I didn’t think the answer was in my feet

Ten years ago I would have rolled my eyes at “feel your feet.

If something felt off, my conclusion was fairly clear:

I needed to think harder.

.

At the time, I was a speechwriter.Finance. Politics.

Constant pressure. But I loved my job. It was fast.

Demanding. Precise. You don’t get to be vague in those environments.

Still, something in me felt… off.

Not in a way that justified a big decision. Just enough to be there.

Muted is probably the closest word.

So I did what made sense to me.

I tried to understand it.

My body. My emotions. Patterns. Reactions.

I was very willing to look inward. Just mostly from the neck up.

And if that didn’t work, I assumed I hadn’t thought about it well enough yet.

What I didn’t consider was that the issue might not be a lack of insight.

It might be that I wasn’t actually staying with what I felt.

I was explaining it. Moving past it.

What I didn’t see was how often I was leaving myself in small moments.

Saying yes while my jaw clenched.

Talking myself out of a hesitation.

Pushing through and calling it discipline.

To me this felt like being capable. The shift didn’t start with a new role.

It started in a place I had previously dismissed. Actually listening to what my body was telling me so clearly. To slow down just a bit.

Not answering immediately. Letting something register before I decided what it meant.

Over time, I moved closer to my body. Meditation, yoga, dance. Being more present in what I was already doing.

And something changed. I stopped negotiating against myself.

I worked with my body, no longer against it.

And from there, things on the outside shifted too.

I didn’t leave my high-stakes work.

I stayed. But without leaving my body - or me.

I became even an embodiment coach.

It turns out the suggestion I once dismissed wasn’t entirely wrong.

I just didn’t think the answer would start there.

With my feet.