When I read the line in “Cutting The Stone” about looking after the body, but not the being, I remembered some lines from T S Eliot’s The Cocktail Party – here they are –
Or take a surgical operation
In a consultation with the doctor or surgeon
In going to bed in the nursing home,
In talking to the matron, you are still
the subject.
The centre of reality. But, stretched on the table,
You are a piece of furniture in a repair shop
For those who surround you, the masked actors
All there is of you is your body
And the “you” is withdrawn
Heroes Not Zombies 
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