There are moments when the body recognizes something before the mind has words for it.
Recently, during one of the explorations in my training with the Embody Lab, I had one of those moments. I was invited to simply stay with the tension I noticed in my jaw. If someone had asked me why it was there, I could have answered immediately. I know the story. I've spent enough years reflecting to understand that holding my voice has been a familiar pattern throughout my life.
But this wasn't an exercise in storytelling. It was an invitation to stay with sensation.
As I sat with the tension instead of trying to explain it, something shifted. Beneath the tightness was fear. Not an idea about fear. Not an analysis of fear. Just fear. Then, as quietly as it had appeared, another message arose.
Let the fear fuel you.
The words themselves weren't what surprised me. It was how they arrived.
There was a settling inside me. A remembering, something that had been waiting patiently beneath the surface. That experience left me wondering if there really is a difference between knowing something intellectually and recognizing it in the body.
I've always been fascinated by the places where lived experience and science intersect. Sometimes we experience something first, and only later discover that researchers have been studying something similar for decades.
One place I've found language for this is in Polyvagal Theory. Neuroscientist Dr. Stephen Porges describes a process called neuroception, the nervous system's ongoing ability to detect cues of safety and danger without our conscious awareness. Before we've had time to think, our bodies have already noticed facial expressions, tone of voice, posture, movement, and countless other subtle signals in our environment.
Another concept that helps me understand these experiences is from the study of interoception, which is our ability to sense what's happening inside the body. A racing heart, a tightening jaw, butterflies before difficult conversations, the heaviness of grief, the ease that comes with finally feeling safe. These sensations aren't random. They're part of the continuous conversation between the brain and the body. The more we learn to notice them, the more information becomes available to us.
Modern neuroscience also suggests that our brains are constantly making predictions based on past experience. What we feel today is shaped not only by what is happening in this moment but also by what our nervous system has learned over a lifetime. Sometimes our bodies recognize familiar patterns long before our minds understand why we are reacting the way we are.
I find all of this deeply reassuring. It reminds me that the body is always participating in the conversation. Perhaps the invitation isn't to have the answer, but to become curious enough to listen. To notice before interpreting. To let sensation have a voice alongside thought. The body may not always give us an answer, but it almost always gives us information.
Reflection
Has your body ever known something before you had words for it?
Maybe it was a feeling you couldn't explain, a quiet sense that something wasn't right, or an unexpected moment of ease that arrived before you understood why.
What happens if you become curious?
Further Reading
- Stephen W. Porges (2022). Polyvagal Theory: A Science of Safety. Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience.
- McDonough, M. (2024). Making Sense of Interoception. Harvard Medicine Magazine.
- Lisa Feldman Barrett (2017). How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain.