what is underneath it all?

As usual, I have no idea what I’m about to write. I do know, though, that the subject of nakedness stirs up some energy in me. And it feels like a frustration, as though we human beings have messed up when it comes to nakedness. I look at all the other animals in their naked state and wonder why I feel constrained, almost all the time, to cover up my body. Of course I am happy to have the possibility to cover my body in order to keep it warm and dry. But what I want to explore is why I feel obliged, most of the time, to be clothed even when I would be quite warm enough naked.

The first thought that comes to mind is that I wear clothes because everybody else does. And that can be quite a powerful motivation. To behave differently is to step outside the herd and then my sense of who I am can no longer be based on the feeling of being a member of the group. But personally, such considerations do not usually bother me too much. In many other, less obvious, matters I feel free to live in atypical ways.

There is a key in the phrase “less obvious”. To be naked, when other people are wearing clothes, is to attract attention and that is something I am generally uncomfortable with. I am much happier being almost invisible in group situations, observing others without being the focus of attention. Yes, that is certainly a big factor for me and something I need to explore in its own right another day. For now, I would merely observe that it is a group phenomenon: one-to-one interactions do not affect me in the same way.

Another reason that I feel obliged to wear clothes in public places is that I would almost certainly be arrested if I were naked, which would be a hassle. It’s a bit odd that I would get arrested because as far as I can tell, there is no law against it here in the UK. There is something called “indecent exposure” which is to do with acts of a sexual nature. But the law which is usually used to arrest naked people is “breach of the peace” which was originally intended for noisy or violent behaviour. On this subject, there is a man (Stephen Gough) known as the Naked Rambler who often gets arrested hereabouts because he believes that we should be allowed to appear in our natural state. 

There is no doubt that some people are disturbed by the sight of a naked person. But why? If there are any children around then this is usually cited as the reason, i.e. the children must be protected from this sight. That is clearly just a projection though. Children never have any problem with nudity until they have been taught that it is wrong. It seems to me that when someone is offended by the sight of a naked body, it is through an association with sexuality. In other words, “nudity is to do with sex” and “sex must only happen in private”, or worse, “sex is wrong”. 

The taboo around sex is a huge topic in itself with massive amounts of cultural, especially religious, conditioning. There isn’t space to go into the subject in detail here but I would say that just to blame cultural conditioning is another form of victim consciousness. Why do we allow ourselves to be conditioned? How did the conditioning come into existence in the first place?

Underneath it all, I suspect that there is a fear of our own sexual energy. To be more precise, I suspect that there is a fear of the loss of self-control which is threatened, or even demanded, by our sexuality. To be even more precise, there is a fear of the loss of the illusion of control.

Regarding the association between nudity and sex, my guess is that this is merely a reflection of the fact that most people only see someone naked, face-to-face, when it is a sexual partner. This association quickly fades away if we experience more non-sexual nude situations, for example on nudist beaches.

There is another aspect to the feeling that “nudity is to do with sex” and “sex must only happen in private”, which is to do with specialness. We like some things to feel special. Privacy, with its feeling of secrecy and intimacy helps to produce this feeling of specialness. And having something which is reserved for a particular relationship or activity also adds to the sense of specialness. Hence by reserving nudity for sexual relationship, we add to the feeling that the relationship is special.

In case you are wondering what all this has to do with reiki, I think I have stumbled upon a tenuous link. The sense of specialness which we like in intimate relationship is very closely related to the sense of sacredness. And sacredness, for me at least, permeates reiki, the symbols and the initiations. And I regard that feeling of sacredness as a good feeling, a wholesome feeling.

So now, after this aimless wander through my feelings and thoughts about nakedness, I have come to some unexpected questions: Why do I feel some things to be special or sacred, and others not? What is it in me that wants to reserve such feelings for certain occasions and reserve some part of myself, such as my naked body, for those occasions? And finally, am I ready to meet every moment in that space of sacredness, of specialness? For surely, it is only in those moments that I am truly alive.

(June 2007)