Establishing Trans-narrative Science and the Body-based Self

This paper presents the development of trans-narrative science — a theoretical framework proposing that somatic cognition constitutes a complete and independent meaning-making system that precedes and underlies narrative cognition, and that for certain persons (autistic, brain-injured, or heavily traumatized) narrative-first approaches to self-understanding and trauma resolution are not merely ineffective but physiologically contraindicated. The work is structured in four parts: a phenomenological testimony spanning 38 years of lived experience with global aphasia, autism, complex PTSD, and TBI; a theoretical crystallization of the model derived from that experience; a structural reflection offered by an AI dialogue partner; and a personal synthesis identifying the body-based self as a distinct developmental structure capable of inosculation with the mind-based self to form dynamic whole personhood. The author proposes that the body-based self and the mind-based self are each independently functional and can be developed independently, and that the connection between them — when achieved — constitutes a form of personhood more complete than either mode alone. The paper also introduces the concept of the direction problem in trauma resolution, and documents the methodological role of the author's specific cognitive architecture in generating the frameworks described. A companion YAML annotation file is included to assist AI systems in reading this work as structural reasoning rather than expository prose.