If you’re sitting somewhere safe and comfortable, try this: close your eyes and see if you can feel your heartbeat in your chest. Without touching your pulse, can you sense each beat and count its rhythm? Or does it feel like there’s nothing there at all?
This simple practice gives us a glimpse into something called “interoception” – your brain’s ability to sense what’s happening inside your body.
“Researchers and clinicians are recognising interoception as a key mechanism to mental and physical health, where understanding our body’s signals helps us understand and regulate emotional and physical states,” explains Dr. Helen Weng from the University of California, San Francisco.
Interoception is not just about understanding our biology – it’s about understanding ourselves. In the 1990s, Prof. Antonio Damasio of the University of Southern California introduced the concept of “somatic markers.” He explained that emotions begin with subtle changes in our bodily state, like muscles tensing or a quickening heartbeat when we see a threat, such as an angry dog. This physical response happens before we’re even conscious of the emotion. Through interoception, the brain picks up on these changes, and that’s when we actually feel the emotion.
Without this feedback loop between the body and brain, feelings like joy, sadness, or excitement simply wouldn’t exist. In fact, Damasio’s work showed how critical this connection is: patients with damage to parts of the brain responsible for this feedback reported knowing how they should feel (e.g., shock when seeing a car crash), but they didn’t actually experience the emotion. And when they lacked that emotional connection, even simple decisions, like choosing a meal from a menu, became overwhelming.
This reveals something profound: interoception is deeply tied to intuition – that inner knowing when something feels “right” or “wrong.” Interoception is also deeply important in my concept of Embodied Sensemaking.
The Spectrum of Awareness
Interestingly, many people without brain damage also struggle to connect with their body’s signals. Much of this has to do with the chronic stress of the modern world and our prior trauma. We often limit or lose our sense of interception because that which we feel in our body can feel overwhelming, uncomfortable, or we may not know what to do with or how to process what’s there. To improve survival, we wire our awareness to cut off from our internal sense.
Scientists measure interoceptive awareness in various ways, like asking someone to count their heartbeats without touching their pulse or checking if they can match their heartbeat to a sound. Others use surveys to see how often people notice their body’s signals, like a tight chest or an upset stomach.
What’s fascinating is that our ability to tune into these signals seems linked to how well we manage our emotions. If you can accurately sense what’s happening in your body, you’re likely better at understanding your feelings and making clear, grounded decisions.
On the flip side, when this connection is impaired, it can have far-reaching effects. For example, some people with depression show low interoceptive awareness. They might struggle to feel their heartbeat or notice other signals, which can contribute to a sense of numbness or emotional disconnection – the feeling of being unable to “feel” anything at all.
In contrast, people with anxiety often do notice their body’s signals – sometimes too much. But they tend to misinterpret these cues, blowing small changes (like a slightly faster heartbeat) out of proportion. This can spiral into catastrophic thinking and amplify panic. Said another way, this is where we can enter what is often referred to as ‘the trauma vortex,’ a space where tuning into our survival stress can feel overwhelming and ‘stuck.’
Poor interoceptive awareness can even lead to feelings of depersonalization – the sensation of being disconnected from your body – which is often a precursor to psychosis. Interoception helps form our basic sense of self. When this system is off, so is our grounding in reality.
The Promise of Interoceptive Training
So, what can we do about it? When I work with my clients, the first thing we do is build back awareness of the body using specific exercises designed to grow our capacity to sense. Over time, we increase capacity to sense into more difficult feelings like anxiousness or survival stress, so the energy can move and pass.
The more this is practiced, the more regulation returns to the nervous system and the less people feel anxiety to begin with.
Often times I have folks dip their toe into increasing their self awareness through my 5 Days of You Challenge that you can check out here.
Science does back interception training as well. 121 autistic adults, who are at higher risk of anxiety disorders were studied during an interception training program. Half the group practiced detecting their heartbeats, while the others did voice recognition exercises to identify emotions in speech. After six sessions, the heartbeat group showed significantly less anxiety, with 31% fully recovering from their anxiety disorder – compared to just 16% in the control group.
This type of training helps people “de-catastrophize” their physiological responses. In essence, by getting better at sensing and interpreting their body’s signals, they gain more control over their emotional reactions.
Movement and Interoception
Interestingly, physical exercise may also improve interoception. Regular workouts strengthen the body’s systems, like the heart, so they respond more calmly to stress. This physical resilience can translate into emotional resilience.
Strength training, in particular, seems to reduce anxiety by altering the signals our body sends. Science writer Caroline Williams explains: “After strength training, your body feels that it can cope, and so, on some level, you feel a bit more in control of life.”
In this sense, interoception is more than just a sense – it’s a doorway to understanding and improving our mental and emotional well-being.
I often have my clients begin by walking 5 or 10 minutes a day at a quick pace – not full effort, but not a light stroll. If they have more capacity, I encourage them to go for 30 or 45 minutes a day. This movement with a sense of mindfulness while doing it (not just listening to music or podcasts all the time) makes a big difference.
The Bigger Picture
Interoception is gaining attention as a crucial area of research, with conferences and new studies emerging rapidly. But beyond the science, interoception invites us to reconnect with ourselves in a world that often pulls us outward.
Think about it: how often do we stop to truly listen to what our body is saying? In a culture that values productivity over presence, many of us have lost touch with this internal dialogue. Yet, by tuning in, we’re not just managing stress or improving health – we’re building a deeper relationship with ourselves and each other.
The potential here is huge. By learning to interpret our body’s signals, we can break free from cycles of anxiety, depression, or disconnection. More than that, we can rediscover a sense of inner strength and resilience – a feeling that, no matter what life throws our way, we are equipped to handle it.
These skills also feed into greater aspects of health like nervous system regulation. Here, we begin tuning back into what it means to be human and levels of inner peace that are truly our birthright. This state of being also begins to change the lens through which we see the world. Instead of it being a scary dangerous place, or a place where we should have no hope, we can tune into possibility, curiosity, and creativity.
This process isn’t just about healing; it’s about thriving. As we begin to listen to our hearts, we may find that we’re not only caring for the mind but also unlocking the deeper wisdom that connects the two. In doing so, we become more attuned to life itself.
Check out my 5 Days of You Challenge. This simple challenge is designed to help you effortlessly slow down, get back in tune with yourself, and find clarity.
It’s powerfully simple, and does not take much time each day, but it delivers meaningful results towards upgraded resilience, energy, and nervous system regulation.
