There is a river inside your body.
You can't see it. But you can feel it.
When you are happy, the river runs fast and warm. It feels like jumping. Like your feet can't stay still. Like the laugh that comes out before you can stop it.
When you are sad, the river moves slow and deep. It feels like your chest is heavy. Like you want to be still. Like a hug would feel really good right now.
When you are angry, the river rushes hot and big. It feels like your hands want to grab something. Like a scream is pushing up from your belly. Like you could run as fast as you can and not get tired.
When you are scared, the river gets tight. It feels like your heart is beating fast and your legs want to run. Like you can't breathe all the way in. Like something bad is about to happen.
Feelings are the river moving through you.
They are supposed to move. That is what feelings do. They come. They move through your body. They leave.
This is how your body was built.
But sometimes, the river gets blocked.
Maybe something happens that is too big. Too scary. Too sad. Too confusing. Your body gets ready -- heart beating fast, hands ready to push, legs ready to run -- but you can't do any of those things.
Maybe you are too small.
Maybe the person who hurt you is the same person who is supposed to keep you safe.
Maybe you tried to cry and someone said, "Stop crying. You're fine."
Maybe you tried to be mad and someone said, "Don't talk back to me."
Maybe you tried to run and there was nowhere to go.
So the river stops. The feeling doesn't leave. It stays in your body.
Your shoulders hold it. Your jaw holds it. Your stomach holds it. Your chest holds it.
You don't forget it in your brain. Your brain could forget the whole thing and it wouldn't matter. Because your body remembers. Your body is still holding the getting-ready.
And your body doesn't know the thing is over. Your body thinks it is still happening.
More days come. More feelings come.
Each time a feeling can't move through, another block goes on the pile.
It doesn't have to be a big thing. It can be small things, over and over. A thousand tiny moments when you needed to cry and didn't. When you needed to yell and swallowed it. When you needed to run and stayed still.
The pile gets bigger. The river gets slower. The blocks stack up.
And something starts to change.
Your body gets ready faster now. Things that didn't used to bother you start to bother you a lot. Someone's voice gets a little sharp and your chest is on fire. A small thing goes wrong and you feel like everything is wrong. You don't know why. You just feel it.
You start to move around the pile. You avoid things that might make the river move. You stay busy so you don't have to feel what's waiting. You can't sit still. You don't like the quiet. You reach for something -- a screen, a snack, anything -- to keep your hands busy and your mind quiet.
You start acting different. Not because you chose to. Because the pile is giving orders now.
And here is the trickiest part:
You start to think the pile IS you.
"This is just how I am," you say. "I'm just a person who gets mad fast." "I'm just someone who can't sit still." "I'm just shy." "I'm just always tired."
But that's not who you are. That's the pile talking.
Who you are is the one who notices the pile.
This is the most important part of the whole story.
You don't fix the pile from inside the pile.
You have to get a little bit above it.
Just a tiny bit. Like climbing onto the bank of the river and looking at the water instead of being in it.
You start to notice:
When your chest gets tight like that, you always reach for your screen.
When someone raises their voice, your hands start shaking -- but the thing they said wasn't even scary. It was just their voice.
When you feel that heavy feeling in your stomach, you don't want anyone to touch you.
You see the patterns. You see what your body does when the pile talks.
You don't have to fix it. You don't have to understand it. You just have to see it. Just for ten seconds.
Ten seconds of noticing changes something. Because noticing makes a tiny space -- a tiny space between the pile and you.
In that tiny space, something new can happen.
Your body wants to finish what it started.
The getting-ready energy is still in there. It wants to move. It wants to complete.
Maybe you need to shake. Like a dog shaking water off its back. Your body might tremor and tremble. That's the river starting to move again.
Maybe you need to cry. Not the kind of crying where you're trying to explain anything. Just the kind where the tears come and your body heaves and there's no story attached to it. Just the feeling moving through.
Maybe you need to move. Run. Stomp. Push against something. Let the big energy find its way out.
This is the part you can't do alone. Not at first.
You need someone safe. Someone who can sit with you and not try to fix it. Someone who doesn't say "it's okay" or "don't cry" or "calm down." Someone who just stays.
Their job is not to make it stop. Their job is to keep you safe while it moves.
This is called a witness.
A witness is not someone who fixes the pile. A witness is someone who sits with you while the river starts flowing again.
Something happens when someone else is there. You can feel the feeling without being swallowed by it. You can let the river move without being swept away.
The other person's presence is like a mirror. You see yourself in it. You see that you are not the pile. You are the one the river is moving through.
When the river flows again, you notice something.
The ground underneath the pile was always there.
It was flat. It was steady. It was you.
The pile wasn't you. The pile was the shape your feelings took when they couldn't move. But you were always underneath.
You didn't need to be fixed. You needed the river to flow again.
And here's the thing that might be the most important thing of all:
You didn't build the pile on purpose.
It wasn't your fault.
The feelings came when you were too small or too stuck or too alone. The river got blocked because that's what rivers do when there's nowhere to go. The pile grew because that's what piles do.
You were just a kid with a body that was doing its job.
And your body -- even now -- knows how to let feelings move through.
It never forgot.
It was waiting.