Ever have a twisting stomach? Butterflies before a class presentation? What about a jerky leg when time is moving too slow?

These feelings come through your sixth sense: Interoception.

Interoception is the awareness of sensations inside your body. Just as when you touch a spoon you might feel the cold handle, rounded top, and hard, smoothness of metal, inside we have sensations and feelings in our bodies. The sixth sense communicates our emotions, premonitions, as well as physically oriented feelings like pain.

Interoception communication is a key part of who you are, but many of us are nearly dear to what it’s telling us. While the other half of us have volume turned up too high. Whether or not we can sense emotions, and where we feel them in our body, is often related to how well we are listening to all of the internal messages sent.

Just as with sight, sound, and other senses, interoception improves upon practice. Learning to stop and listen generally results in noticing noises we might not otherwise hear: like a car passing through the rain, a drop falling outside, or birds singing. Stopping to notice rather than rushing through life might result in catching details we might otherwise miss, like the many different colors brightened by the rain. And, when we listen to our sensations inside the sounds, textures and feelings can be heard and noticed. A warm feeling in the legs when curled up underneath you. The sense of warmth in your stomach while you hold a little one’s hand. A strength in your chest when you’ve completed a challenging goal.  

Befriending interoception is a key part of mental wellness. Mindfully paying attention to internal sensations helps process emotions, adjust thought patterns, and even alter habits and behavior.  When we take notice, we can name layers of our heart and become a compassionate witness to one’s own story.

That twisting stomach every time you go to work may have something to do with why you’re always late. Maybe your child refuses to eat spaghetti because their throat closes and are implicitly reminded of hard, hard, things.

Interoception is key to helping process old brain patterns and writing new ones. Just as much as our eyes communicate daylight or darkness, interoception communicates comfort, or distress. As our brain writes new pathways, awareness of interoception can deepen and strengthen the paths we want to grow.