When Anxiety Hits Your Body First: Listening to the Signs Before Your Mind Catches Up

(air hissing) (mouse clicking) (gentle music) Headspace Studios. (gentle music continues) Hey friends, it's Rosie here, and welcome to "Radio Headspace." So a few years ago I was on my way to teach a workshop. I was visiting my mom in Texas and the sun was already unforgiving, one of those mornings where it feels like the heat is coming for your soul. I was teaching a session I've led dozens, maybe hundreds of times, nothing out of the ordinary, but as I pulled into the parking lot, I felt this heaviness in my chest, like something was sitting right on top of it. My heart was racing, my jaw was clenched. I wasn't even nervous, at least not consciously. Everything was technically fine, but my body had already made the decision, "We're on high alert." So today, I wanna talk about the mental loop of anxiety, how our thoughts can spiral and pull us away from presence. But what do you do when anxiety shows up in your body before you even realize what you're feeling, that tightness in your chest, the shallow breathing, the weird buzzing in your arms, or the sudden need to do something, anything to make it stop. Yeah, that kind of anxiety. So back to Texas. I sat in my rental car hands gripping the steering wheel and thought, "Why now? What's wrong with me?" But that's the thing about anxiety, it doesn't wait for logic or context, it doesn't ask for your permission, and sometimes it just shows up. The irony of it wasn't lost on me. I was literally about to walk into a room and teach tools for managing stress, and I was in it. (gentle music continues) That day, I had to go back to the basics. I rolled down the window, I took a deep breath, I placed one hand on my chest, one hand on my belly, and I asked myself, "What am I feeling that I haven't acknowledged yet?" It wasn't fear about teaching, it was everything else: the pace, the pressure, the juggling of family, work, emails, expectations. I'd been in motion all day for days checking in with everyone but myself. My body wasn't failing me, it was sending me a message. And in that moment, I could hear my Althea's voice in my head, it was like a whisper from the past, (Rosie speaking Spanish) (Rosie speaking Spanish) which means worry doesn't take away tomorrow's pain, but it does take away today's peace. That saying always hits me because anxiety wants to keep us safe, but it often does so by robbing us of the very stillness we need to feel okay. And it reminded me of something a trauma teacher once told me, the body speaks first, the mind is just slower to translate. Anxiety isn't just in your mind, it's in your body. And often your body knows you're overwhelmed before your thoughts do. When we learn to listen to those physical...