Listening to Your Body

Do you tend to listen to your body, or do you dismiss it? Take a moment to pause and notice how you feel. Yes, right here, right now take a moment to notice what’s happening in your body. What sensations do you notice? Where do you notice them? What thoughts might you be having? Do you have an urge to do something? Notice your heart rate. Is your breathing deep or shallow? Scan your body. Do you notice any tension?

Signs of Protection

Did you know that when you are overwhelmed with stress, your body may send signals of danger whether or not the danger is real? When your body senses danger, you don’t feel safe and patterns of protection begin to replace patterns of connection and you will have a tendency to withdraw or isolate from others.

Signs of Safety

When your body feels calm, your breathing is steady and you are easily able to connect with your community. You feel like you can handle life’s challenges without becoming easily overwhelmed. These are signs of safety.

But when you lack safety, you will have physiological and emotional signs that show up as your body decides which autonomic nervous system state will protect you best. You don’t choose it. It happens automatically.

Vagus Nerve Action

Signs of safety and danger are driven from the brainstem and limbic systems that coordinate to activate your vagus nerve to direct many systems in your body to take action such as fight, flight, freeze, or faint. You don’t have to think about it because thinking time would take away from survival time.

As you pay attention to your body, notice what happens with your tone, words, and inflections? What happens with your facial expressions or physical movement? What happens with your breathing, blood pressure, and tension in your body? Each movement communicates something that is designed to help keep you safe.

Internal Focus

In others, it’s important to notice if they feel pushy to you – like they are invading your space by wanting to become too close too soon. It’s also important to notice if your boundaries are respected. What happens inside of you when they aren’t? Does another’s body language match their words? Maybe something just feels “off” but you don’t know what it is.

If anything communicates danger, you always have the right to protect yourself and preserve your safety. Proverbs 27:12 tells us that “the righteous see danger and take refuge but those who keep going suffer the consequences.” God values your safety and sanity, and He will empower you to take the next steps. I rarely see safety just happen; it usually takes intentional and wise steps.

Are You Listening?

But here’s the question, do you value the wisdom of your body? In western culture, the body tends to be cut off from the neck down which dismisses what our body is trying to communicate at times. Logic is heavily relied upon; but to be whole and healthy, you need all parts of you working together. You need reasoning skills and emotional skills.

Perhaps, you had to learn to cut off listening to your body as a way to survive. You can honor that, but you don’t have to continue surviving. You were created to heal, grow, and thrive!

You Can Heal

You can begin to pivot toward places where you can experience emotional presence that allows you to feel seen, soothed, and safe. Sometimes, this begins with a therapist. As you heal, you can begin to take small risks and venture into secure relationships where you feel supported. You need more than just knowing intellectually that life can be different, you need to experience that life can be different.

If you want help to overcome old patterns and learn how to listen to the signals that your body is sending you, feel free to reach out to Breathe Again Counseling. Take the next step toward your healing and growth and live a life of freedom and confidence!