Body Territory – The Consciousness of Lived Space
Body Territory – The Consciousness of Lived Space
First-Person Consciousness
A Good Dream in the Well-Being of Now
Before it existed as an idea, the body existed as landscape.
Mountains, rivers, forests, and winds were the first teachers of anatomy.
The body learns from the territory, and the territory learns from the body.
In Amerindian cosmologies, there is no boundary between them —
only living reciprocity.
Body Territory is not a metaphor; it is an ontology.
Being does not inhabit space — it is the space that inhabits itself.
The skin is a permeable border where inside and outside recognize each other.
Breath, touch, and gaze are sensory translations of the territory pulsing within us.
Each step is a negotiation between body and ground;
each gesture, a re-organization of the world.
The Neuroscience of a Place that Feels
Modern neuroscience is rediscovering, in its own language, what Indigenous wisdom has long known:
consciousness arises from the relationship between the body and the space that surrounds it.
Research on the hippocampus and place cells shows that the brain builds bodily maps of the environment —
not as static images, but as movements of belonging (O’Keefe & Dostrovsky, 2020; Moser et al., 2021).
These maps do more than locate us; they allow us to feel ourselves in the world.
With every movement, the brain integrates proprioceptive, interoceptive, and sensory signals,
continuously reconstructing a living topography of existence (Craig, 2023; Northoff, 2022).
Thus, place is not merely geographic — it is neural and affective.
It is how the body recognizes itself in relation to the environment that sustains it.
“We do not think the territory — we metabolize it.”
Belonging and Reciprocity
Biologically, belonging emerges from Human Quorum Sensing:
the organism’s ability to perceive the signals of others — chemical, bodily, emotional —
and adjust to them in search of collective balance.
This process is molecular, but also social and spiritual.
It reflects the universal principle that nothing lives alone.
Body Territory is the sensitive expression of this principle.
Each cell reads its environment; each organ responds to local conditions;
and the sum of these responses produces consciousness.
The body is, therefore, a real-time translation of the environment in which it lives.
In Indigenous spirituality, this continuous reading is dialogue with the sacred:
listening to the forest, sensing the humidity, respecting the wind —
all of this is consciousness in motion, embodied intelligence at work.
The Damasian Mind and the Ecology of Feeling
Antonio Damasio describes consciousness as the meeting of interoception and proprioception —
of inner feeling and bodily movement in space.
When this relation expands,
a mind appears that exceeds the skull’s frontier:
a territorial mind, including the environment within its perceptual circuit.
From a decolonial perspective, Body Territory replaces the isolated subject of Western thought.
It proposes a relational consciousness in which the “I” is nothing but a flow of relations.
Every emotion is a tide; every thought, a landscape the body crosses.
During sleep, this perception reorganizes itself:
the brain’s networks resume slow connectivity patterns mirroring nature itself —
electrical waves like ocean tides, cerebrospinal fluid pulsations cleansing the inner territory (Fultz et al., 2019; Berntson, 2023).
To dream is to reorder the bodily territory, to remember where we belong.
Politics of the Body and Ethics of the Environment
Body Territory is not only biology — it is also politics.
In Indigenous worldviews, to offend the land is to offend the body.
To pollute the river is to poison the blood; to burn the forest is to inflame the lungs.
This direct correspondence between ecology and physiology
reveals an ethics of existence grounded in metabolic reciprocity.
The human body is a temporary fragment of the Earth
that organizes itself to breathe, think, and love for a brief moment.
To respect the territory is to preserve consciousness.
And to understand consciousness is to rediscover the planet’s body that dreams us.
Final Synthesis
Body Territory is the space where consciousness takes form.
It is the dialogue between skin and forest,
between breath and wind,
between presence and landscape.
There is no “I” outside the world,
nor world outside the body.
We are territory pulsing,
and the territory is the body dreaming itself alive.
Post-2020 References (no links)
Neuroscience and Spatial Consciousness
O’Keefe, J., & Dostrovsky, J. (2020). Place Cells and the Cognitive Map Revisited.
Moser, E. I., & Moser, M.-B. (2021). Spatial Representation and the Dynamics of Memory. Nature Neuroscience.
Craig, A. D. (2023). Homeostatic Emotion and the Neural Basis of Feeling.
Northoff, G. (2022). Mind, Brain, and the Spatiotemporal Continuum of Consciousness.
Berntson, G. G. (2023). Autonomic Rhythms and Embodied Awareness.
Complexity, Body, and Territory
Damasio, A. (2021). Feeling and Knowing.
Maturana, H., & Varela, F. (2021). Autopoiesis and Cognition – New Edition.
Friston, K. (2022). Active Inference and the Ecology of Mind.
Pereira Jr., A. (2023). Consciousness, Information, and the Triple Nature of Reality.
Kopenawa, D., & Albert, B. (2022). The Falling Sky.
Viveiros de Castro, E. (2023). Cannibal Metaphysics (Updated Edition).
Fausto, C. (2020). Feasting on People: Eating and Personhood in Amazonia.
Buen Sueño en el Bienestar del Ahora
A Good Dream in the Well-Being of Now
Sonho Bom no Bem-Estar do Agora
El Renacimiento del Pertenecer Natural – Joinville, los Umbu, los Sambaquíes y la Prosperidad Bribri
The Rebirth of Natural Belonging – Joinville, the Umbu People, the Sambaquis, and Bribri Prosperity
O Renascimento do Pertencimento Natural – Joinville, Umbus, Sambaquis e a Prosperidade Bribri
Movimiento de las Aguas Interiores y Sincronía Circadiana del Ser
Movement of the Inner Waters and Circadian Synchrony of Being
Movimento das Águas Interiores e Sincronia Circadiana do Ser
Cuerpo Territorio – La Conciencia del Espacio Vivido
Body Territory – The Consciousness of Lived Space
Corpo Território – A Consciência do Espaço Vivido
Movimiento de las Aguas – El ciclo vital dentro y fuera del ser
Movement of the Waters – The Vital Cycle Inside and Outside the Being
Movimento das Águas – O Ciclo Vital Dentro e Fora do Ser
Apus – La Propiocepción Extendida del Ser
Apus – The Extended Proprioception of Being
Apus – A Propriocepção Estendida do Ser
Yãy hã mĩy Extendido – El cuerpo que imitando se trasciende
Yãy hã mĩy Extended – The Body That Imitating, Transcends Itself
Yãy hã mĩy Extendido – O Corpo que Imitando se Transcende
Taá Extendido – El Sueño que Conecta Todas las Cosas
Extended Taá – The Dream that Connects All Things
Taá Estendido – O Sonho que Liga Todas as Coisas
Weicho - El Ser sin Diferencias
Weicho - Being Without Differences
Pei Utupe - El Alma como Información Comprometida
Pei Utupe - The Soul as Engaged Information
Pei Utupe - A Alma como Informação Engajada
Yãy hã mĩy - Imitarse Ser para Trascenderse Ser
Yãy hã mĩy - To Imitate Being to Transcend Being
Yãy hã mĩy - Imitar-se Ser para Transcender-se Ser
El Soñar de la Información - El Taá
The Dreaming of Information - The Taá
O Sonhar da Informação - O Taá
Sentir e Se Referenciar - Diferenças Fundamentais entre Parkinson e Alzheimer
Deputado Federal Joinville
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