Your Body Knows Before You Do

The subtle signals we ignore, the cost of overriding them, and the practice of staying with what’s true

Welcome to this edition of Walking the Liminal!

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The Moment Before Words

It came so innocently, almost imperceptible…
a slight contraction in my belly,
a tightening in my chest.
Subtle. Familiar.

Over time, I’ve learned to recognize these sensations. Mostly nondescript yet carrying important information.

There was something said in that meeting that didn’t quite land. Not wrong. Just slightly off.
As if part of the picture was missing.
As if something beneath the words wasn’t being named.
As if the conversation was moving just a little too fast.

There it was.
The moment of discernment. The moment of choice.

A pause where I could have stayed with what I was sensing, maybe even responded from there. But I moved past it. I nodded, kept up with the pace of conversation.

And almost immediately, something in me shifted…
Heaviness settled in.
A cloud slowly descended.
Like picking up a load that wasn’t mine to carry.
I could feel myself adjusting…
Withdrawing, even if just slightly.

Nothing happened, outwardly. Yet, inwardly, the clarity I felt moments prior began to blur. My connection with myself and the group felt less alive. I was still present, but no longer fully coherent.

And still, the signals didn’t stop. Instead, they shifted, pointing me to the internal consequence of moving past what I sensed.

Not as judgment.
Not as punishment.
Just information.
Still there.
Still speaking.

Simply… signaling.

A Layer Beneath Language

There is a layer of intuitive knowing that lives beneath both our verbal and nonverbal language. Not abstract, but immediate. Not complicated, but simple.

It can even feel magical or mystical. Which, in some ways, it is. And perhaps it feels that way because we’ve made it something distant, something rare. And so, when we come into presence with it, it carries an almost exceptional quality.

And this way of knowing is part of our nature, our biology.

Our bodies and nervous systems are constantly receiving and responding. They register tone, timing, correspondence, as well as incongruence. They sense what lands and what doesn’t. What feels open, and what feels just off.

The body knows before our minds decide. It registers instantly. Yet, to notice it requires presence, enough to catch what arises before it passes. For the mind arrives moments later… organizing, explaining, sometimes even rewriting the experience to fit what’s easier to hold.

Psychology names this in its own way, the recognition that there are two different processes at play in how we make sense of our world. One immediate, intuitive, beneath conscious awareness. The other slower, more deliberate, concerned with logic and explanation.

Both are necessary.

But they don’t move at the same speed. And this is where that first communication can be lost.

Because it doesn’t command.
It doesn’t argue.
It doesn’t try to convince.
It simply… signals.

The Quiet Override

If we’re not attuned to this inner language, it’s easy to move past it, replaced by something more articulate, more acceptable, more easily understood.

Most of the time, we override it. Not because we’re unaware. But because we’ve learned to.
To maintain harmony.
To avoid being seen as wrong.
To be accepted.
To belong.

And more than that, we’ve been conditioned away from it. Systemically. Quietly. Repeatedly. Taught:
To doubt what cannot be explained.
To trust what’s external over what’s internal.
To consume the world… rather than be in relationship with it.

So, the moment passes. The information moves through… and is dismissed.

The body softens into compliance. The mind steps in to make sense of things.

It’s fine.
It’s not a big deal.
I probably misread that.

But maybe you didn’t.
Our intuition doesn’t stop.
It simply… signals.

The Cost of Silence

What goes unacknowledged doesn’t disappear. It becomes a normalized dissonance in the body, an internal drift.

A turning away.
A slight distance from yourself.
A pattern that begins to shape how you show up, what you allow, what you no longer question.

There are structures in our world that both benefit and depend on this. That rely on your compliance. Your silence. Your disconnection from what you know.

And over time, these incremental self-abandonments begin to take a toll. Physically. Psychologically. Relationally.

As increased stress: an underlying tension from the constant override.
As anxiety: cycles of doubt that erode trust in our own perception.
As imbalance: a life that looks coherent on the outside but feels fragmented within.
As health issues: the body carrying what the voice did not express.

A quiet diminishing of well-being. So gradual it’s easy to miss… until it isn’t.

And still, our intuition remains.
It doesn’t force.
It doesn’t disappear.

It simply… signals.

Learning to Stay

Art by Tamara Phillips. Etsy - Deepcolouredwater

The practice isn’t to react or to bypass. It’s to stay.

To notice the moment when something in you shifts… to not immediately move past it.

To let the signal exist without needing to resolve it.
To feel the sensation without rushing to explain it.
To allow the “no” to be there… without softening or overriding it.

This calls for discernment. And discernment takes time and presence.

A willingness to remain with what is felt, without turning it into something more acceptable. To sense the difference between embodied knowing and a triggered response. To speak from grounded clarity, rather than from charge or urgency.

And from there, something more honest can emerge.

A boundary.
A different kind of listening.
A subtle but real shift in how you are with another.

Truth, in this way, isn’t performative. It isn’t about speaking perfectly or naming every nuance. It’s relational. It lives in the space between what is sensed and how we choose to meet it.

A Quiet Honesty

There is a quiet honesty available in every moment.

Not loud.
Not urgent.
Just present.
Waiting.

It lives in the pause before you agree,
in the knowing that arises before you explain it away.

And the question isn’t whether it’s there.

The question is whether you will stay long enough to notice it…
before it becomes something more reasonable, easier to hold.

This kind of honesty doesn’t ask for perfection.

Only that you begin to notice.
That you begin to remain.
That you remember.

Because what speaks in those moments…
quiet, immediate, and often dismissed…
is not something separate from you.

It is you.

And it has been speaking all along.

It simply… signals.

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A Few Questions to Sit With

• What does your body’s language feel like when something is aligned? When something is off?
• Can you sense the difference between intuition and a triggered response in your own body?
• What might change if you trusted the first signal, with presence and discernment?

Offerings:

I offer tarot readings and one-on-one sessions, a held space of reflection designed to accompany your inner explorations, integrations and alignment with the rhythms of life. If this resonates, feel free to send me a message or visit my website for more information.

Thanks for reading!

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