Balance and Yoga

Alfred Tomatis was born in Nice in 1920. He holds a doctorate in medicine from the Faculty of Paris and is an otorhinolaryngologist and a specialist in disorders of hearing and language. As early as 1947, he undertook research in the fields of audiology and phonology. He formulated a number of laws that now bear the name of the Tomatis Effect.

Doctor Tomatis created a body of techniques for education and re-education that are applied in 180 centres distributed throughout the world and grouped together in an international network. He today directs a major department of research on the ear and the brain. The author of numerous scientific articles and works, he has recently published a book on prenatal listening entitled « Nine Months in Paradise », another on the learning of languages « We Are All Born Polyglots », together with a work on Mozart « Why Mozart? ».

BALANCE AND YOGA: THE ROLE OF THE INNER EAR

Yoga ultimately leads to knowledge of the self as inserted within the Cosmos. It responds to the search for the laws that govern their relations. This is to say that it leads to a perfect consciousness of the one and the other.

These bonds quite obviously exist in their own right. Yet they are scarcely perceived at first sight. And so they are grasped but very rarely. Man attains this plane of plenitude often only after a long journey. He will have to wait until the keys of heaven are delivered to him.

Indeed, if it is true that the child knows the essence of all things even before being born, it is no less true that his plunge into the immensity of the universe, from his birth onwards, conceals the reality of these ontological certainties. From then on, he will be dependent upon the milieu in which his familial, cultural, and social belonging confines him.

The perception of intimate union with Creation remains the Ariadne’s thread of the Being in quest of revealed truth. One recalls David expressing in sublime fashion the manifested presence of his God, the Creator of the Universe, and Socrates teaching on the Agora how to attain knowledge of the self so that the reality of the Cosmos might crystallize in human consciousness.

Yoga, for millennia, has claimed to reach the same results by a wholly different approach. If the perception of immanence led the children of Abraham to feel the obligation to obey the demands set forth in the Torah, if the implacable logic of the Greeks conferred upon them the possibility of objectifying man as a cosmic inclusion, Indian thought, for its part, takes several paths in order to arrive in the end at the same goal. Each of these has the advantage of answering to the potentialities inherent in the different temperaments. Thus Bhakti Yoga will be directly adopted by the intuitive, Jnâna Yoga by the intellectual; and finally, among many other forms, Hatha Yoga, the most widespread in reality, takes the somatic path in order to discover the intimate connections that bind the universe to the body of man.

It is this last that we shall treat most especially in this article, taking into account the fact that the other approaches in reality make use of the fundamental elements of Hatha Yoga. Without being its basis, the latter nevertheless remains imbricated within the whole of the various techniques that touch upon Yoga.

Man, from a certain point of view, is a neurological ensemble. And so Hatha Yoga may be considered as exploiting, in some measure, the resources of the nervous system. It is all the more so in that bodily participation is essential to it. Moreover, what concerns movement and statics is dependent upon the apparatus of equilibration, that is to say upon the inner ear and the neuronal network appended to it.

THE INNER EAR: ITS FORMATION AND ITS ROLE IN VERTICALIZATION

The inner ear is a complex also called the membranous labyrinth.

[Fig. 1 — Inner ear]

It is enclosed within a shell as dense as ivory: the bony labyrinth. As a function of phylogenetic evolution, this organ attains a configuration of complicated appearance. It is, however, easy to study if one withdraws for a time from the reductionist grip of the anatomists. Indeed, often, through their intervention, any global vision runs the risk of disappearing.

It is thus that the inner ear benefits from an evolutive structure that has come into place over the course of time in order to answer to the necessities of the moment. Each of the stages of this progression marks a step in the dynamics of kinetics, of which we know that it culminates in man, in its terminal phase, in the standing station and in bipedal walking. Verticality achieves its accomplishment with the appearance of the specific right-handedness induced by language.

It is thus that the utricle succeeds the lateral line of the lower fishes and ensures horizontality. By adjoining to itself the semicircular canals, which are three in number — the external, then the superior, and finally the posterior, in the order of their respective appearance — it allows spatial annulments, during displacements, to be thereby easily controlled in the higher fishes. Later, the saccule will make its entrance upon the scene and the race toward verticality will begin, henceforth marking the liberation of the head with respect to the nape of the neck in amphibians and batrachians. Lastly, the cochlea, generated in two stages, is characterized by the lagena — first of all going hand in hand with the lengthening of the neck in birds — and, to conclude, by the cochlea proper, in mammals.

It is fitting to note in passing a detail of importance, that of the conjoint progression of the nervous system. Indeed, while the ear proceeds with its successive increments, the nervous system, and notably the brain, attains a complexity that is more and more exponential.

The consequences of the acquisition of verticality are considerable. Indeed, man, endowed with speech, erects himself like an antenna listening to the universe that ceaselessly addresses him. From this instant on, he is concerned. His feeling of belonging to the great whole asserts itself, while he encounters the macrocosm through the microcosm that constitutes him.

Thanks to this vertical posture, he will know the fusion of all that is cosmic with his own body. He will feel with certainty that the energy which sustains and animates the universe invades and traverses him, thus introducing an extraordinary communication. This « energetic dialogue » will be all the better instituted as bodily uprightness is attained and preserved, and as it has been definitively integrated.

It thus falls to the membranous vestibule to achieve verticality in man. Indeed, the initial horizontality, observed in the lineage of fishes, will persist at the level of the position of the head, when the utricle finds itself situated on a horizontal plane. Later, the saccule will undertake the process of verticalization proper. One may surmise the enormous anatomical transformation that presides over this veritable « postural transfiguration ». Archaic memories will allow earlier reminiscences — mineral and vegetal as well as animal — to resurface within the « evolutive body ». They will go back to the dawn of time and will have as their origin the beginning of the world. Man is in « eternal memory », sings the psalmist.

BALANCE IN THE ASANAS

Hatha Yoga plunges back into this evolutive process the one who devotes himself to it, with the essential aim of discovering therein the way out toward « realization », which some also call « liberation ».

Looked at closely, this approach follows very faithfully the coming into place of the atomic elements constitutive of the universe itself within an organic crystal that is nothing less than man, made of 80% water and 20% mineral salts.

All is balance in the multiple asanas proposed to the disciple. And so a more thorough study of the vestibulo-cochlear apparatus seems to me, if not indispensable, at any rate most useful for those who like to understand the neurophysiological mechanisms brought into play during the exercises that accompany the yogic approach. To say that there is balance is to signify that there is movement. This is no mere paradox. Immobility exists only in relation to mobility itself. In this, balance, and notably verticality as well as a large part of the asanas, constitute an unstable state that requires permanent vigilance and that thereby demands a particular activity of the membranous labyrinth. More still, the relative movements of each of the segments of the bodily limbs find themselves controlled by the same organ.

Consciousness of the body is for a large part centralized upon the somatic knowledge generated at the level of the muscles, tendons, joints, ligaments, and bones. To this will be added other, finer perceptions, cutaneous ones for example. The former, deep ones, are termed protopathic when they determine the sensibility called — wrongly, in our view — unconscious. The latter, as a general rule more peripheral, are designated as being epicritic. The terms protopathic and epicritic are significant with respect to the degree of perception.

To apprehend the totality of the phenomena that come into play in the regulations that determine postures, and more specifically verticality, a cybernetic systemics comes into place. It is evident that the brain is implicated in its totality (as is the body), leaving, of course, preponderant activities to certain sectors of the nervous system corresponding to the bodily zones engaged.

THE SYSTEMS RESPONSIBLE FOR BALANCE: THE INTEGRATORS

The inner ear comprises the major elements that permit the establishment of this cerebral dynamics. Indeed, the complexity of the latter, with its hundred billion associated neurons, can be easily studied thanks to the bringing into evidence of territories well defined by the very functions of the membranous labyrinth. Thus two « integrators » group together by themselves alone the highest activities of the human structure. The one governs protopathic sensibility, the other epicritic sensibility. These are, respectively, the vestibular integrator and the cochlear integrator, also recognized as being the one somatic and the other linguistic. One will speak on the one hand of the bodily instrumental ensemble and on the other of the cortical system. The latter, eminently active, is the seat of the will traversed by consciousness.

The somatic integrator

The neuronal system constituting the somatic integrator takes its origin in the vestibule, of which one recalls that it comprises the utricle surmounted by its semicircular canals and, moreover, the saccule appended to it perpendicularly. The vestibular nerve (fig. 2), which emerges from the ganglion of Scarpa, makes its way toward the upper part of the medulla oblongata, which overhangs the spinal cord. There, after having distributed itself at the level of four nuclei, it will give various fascicles. The first, inferior external, emanating from the nucleus of Deiters, makes its way downward and distributes itself in unilateral fashion to the muscles of the body seated on the same side below the neck. This descending tract is non-voluntary motor, as was specified earlier. It will thus be called extra-pyramidal, in opposition to the pyramidal fascicle which monopolizes by itself alone voluntary activity. In fact, if one admits that the vestibular integrator that comes into place centralizes to a certain extent the instrumental activity, passive by itself, one may deduce that the pyramidal ensemble assumes the active role of the conductor.

[Fig. 2 — Vestibular or somatic integrator. (1. Utricle; 2. Semicircular canals; 3. Saccule; 4. Ganglion of Scarpa; 5. Nucleus of Roller; 9. Homolateral vestibulo-spinal F.; 10. Heterolateral vestibulo-spinal F.; 11. Anterior horn; 12. Posterior horn; 13. Anterior root; 14. Muscles; 15. Joints; 16. Bones; 17. Skin; 18. F. of Flechsig; 19. F. of Gowers; 20. Bulbar olive; 21. Globulus; 22. Embolus; 23. Red nucleus; 24. Rubro-spinal F.; 25. Olivo-spinal F.)]

The muscles of the hemibody corresponding to the nucleus of Deiters thus receive their vestibular innervation. A sensory return ensures them the necessary adjustments so that an overall coordination may be maintained. To do this, two sensory pathways are taken. The one, which is predominant in the sub-diaphragmatic part, is specially reserved for the lower limb. This is the fascicle of Flechsig, which takes a homolateral ascending pathway and projects upon the paleo-cerebellum. The other pathway is above all distributed in the supra-diaphragmatic zone, notably toward the upper limb. It constitutes the fascicle of Gowers, which differs from the preceding one in the sense that it crosses the median line of the cord to make its way upward in the direction of the pons, thus beyond the medulla. There, it re-crosses the median line, becomes in short homolateral once again, ending like the preceding one at the level of the paleo-cerebellum upon which the projections of the body are collected.

Without entering into a thorough study of this part of the vestibular integrator, to which it would be fitting to add the red nucleus and the bulbar olive, we may say in brief that an immense network is constituted. It will ensure the coming into place of an organization that will be completed by the interplay of the other constitutive elements of the three remaining vestibular nuclei.

First of all we shall have the inferior and internal nucleus, or nucleus of Roller. It distributes fibres which, after having traversed the spinal cord and given the heterolateral vestibulo-spinal fascicle, address themselves to the muscles antagonistic to those that depend upon the homolateral vestibulo-spinal fascicle. One recalls that the origin of the latter is seated at the level of the nucleus of Deiters. Next, the superior and external nucleus, called the nucleus of Bechterev, is in fact a relay of communication between the vestibule and the cerebellum, thanks to afferent and efferent connections. This direct relation constitutes an important element so that the vestibule may project upon the archeo-cerebellum, which will be linked to the paleo-cerebellum by way of a dense network of dendrites, prolongations of the cells of Purkinje. This cerebellar dendritic tissue is assuredly one of the principal territories upon which are established the control linkages of postural activities. Finally, a last superior and internal nucleus, that of Schwalbe, is at the origin of two ascending tracts, the one external, the other internal, which rejoin in their upper part within the nuclei of Thomas and of Darkschewitsch before being prolonged at the level of the posterior longitudinal fascicle. In its descending course, the latter sends out fibres to reach the various cranial nerves, thus permitting the muscles situated above the neck to be equally under the direction of the vestibule.

Thus all the muscles of the body are, without exception, dependent upon this organ. It is fitting to specify that the fascicles we have just seen lastly, emanating from the nucleus of Schwalbe and often designated under the name of spino-mesencephalic fascicles, establish from bottom to top a nervous connection with the nuclei of the VIth, IVth, and IIIrd cranial pairs, that is to say with the nuclei charged with the innervation of the ocular muscles (fig. 3). This contribution is of particular importance, for it reveals the major interference of the vestibular apparatus upon the dynamics of the eye in vision.

[Fig. 3 — Visual or spatial integrator. (1. Eye; 2. Optic nerve; 3. Occipital area; 4. External geniculate body; 5. Tecto-spinal F.; 6. Nucleus of the third pair; 7. Nucleus of the fourth pair; 8. Nucleus of the sixth pair; 9. Mesencephalic F.; 10. Vestibule.)]

The pyramidal fascicle: its role of « command » in equilibration

The interplay of the apparatus of equilibration consists in short in preparing the body in all the activities linked to movements, as well as in those solicited by the search for statics. It is necessary to adjoin to it a veritable system of « command ». This role will be devolved to the pyramidal fascicle. It would please me to speak here of the « pyramidal integrator », which is in fact that of the transmission of the voluntary act. It might comprise the pyramidal fascicle itself, associated with the direct and crossed spino-thalamic sensory fascicles, thanks to which the control of the act will find itself executed.

Thus the whole of the tracts of an « integrator » takes on its full meaning. It defines the neuronal territory constituted by the function. This approach, answering to an operational reality, is easier to apprehend than is the systematic enumeration of the nerves according to the classical description, devoid of any global vision. We conceive, indeed, that it is a practical conception to approach the nervous system under an aspect by which the function is taken as being the support of our investigation. It suits us all the better in that it answers perfectly to the elaboration of each of the stages permitting man to cross the various steps of evolution, so that there may be instituted in him one day a profound relation with the Logos.

The linguistic integrator

It is at this precise moment, when language holds all its rights and when, through its intermediary, the world comes to exist under the mediating angle, that the linguistic integrator imposes itself in our exposition. One recalls that it is also presented under the rubric of cochlear integrator. The importance of this new network is considerable, since, thanks to it, human language can blossom and attain the amplitude that we know. It perfects the acquisition of verticality, without which the faculty of speaking inherent in man would not succeed in elaborating the functions indispensable to this speech act that is so specific to him.

The cochlea is annexed to the saccule, as we have already pointed out. It represents the last link to appear in the evolution of the structures of the inner ear. It transforms the human body into an antenna not only listening but still vibrating, resonating. Through its intermediary, the body becomes the essential instrument of speech, which will modulate upon the music of each language.

From the cochlea, in its internal part, spring forth the fibres collected at the level of the basilar membrane and grouped together in the form of the ganglion of Corti, situated at the centre of the cochlear spiral known under the term of columella. The cochlear nerve is born after this ganglionic relay and makes its way toward the upper part of the medulla, which it penetrates at the same level as does the vestibular nerve. There, nuclei receive it and act as relays; they are two in number. The one, anterior, is called ventral, while the other, seated at the rear, bears the name of dorsal. From each of these two nuclei, two fascicles set out. The most important among them crosses horizontally the median line and goes to rejoin its homologue on the opposite side. The other, ascending, participates in the constitution of the lateral lemniscus, together with the fibres come from the ventral and dorsal nuclei, emanating from the cochlear nerve of the other ear. Thus two fascicles rise toward the following relays, which they rejoin at the level of the thalamus in its posterior part called the pulvinar (fig. 4). They are each constituted of homolateral fibres for two-fifths and of heterolateral fibres for the remaining three-fifths. As one sees, the two lateral lemnisci establish a bridge thrown between the upper bulbar part and the encephalic thalamic part.

[Fig. 4 — Cochlear system. (1. Cochlea; 2. Dorsal cochlear nucleus; 3. Ventral cochlear nucleus; 4. Lateral lemniscus of Reil; 5. Internal geniculate body; 6. Thalamus; 7. Convolution of Heschl.)]

From this third relay, nervous tracts dart in the direction of the first temporal convolution, called that of Heschl (fig. 5). It is the arrival of the cochlear nerve upon area 41, the place of projection of the cochlea itself, there where decoding begins. The information thus gathered at this level will have to pass into the underlying area 21 in order to be recognized there, which implies that it has been stored beforehand. To proceed with this placing in reserve, temporal area 22, situated immediately below the preceding one, plays the role of reservoir. Its name is, moreover, most suggestive in this regard; indeed, it was called in 1870, by a follower of Broca, Charlton Bastian, the zone of nominative memory.

[Fig. 5 — Auditory area. (1. Temporal lobe; 2. Area 41 (sensory); 3. Area 42 (gnostic); 4. Area 22 (motor).)]

That is not all, for the extent of this memory area is not limited to area 22 itself. Its territory is in truth immense. That is why it is capable of storing a considerable number of items of information, of inventorying them, of drawing up the lists of similarities and dissimilarities. And it is all the more efficient in that its activity manifests itself on a particular register. Indeed, contrary to the two areas that precede it and that are essentially sensory in nature, it answers, for its part, to the characteristics of the extra-pyramidal motor areas. This is to say that its intervention will be of great importance. It has, in effect, an influence upon the whole extra-pyramidal cerebral network with which it is connected and which works in concert with the vestibular integrator. One recalls that the latter is the very foundation of an enormous somatic network, which means, in plain terms, that every sound item of information will have its bodily correspondence. Let us add to this that all music will determine its elective action upon such or such part of the soma, and that language, for its part, will be truly incarnated, « embodied ».

The pathways that the nominative area employs in order to spread itself begin with the fascicle of Turck-Meynert (fig. 6), which leads to the nuclei of the pons. From there, a projection is made at the level of the neo-cerebellum situated on the opposite cerebellum. In passing, let us point out that the dendritic network of the cells of Purkinje collects here the information transmitted to the regions of the paleo- and archeo-cerebellum. Thus the contralateral vestibule finds itself informed. From the projection upon the area of the neo-cerebellum, the circuit thus begun pursues itself in the direction of the dentate nucleus and then leaves the cerebellum. After this last relay, the journey continues toward the thalamus, which it approaches in its central part and which it traverses in order to spread itself literally over the whole of the extra-pyramidal cortex. This is to say that it reaches an important territory, just as much upon the frontal area in front of the pyramidal area as upon the parietal area behind the ascending parietal convolution. The latter is destined to gather the epicritic sensibility of the pyramidal integrator, which is, one recalls, that of voluntary command.

[Fig. 6 — Cortex-Pons-Cerebellum-Thalamus-Cortex circuit. (1. Area 22 (motor); 2. Fascicle of Turck-Meynert; 3. Nucleus of the pons; 4. Neo-cerebellum; 5. Dentate nucleus; 6. Network of Purkinje; 7. Red nucleus (neo-rubric); 8. Thalamus; 9. Cortical projection and return toward the pons; 10. Corpus callosum.)]

Finally, from this vast ensemble of regions solicited by the information always fed by the activity of temporal area 22, recurrent filaments descend again, detaching themselves from each of the landing points of the thalamo-cortical fascicles, in the direction of the nuclei of the pons. Once again, from these relays, the neuronal journey resumes its course toward the neo-cerebellum, thus creating the great circuit named « cortico-ponto-cerebello-dentato-thalamo-cortical ». Thanks to this circuit, memorization constitutes itself with all the more profound anchoring in that, with each accomplishment of a turn of this long journey, the information primitively collected by the intermediary of a nervous filament emanating from the dentate nucleus darts an injection to the red nucleus. The latter then enters into relation with the vestibular fascicles which, by way of the anterior roots of the cord, can thus distribute themselves to all the muscles of the body. The latter are thereby imbued with a certain memory.

This course through the labyrinth of a functional neurology risks, at a first reading, being felt as something a little arduous. We think, however, that it will become clearer as procedures of deepening are reiterated. To be sure, one must begin by locating the places and identifying them in order to be able to discern each of the ensembles concerning the integrators that have been described. One recalls that these lines were written for those who have expressed the wish to understand. Those less interested at first may quite well dispense with pursuing their efforts, with the possibility of taking up these notions again later when the need for them makes itself felt.

HATHA YOGA AND THE NEUROPHYSIOLOGY OF THE EAR

At the present stage, the contributions of science are such that one is entitled to grasp better the effects of Hatha Yoga. One can, to be sure, verify them, but one is often constrained to accept them by an act of faith, without truly succeeding in detecting the mechanisms that preside over the establishment of these results. Fortunately, many mysteries still subsist, and others that were not expected will come to feed the quest of researchers preoccupied by the problems that physiology in general raises.

The « cellular memories ». The language of the asanas

Art of postural balance, Hatha Yoga addresses us as to the very meaning of the various asanas. In fact, it is a question of deciphering, at the level of the body, the semantic value of each of them. In other words, such a research can only really be undertaken when one admits that the soma has stored away somewhere certain memories, that it has collected them with a subtle intelligence to the point of engramming them, that is to say to the point of delivering to them the form of a discourse. One may evoke an apparently non-verbal language that in reality asks only to take on speech form thanks to the vestibulo-cochlear substratum. It is in short a matter of a bodily linguistic absorption in the one case and of a verbalization of the somatic memories in the other.

In the absence of a dialectic between these two polarities, one runs the risk of seeing psychosomatic fixations become established, within which the relational dynamics at the level of these two poles progressively diminishes. It will go so far as to express itself in significant pathological alterations, themselves also semantically signifying, but in the mode of a metalanguage that is often not understood. As for the pure and simple refusal to conceive of such an engagement, in which the body becomes the receptacle of this secret discourse, it leads ineluctably to the alienation that begins, as one sees, with the suppression of communication with oneself.

The asanas are dialogues in depth, from which emerge, with the passage of time, crystallizations of these memories integrated into the very depths of the cellular soul. To be executed, they demand at one and the same time a voluntary abandonment, so that the body may express itself, and a sharpened vigilance, to decode the messages that it formulates. It goes without saying that it is necessary to know how to wait, for it is not in the immediate that the innermost depth surges forth and that the corresponding deciphering is acquired. One will have to reckon with time and not dread to encounter seriously this body that one suspects of containing memories labelled as undesirable.

Yet, well conducted, Hatha Yoga conveys the one who devotes himself to it — by combining relaxation and consciousness — toward the discovery of the dialogue between his body, which he will succeed in fashioning, in sculpting until he perceives it as a receiving antenna, and the Creator of all things, who invites him to participate in the fabulous spectacle of the Universe.

It would please us to pursue such a development, so much are the rapprochements between Hatha Yoga and the neurophysiology of the inner ear correlated. Without exceeding too much the place that is allotted to us in this article, let us say a few words on the cochleo-vestibular ensemble. We shall attempt at the same time to imagine a very particular posture: the Lotus. Diagrams will allow us to proceed to certain simplifications.

Organization and functioning of the cochleo-vestibular apparatus

[Fig. 7 — Vestibule]

If we take the utricle with its three semicircular canals (sc), an ensemble now become familiar in fig. 7, and if we look at it from above in fig. 8, we shall see better the implantations of the sc. Physiologically, their active parts manifest themselves in the ampullae, where are found the sensory cells that appreciate the displacement of the endolymphatic fluid circulating in the sc. Fig. 9 marks the fixations of the ampullae; they are three in number: the external sce, the superior scs, the posterior scp. Fig. 10 represents the projection of these implantations upon the basal plate of the utricle, the place where the ciliated sensory cells are distributed. The incurved line traced upon the surface of the utricular plate is the place of convergence of the endolymphatic flows, notably at the emergence of the ampullary fluids.

[Fig. 8 — Fig. 9 — Fig. 10]

[Fig. 11]

If one schematizes the two utricles with respect to the median line, one notices that, contrary to the usual conception, the two vestibules are by no means parallel. Indeed, their axes converge anteriorly as a function of the petrous pyramids (fig. 11) that contain them, thus forming an angle of 45 degrees with the median line, that is, 90 degrees between them. So much so that the scs, always described as sagittal, is in fact oblique forward and inward at 45 degrees, whereas the scp, ordinarily considered as frontal, finds itself oblique backward and inward, equally at 45 degrees. From these orientations, it results that each scs and scp on each side is the parallel not of its homologue but of the teammate of the latter.

Thus the two vestibules indeed work in pairs, but not in parallel. They achieve a veritable dialogue face to face, and therefore not in opposition but in a dialectical relation built upon permanent compensations and incessant adjustments.

The appearance of each of the sc during phylogenetic progression must here retain the attention. Indeed, the sce appears first in the agnathans, fishes in which, during displacements, lateral angulations are facilitated, probably by an easier mobilization of their antero-lateral fins, the first sketches of the upper limbs. The scp, the frontal of the old conception, comes second and introduces the activity of the postero-lateral fin, the origin of the future lower limb. Finally, the scs, formerly called sagittal, appears. Its role will be more specifically destined for the balance of the head. The English term « balance » would suit perfectly to illustrate its function.

In the structure that comes into place, there is still lacking the control of the thorax and the abdomen, of the trunk in short. Phylogenetic progression, doubled by the ontogenetic process, illuminates in a quite telling manner the evolutive mechanisms. Indeed, the primordial element to retain here is the initial fusion that joins the head to the thorax. Thus the cephalo-thorax finds itself to be the primitive form, with no possible distinction between these two parts so liberated later one from the other. They will nevertheless remain long to integrate, within what it is customary to designate under the term « image of the body ».

One recalls that the child cannot, for a certain time, produce a drawing that would represent him without scribbling a little fellow all round like a sphere (fig. 12). Soon the two upper limbs will spring forth on the sides (fig. 13). A curious fact, they come out at the very place where the two ears will later be implanted. It is true that then his hands listen. It is only a little later that two vertical strokes descending from the sphere invite one to think that the lower limbs have taken their place in the image the child has of himself (fig. 14). Finally, one fine day the head differentiates itself from the trunk (fig. 15).

In the end, are we not witnessing the appearance of the dependencies affiliated to the semicircular canals, which position themselves functionally in the order of the programme of evolution? Everything inclines us to think so. Moreover, this progression accelerates with the appearance of language. The induction generated here is considerable and manifests itself by a tenfold energy.

But to return to the relations that establish themselves between movements and their cochleo-vestibular components, to which they are bound, one may say that the asanas are surely the most refined models of the gestural repertoire corresponding to the optimal activities of the inner ear. Thus each posture is the visible bodily representation of a quite specific attitude of the auditory labyrinth. The latter remains occult, but it exists. It is reproducible and determines, by its very presence, the same bodily response.

[Fig. 12 — Fig. 13 — Fig. 14 — Fig. 15]

Language and balance: the role of the cochlea

We have seen summarily how the vestibule placed itself with its first elements. The cochlea remains. Arrived last, it is characteristic of the ear of mammals and finds its full employment in man when it devotes itself to listening. It becomes the conductor of an organization that groups together all the sensory organs, with the aim of seeing the body come to become a listening antenna. We have approached the essential of this evolutive approach. It is good, nevertheless, that we should try to understand the role of the cochlea, the last element to appear.

Language, as we have specified on several occasions, takes hold of the human instrument. Literally seized by this high-level faculty, which will open to him the doors of consciousness, man will verticalize himself. We know how he reaches this through the interplay of the vestibule. Next he will become right-handed. It is thanks to the adjunction of the cochlea in its function of listening that these fundamental transformations will be rendered possible.

What will be the role of the cochlea in this new progression? It will consist in detecting sounds, one will answer us, and in recognizing their various characteristics: intensity, timbre, modulations, rhythms, and sequences. This is true, but largely insufficient. Indeed, through such a definition of function corresponding to the analysis of sounds by the ear, the body does not appear. It would all amount to saying that the ear would suffice unto itself and that it alone would operate. Enough has been said in this discourse for one to know that it cannot be so. The body participates entirely, just as the nervous system is equally solicited.

The faculty of listening leads out onto the spoken function, while communication is instituted. But to speak is to play upon the body of the other. This implies that the speaker knows how to play upon his own. How can one succeed in reconciling all the items of information we have just set forth, if we wish to continue thinking that the ear is made up anatomically of bits and pieces, that the vestibule is an organ dedicated to balance, and that the cochlea is a wholly other apparatus destined for listening? It suffices to recall the fact that the ear is a whole, and that, if the vestibule indeed offers balance, the cochlea, for its part, induces the verticality indispensable to the elaboration of language. Its role is essential because, in the act of speech, the body itself becomes a frequency analyzer.

Of course, an apprenticeship is needed to attune the ear and the body so that they work together and are tuned to the same wavelength. The cochlea is the bodily replica, while the body is a sensitive structure, above all at the level of the skin. The latter is indeed capable, after a period of accommodation, of proceeding to frequency recognitions. It will do so all the better in that the cochlea trains it to practise analogical responses. In the absence of hearing, this conditioning is more difficult to achieve, but it is possible to arrive at it. This is a most interesting means for helping the handicapped stricken with deafness.

The cochlea is a paraboloid of revolution (fig. 16). As such, if a complex sound were to meet it, it would set itself into resonance not in its totality but on iso-frequential zones corresponding to the frequencies included in the spectrum of the sound under consideration. Thus the sound will come to be situated on one of these iso-frequential parallels and on the line of insertion of the organ of Corti, of which we know that it develops along an ascending helicoidal spiral. A sort of orange-peel cutting thus takes shape upon the surface of the paraboloid, determining the elective point of each frequency.

It is the same for the body. Indeed, each sound distributes itself to a quite precise location, answering to a place itself also defined. The latter answers, for its part, to a metameric slice of the body, that is to say, situating itself at the level of each of the vertebrae, or more precisely corresponding to the various emergences of the vertebral nerves.

The Lotus asana: a referential model

But let us return to the Lotus, the ideal posture, representative of Yoga itself. The image of the self in this situation is found again in the classic interpenetration of two triangles: the one descending from « heaven », the other springing forth from the « earth ». These two images can also be visualized by thinking that what supports the two shoulders are the dorsal muscles spread widely out, moored downward upon the iliac crests and ending at the lower apex capped by the sacrum and the coccyx. A second isosceles triangle, like the preceding one, having for its base the external part of the two hips, hooks itself by its apex to the occipital process seated at the posterior part of the skull. These felt triangles help considerably to set the posture of the back in uprightness. Let us recall that the latter is difficult to integrate, for lack of a representation of specific regions well developed upon the motor and sensory areas on the frontal and parietal cortices.

As for the Lotus chosen as a referential model, we can imagine that the lateral sides of the upper triangle in particular are the generatrices of a paraboloid of revolution turned upward. From then on, the vertebral column will be its median axis. The opening of the apex angle will be variable as a function of the anatomical structure but also of the stage of evolution in the practice of the yogic exercises, and particularly of those aiming at the mastery of the circulation of the energies. Man can now represent himself as having a controlled seating at the level of the utricular base, which sets the horizontality of the head, the shoulders, the diaphragm, the hips, the sacrum, and thereby the coccyx. At the same time, he seems enveloped by the periphery of the paraboloid of revolution, upon which are inscribed the iso-frequential lines corresponding to those determined on the cochlea, more exactly on the right and left cochleae.

Man thus finds himself centred, balanced around a vertical vestibular axis, imagined as being represented by three cochleae (fig. 17): the one a bodily envelope, and the two others placed like internal earphones and functioning with such efficiency that no material earphone could rival them. Doubtless each realized man is supposed to bear permanently these two earphones, open to the world of others and tuned to the universe of all. One cannot help but evoke here the splendid Moses of Michelangelo, marvellously draped in an energetic envelope from which a singular force radiates, and provided with two temporal horns unrolled in the manner of two cochleae, which they assuredly symbolize.

The second isosceles triangle, the one having the pelvis for its base, can also be the support of a paraboloid of revolution, inverted with respect to the preceding one. Turned toward matter, contrary to the first, which opens toward the heavens. Might not the human gait be oscillating between these two polarities?

Thus, far from dwelling upon remarks concerning the duality between matter and spirit, we invite the reader to discover man in his fundamental stature, characteristic of his human dimension, revealing him as the receptacle and the dwelling of the Being. Verticality from then on imposes itself as a necessity, while it associates itself with a mental uprightness and is reinforced by a psychological balance. The one does not go without the other. The inner ear here manifests to us, in all respects, its organizing power under the inductive impulse of the faculty of listening. The latter permits multiple communications, some of which are situated well beyond our habitual concepts and enter into the framework of a fusional communion with the Cosmos through the Thought that, in all ages, has germinated in the hearts of inspired men.

Source: Alfred A. Tomatis, « Équilibre et Yoga : rôle de l’oreille interne », Revue Française de Yoga, 1991. Transcription from the facsimile.