July 18, 2026
So we have propositional knowing (facts, beliefs, ideas) and non-propositional knowing (skills, perspectives, relationships), all of which happens in and through the body.
And we have propositional tyranny, a world wherein propositional knowing is held highest and non-propositional ways of knowing are devalued and forgotten.
In response to this propositional tyranny, there can be a reactionary move in the psyche to ‘get out of the head’ and ‘get back in the body’.
Interestingly, the notion that this is a possible move at all is a function of the trauma of propositional tyranny. The head, both physically and metaphorically, is an aspect of the body.
The head is in the body.
The head is in the body.
The head is in the body.
In the effort to ‘get out of the head’ and ‘get back in the body’, we further entrench the disconnected, Cartesian-split paradigm we’re looking to move away from.1
The reason we have so many issues with a head and a neck is that we think of them as a head a neck - Arlyn Zones
The more we treat the head, both physically and metaphorically, as though it is separate from the whole Instrument of Knowing (the body), the more we invite self-deception and dysfunction.
While the propositional layer might be considered the most superficial layer of knowing, there is potency here.
Propositions, like spells of the human psyche, shape (world)views. View shapes the possibility space for action and how I participate in the world.
How we conceive of a thing has everything to do with how we behave in relation to that thing. - Gil Hedley
Propositions reflect and allow us to reflect on views. In articulating a view, I begin to bring it into relationship.
A perspective that cannot be reflected on remains trapped inside itself. As Carl Jung described, until you make the unconscious conscious, it will control you and you will call it fate.
It’s important to note that there is always a view. As an agent in an arena, there is always a frame through which I am seeing the world - this frame is not simply a collection of beliefs, it is the embodied frame through which I filter and perceive, it is a generative, lived model through which my world arises.
So what is the third way? What is right relationship between the propositional and the non-propositional?
To start:
Recognize (conceptually and in practice) that these ways of knowing are not dichotomous, they are inextricably related.
Investigate these relationships.
Reorder priority - rather than holding propositional knowing highest, flip the pyramid and orient to the participatory as highest, and use the propositional in service of the non-propositional.
This all threads back into the why of this project.
How we conceive of a thing has everything to do with how we behave in relation to that thing.
—
The aim is
to situate contact improv in an understanding of human cognition and a moment in time
in order to properly orient to and harness the potency of the practice
such that whatever is learned within
may translate broadly and deeply
throughout life
—
In articulating a view, I begin to bring it into relationship. And as the inhabited view develops, participation in and relationship to the dance shifts.
This is the description of one view, and I by no means intend to position it as complete, comprehensive, or supreme. A great thing about views is that you don’t have to be attached to them. I hope and imagine this view will evolve as the propositional and the non-propositional continue in dialogue together.
Of course, it can be useful to make distinctions between the mode of knowing made up of things like verbal language, analyzing, comparing, and reflecting (what is commonly thought of as the metaphorical ‘head’) and other modes of knowing. There is a world of difference between making these distinctions and the attempt to disconnect from the head.
I enjoy reading your writing immensely. I was at contact today so this resonates especially.
As both a Feldenkrais practitioner and a Jungian Analyst, I love hearing you combine the two! (A definite “no no” during my own Feldy training…”). It’s often overlooked that Feldenkrais begins Body and Mature Behavior w “this is my answer to Freud…”. One would have to have actually read Freud (and I highly recommend you do!) to actually have a sense of what he means by that…. There’s LOTS to say about this, body, instinct, functionality, movement, mind, cognition, the Unconscious(!)…. Jung posits what he calls “the somatic unconscious” in his many discussions regarding the “subtle body”…. I written about it these elsewhere. Cheers all.
www.kyleleewilliams.com