My body knew…

[Se****]

**DISCLAIMER: this writing and thoughts contained writing it are by no means correct for everyone. Nor do my personal thoughts, even if you agree with them, mean that one should not have safety precautions in place and take proper care of oneself and fully vet others.**
 

I haven’t been able to trust myself for quite some time, I doubt my ability and judgement in situations and give chances when they aren’t deserved. I have amazing friends that I’ve made through this site who I use as my sounding board at times and who I trust to be honest with me even if it’s ***ful to hear.

However being unable to trust oneself isn’t as simple as it may first appear. It makes me unsafe to myself, it means that I can (and sometimes do) put myself in dangerous positions not purposefully but because I don’t listen to my senses.

Today I’ve had a moment of clarity and it’s been something that has been on the periphery of my mind for quite some time now but not quite tangible enough for me to grasp hold of.

My body knows!

It is that simple and also that difficult. I live my life (for a variety of reasons) with my nervous system being on edge, I generally don’t ever feel fully calm or safe and relaxed.

The people I engage with through this site ought not compound this feeling (or make it worse), they ought to be people who, when I’m in their presence physically or online, I feel like I can fully breathe with.

I’ve engaged with well, I dread to think of the actual number, a LOT of people on this and other platforms and the ones who’ve had staying power WITHOUT A DOUBT have been the ones my body relaxed with. It might not seem like a compliment but if I’m in your presence and tell you I could fall asleep with you - it’s a good thing, my body feels safe and relaxed with you and my body knows. It knows before my mind does and it knows even when my mind tries to fight it.

Safety, for me, isn’t a construct my mind can build. It isn’t the words or even necessarily the actions of another person it’s a feeling. It’s my nervous system switching off and knowing that this person is safe, this person will protect me. It’s the ability to take a proper breath, the relaxation of my muscles and my mind not needing to be on high alert.

And when I look back in hindsight, every conversation that has ended badly, every person who’s ever blocked me (or vice versa), every time I’ve been ghosted or hurt my body has known long before my mind caught up. My nervous system reacted to unknown signals, it began to put its defences in places while my mind was still seeing hearts and flowers.

The huge task I have in front of me now is learning to listen to and trust my nervous system - she has never been wrong yet, unfortunately I only seem to realise this in hindsight.

Love,

X

[Gi****]

Preach!

[Ra****]

So true, intuition isn't just some random feeling. It's left over protection from when misjudging someone could get your entire clan eliminated.
Science has proven that we emit an electrical vibration from our heart center. This is how you know almost immediately before a word is spoken, " I do or do not like this person" or I do/don't vibe with them. Extremely intuitive people pick up on this through phone calls, letters and even text. Every facial expression, every "t" not crossed or sentence not formed in their usual way is information and the intuitive can decode it and not even realize how or why.
So your comment that your body knows before your mind is spot on. Have you noticed that most of what the mind tells us is simply worry and generally never comes to pass? But your body, your gut feeling, your intuition only alerts you when it has evidence that we seldom even notice.
All I can say is learn to trust that feeling it's a gift of survival passed to you from your ancestors. sdp

[A-PRIORI]

I believe this is a dangerous idea. It shuts out reason and critical thinking by treating the mind and body as two separate and opposing authorities, when in reality they are part of the same system. Elevating the nervous system to the role of ultimate truth replaces thoughtful evaluation with reflexive emotion.
And that line - my body has never been wrong - that’s the kind of thing people say right before they drive their life into a ditch and call it destiny. It’s memory playing favorites. You remember the wrecks and forget the quiet drives home. You crown *** as king because it shouts the loudest.
The bad nights stick. The ghostings, the goodbyes, the doors slammed in your face. They burn holes in your head and convince you the world is nothing but closed fists. Meanwhile, all the ordinary, decent moments get swept under the rug like dust.
Then you build a little church out of it. You kneel to your nerves. You call anxiety intuition and call retreat wisdom. You turn every coincidence into prophecy and every bad ending into proof.
But the body is a drunk bouncer. It throws out the wrong people and lets in the ones with knives. It’s wired for panic, not truth. It learned *** from old wounds and keeps replaying them like a scratched record.
Real sense is when the gut speaks and the mind listens - and then asks questions. Anything else is just running from one fire into another and calling it salvation.

[A-PRIORI]

Maybe I'm just mad because I'm weird.

[A-PRIORI]

I think the reason this post gets under my skin is because I’ve met women like this before. Not so much in real life, but online - where everything is louder and softer. I always seem to fumble it with them. They read me just well enough to build a story and just badly enough to believe it. Maybe the universe warned them, but I doubt it. People are messy and timing is cruel.

[Ra****]

I can get onboard with, " real sense is when the gut speaks and the mind listens- and then ask questions." I think the key, for me is that the gut recognizing a situation or person as potentially being misaligned with your best interest. Allowing the mind to question the circumstances, seems like a reasonable step, however for me anyway, it's a step that I find seldom offered any alternatives and usually promoted a reality of its own creation. A reality based on fantacy and wishful thinking. I suppose everyone has to navigate through this life using the tools that have best served them in their past.
I do have to ask though, if treating the mind and body as two seperate and opposing authorities is a dangerous idea, as you open with. Why is treating the gut and mind being viewed separately , where the mind hears and questions the gut's alarms, considered " real sense", as you close your rebuttal?

[A-PRIORI]

Shoot, I didn't realize this shows up on my wall. Hopefully, this doesn't frame me in a bad light

[Ra****]

I dont know why it would everyone has an opinion and yours is as valid as anyone's
Not a single person alive or long time gone has walked your path, and we each only have personal experience from which to draw.

[AKA_Copper]

4 hours ago, MrDick said:

I believe this is a dangerous idea. It shuts out reason and critical thinking by treating the mind and body as two separate and opposing authorities, when in reality they are part of the same system. Elevating the nervous system to the role of ultimate truth replaces thoughtful evaluation with reflexive emotion.
And that line - my body has never been wrong - that’s the kind of thing people say right before they drive their life into a ditch and call it destiny. It’s memory playing favorites. You remember the wrecks and forget the quiet drives home. You crown *** as king because it shouts the loudest.
The bad nights stick. The ghostings, the goodbyes, the doors slammed in your face. They burn holes in your head and convince you the world is nothing but closed fists. Meanwhile, all the ordinary, decent moments get swept under the rug like dust.
Then you build a little church out of it. You kneel to your nerves. You call anxiety intuition and call retreat wisdom. You turn every coincidence into prophecy and every bad ending into proof.
But the body is a drunk bouncer. It throws out the wrong people and lets in the ones with knives. It’s wired for panic, not truth. It learned *** from old wounds and keeps replaying them like a scratched record.
Real sense is when the gut speaks and the mind listens - and then asks questions. Anything else is just running from one fire into another and calling it salvation.

Im not going to speak for SK, she's more than able to do so for herself.
But
You're response to someone voicing their recognition that whilst their heart has hope for a connection with someone and their head is catching the red flags creating turmoil and indecisiveness, that their body is showing up for them, they just need to listen harder is to voice your frustration with how that impacts your ability to connect with people?

[Deleted Member]

This is very thoughtfully put, and it resonates more than you might expect with a lot of people - particularly those who’ve spent a long time overriding their own internal signals in order to cope.

 

What you describe about the body knowing before the mind catches up feels both accurate and uncomfortable, because it asks for a kind of honesty that can’t be talked around. Learning to trust a nervous system that’s been on high alert for years isn’t simple or quick, but recognising that it has been signalling all along is a significant step.

I also appreciate the distinction you make between safety as a cognitive checklist and safety as a felt experience. Words, intentions, even good behaviour can all coexist with a nervous system that’s quietly bracing - and ignoring that cost tends to show up later rather than sooner.

 

Listening to the body doesn’t mean abandoning discernment or boundaries, but it does seem to mean taking those early sensations seriously rather than rationalising them away. That’s not weakness; it’s integration.

 

Thank you for sharing this this so openly. There’s a lot of clarity here.

[ge****]

You should read The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Vander Kolk. Trauma wires into your nervous system, and whatever ACE or other experiences you have had accumulate. A skilled trauma trained therapist can really help. I say this from watching a loved one deteriorate from ADHD + Acute Trauma + PTSD. But yes…your body has a subconscious spidey sense and you should listen to it, even if it is overactive at times.

[pushyourlimits63]

Reading this, along with the replies, would you not say that this is gut instinct? I'm sure we have all been there at one time or another where out head is saying one thing and our gut is in polar opposite, then we wrestle with our head rationalising everything and our gut telling us this feel right etc. personally speaking my gut instinct has very rarely let me down.