes possible to identify biases, inconsistencies, and inner struggles—in short, everything that makes us act in the world, consciously or unconsciously.

Congruence as a Key to Transformation

By becoming aware of these dynamics, we can transform our patterns and embody what we truly wish to be. Carl Rogers, in On Becoming a Person (1961)5, spoke of congruence to describe this state of alignment between values, feelings, emotions, thoughts, words, and actions. For him, this alignment is the key to a fully realized life.

A congruent person is the most powerful there is because they don't waste energy on internal contradictions. Brené Brown, in The Gifts of Imperfection (2010)[^6], showed that congruence is inseparable from vulnerability and authenticity. An aligned person finds it easier to love themselves, and in return, they love others and the world more sincerely.

Non-Congruence as a Driver of Destruction

In my eyes, everything that "goes wrong" in the world comes from the actions of non-congruent people. Boris Cyrulnik, in The Whispering of Ghosts (2003)[^7], studied how traumas are transmitted from generation to generation without being acknowledged. We are like a ball of tension that densifies over time. No known biological system thrives under such constraint.

Non-congruence pushes human consciousness toward infinite consumption of immediate pleasures, which becomes the fuel of the system that destroys us. Gabor Maté, in In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts (2008)[^8], showed that addiction is often a response to a lack of inner alignment rather than a moral failing.

Conversely, congruent people consume fewer resources, time, and vital energy from others. They are autonomous, resilient, and become providers of resources and love.

The Illusion of Universalization and the Power of "This AND That"

Another thing that strikes me, particularly in the French materialist rationalist culture I come from, is the spontaneous urge for universalization. Edgar Morin, in On Complexity (2008)[^9], explains that the world's complexity cannot be understood through binary logic but requires systemic and interdependent thinking.

Instead of asking What is true? This or that?, I prefer to ask What if both were true? What would that reveal about the situation? Gregory Bateson, in Steps to an Ecology of Mind (1972)[^10], already saw this approach as essential to understanding living systems. Try it; you'll see: it often gives much more meaning to things.

References

1. Han, Byung-Chul. The Burnout Society. Stanford University Press, 2015. Publisher's link ↩

2. Baudrillard, Jean. Simulacra and Simulation. University of Michigan Press, 1994. Publisher's link ↩

3. Klein, Naomi. The Shock Doctrine. Metropolitan Books, 2007. Publisher's link ↩

4. Varela, Francisco J., Evan Thompson, and Eleanor Rosch. The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience. MIT Press, 1991. Publisher's link ↩

5. Rogers, Carl. On Becoming a Person: A Therapist's View of Psychotherapy. Houghton Mifflin, 1961. ↩

6. Brown, Brené, The Gifts of Imperfection, Hazelden, 2010, Goodread's link

7. Cyrulnik, Boris, The Whispering of Ghosts, Other Press, 2003, Read here

8. Maté, Gabor, In The Realm of Hungry Ghosts, Vermilion, 2018, Author's website

9. Morin, Edgar, On Complexity, Hampton Press, 2003, Publisher's link

10. Bateson, Gregory, Steps to an Ecology of Mind, Ballantine's Books, 1976, Read here