The ins and outs of navel-gazing

Kirk Ericson | Dec 22, 20220

“The man without a navel still lives in me.” — Thomas Browne, English author

From the Cambridge Dictionary: Navel-gazing — the activity of spending too much time considering your own thoughts, feelings or problems.

From the Urban Dictionary: Navel-gazing — engaging in self-absorbed behavior, often to the point of being narcissistic.

If you type “navel-gazing” into Google and hit the “All” tab, you’ll get 1.46 million hits, depending on the day, I suppose. I looked at some of the sites, and while a lot of complacent self-absorption is going on, actual discussion about actual navels is rare.

A story from The Guardian website popped up: “I have tried to find calm through meditation and yoga, unblinking in my focus on my belly button,” the headline read. That person likely was being metaphorical — you can’t focus on your navel without blinking. The only activity you can focus on without blinking is not blinking.

The Greeks have a word for navel-gazing. “Omphaloskepsis” is constructed from the words “omphalos” meaning “navel, boss, hub” and “skepsis” meaning “the act of looking; inquiry.”

With 1.46 million pages of navel-gazing going on, you’d think more people would be thinking about the

composition of their navels. Certainly, the first person accused of navel-gazing had to be staring at her or his navel at the time.

“Hey, you, back to work. Quit staring at your thing there.”

“I wasn’t ‘staring.’ I was gazing. And for your information, it’s called a navel.”

Here are a couple of facts about the navel:

■ Your pancreas is situated 3 to 6 inches above your navel and straight back toward the rear of your abdominal cavity.

■ Scientists revealed in June that they’ve discovered the oldest navel. “Paleontologists have discovered the oldest belly button known to science,” according to Smithsonian Magazine. “It belongs to a Psittacosaurus, a member of the horned dinosaurs Ceratopsia, in a fossil uncovered in China. The belly button does not come from an umbilical cord, as it does with mammals, but from the yolk sac of the egg-laying creature.”

I’m probably like most people in that I can’t see the bottom of my navel while sitting down. I assume this inability is shared – I’ve never checked other people’s navels while they’re sitting, nor have I read anything about the variations of the human navel, aside from the innie or outie description.

My navel gets lost inside a single stomach roll. It might be several rolls depending on one’s condition. I can make out the lines leading out of it, but that’s it. An alien might never know that all humans have belly buttons, especially if we refuse to stand for them.

To properly inspect one’s navel, you have to recline.

My navel is round. The diameter is half an inch, and it’s about half an inch from rim to bottom. Some schmutz was in there, which I excavated and rolled into a tiny ball. I bet someone out there in the wide, wide world of sports has a collection of navel debris stashed in a box next to the bed. Maybe someone collects other people’s navel schmutz. Who knows?

I looked at my navel some more. Nothing. My mind drifted to my sons’ births, the two times I’ve seen navels created. The scissors came out and the umbilical cords were tied off quickly and as neatly as a professional gift wrapper, which I once was. I had no advice to offer.

The nurses didn’t ask me, “Could you put your finger here,” like when somebody’s tying ribbon on a present.

Back to navel-gazing.

Nothing.

After our first son was born, the placenta came out and the nurse asked me whether I wanted to inspect it.

“No,” I said. “I’m sure it’s fine.”

Back to my navel.

Hmm.

It’s round. Round seems to be a magical shape. A circle is the symbol of infinity.

Hmm.

Nothing.

I’m done.

That’s the thing about navel-gazing. You can’t stop there.