"Embodied cognition" also ties in a lot with the field of linguistics I did my graduate work in. It's intersects with my essay above in the sense that if the "props" we interact with have been imbued with meaning for us, then, in turn, we can draw on that meaning to enhance our experiences. I piece of clothing that has a "story" attached -- and we have to know the story for it to be real -- takes us into the story and lets us inhabit the role. But the props and the story and the role are neutral with regard to "truth". That's where this angle diverges a bit from the linguistic approach I worked with, where the embodiment was concerned with transferring our physical understanding of interacting with the world onto our abstract thought processes. The connections made by the transfer might not be "true" but the source concepts are. In contrast, if you become a medieval princess (in your mind) by putting on a medieval princess dress, it doesn't matter whether the dress has any innate connection with medieval princesses as long as you encountered it as such.

Gah. That's probably incoherent.