Reconnect with your body and reclaim your peace: A culturally safe approach to managing stress

How can listening to your body reduce stress? What practical steps can you take to connect your mind and body? Why cultural safety matters in emotional well-being.

Understanding your body’s stress response

Have you ever noticed how your heart races when you are anxious  or stomach churn when walking into an unfamiliar space or how your muscles tense up when you are angry? These reactions are not random, they are part of your body’s natural response to stress.

In many Black and African communities, we have been taught to “push through” discomfort, to be strong and to keep moving. But what if strength also meant pausing to listen to your body’s signals before stress builds up? Understanding the connection between your body and mind is the first step to healing. When you learn to tune in and respond intentionally, you gain more control over your emotional well-being.

The body’s stress response is driven by a powerful mechanism known as the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS).

The ANS has two main settings:

• Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS) activates the ‘fight, flight, freeze, or fawn’ responses. When triggered, it prepares your body to respond to perceived threats by increasing your heart rate, breathing and muscle tension.
• Parasympathetic Nervous System (PNS) works to bring you back to a state of calm by promoting relaxation, digestion and healing.

When we you experience stress, you get stuck in the SNS response. This is where your body often communicates the stress through physical sensations such as a tight jaw when angry (e.g. fight response), fidgeting legs when anxious (e.g. flight response), numbness when overwhelmed (e.g. freeze response) or body tension from people-pleasing (e.g. fawn response).

When stress is constant, your body can get stuck in survival mode making you feel tired, anxious or disconnected. Imagine you are at a family gathering and someone makes a comment about your weight. You feel your chest tighten, your stomach churn and your hands begin to shake. This is your body communicating your current stress state. Recognising these signs allows you to choose how to respond rather than being controlled by the emotional reaction. This awareness is called interoceptive awareness which is your ability to sense, understand and respond to your body’s signals.

Taking practical steps for mind-body connection

Interoceptive awareness is about knowing what is happening in your body and responding intentionally. Studies show that people with higher interoceptive awareness are better at regulating their emotions and enhancing their well-being. This process involves recognising your body’s signals and using techniques to calm your nervous system.

To start this journey, you can try these practical exercises from the Getting Started Mental Health Care Package ‘Body Awareness Workbook’:

1. Self-assessment of how well you listen to your body

You will be introduced to the Multidimensional Assessment of Interoceptive Awareness (MAIA) which helps you identify patterns in how you respond to your body’s signals. For example:

• Do you notice when your breathing changes under stress?
• Can you tell when your body needs rest before exhaustion hits?
• How well do you trust your gut instincts?

By understanding where you stand, you can improve your ability to respond to stress early rather than letting it overwhelm you.

2. Journaling prompts to notice your emotional and physical patterns

Journaling helps connect emotions to body sensations and uncover patterns. The workbook has numerous prompts for you to try such as:

• “When I feel anxious, I notice my body reacts by…”
• “The last time I felt safe and relaxed, my body felt…”
• “A moment when my body told me something before my mind caught up was…”

Here is an example of how journaling can help.

You have had a stressful week at work. While journaling, you realise that every time you feel stressed or  overwhelmed, your shoulders tense up and you clench your jaw. Now, you can take action earlier like stretching, breathing deeply or taking a break before stress takes over.

3. Ubuntu challenge: connecting body awareness to community

In African and Black cultures, emotional well-being is communal. The Ubuntu Challenge helps you reflect on how emotions influence not just you but the people around you.

At the end of each day, think about how your emotions shaped your interactions with family, friends or colleagues. Consider how other people’s emotions affected your body’s response. Did you absorb someone else’s stress or energy? Share your reflections with a trusted person or write them down.

For example, you may notice that after comforting a friend going through a tough time, you feel emotionally drained and physically heavy. This awareness helps you set boundaries and care for yourself while still supporting others.

What is body awareness again and why does It matter?

Our upbringing, cultural expectations and lived experiences shape how we respond to stress. Many of us may have inherited resiliency or survival responses which were ways of coping that once protected us but may now keep us stuck in patterns that no longer serve us. Instead of seeing these responses as personal flaws, we can understand them as survival strategies shaped by experiences.

For example:

• If you were raised to always be agreeable to avoid conflict, this might be linked to the fawn response where people-pleasing behaviours emerge as a way to feel safe in environments where you have felt judged or excluded.
• For many in migrant and Black communities, the pressure to work twice as hard to be seen, valued or secure in workplaces or society can activate the fight response. Noticing when you constantly push yourself to prove your worth can help you recognise that this may stem from the societal pressure to work harder for recognition.
• If you struggle to rest without guilt, recognise that this may be linked to generational beliefs that rest is “lazy” rather than necessary for well-being.

When we develop interoceptive awareness, we begin to notice these patterns in our bodies. Instead of defaulting to survival responses, we can break the cycle and choose healthier and more authentic ways of coping.

Your journey to healing and wellness starts here

The Getting Started Mental Health Care Package is designed to guide you through these processes with practical tools and exercises that honour your unique experiences. From self-assessment quizzes to structured journaling prompts, you can gain the skills to reconnect with your body and improve your emotional regulation.

Are you ready to reclaim your peace?

Subscribe to the Getting Started Mental Health Care Package now and take your first step towards a healthier and more balanced life.

Follow us on our social platforms – Instagram, YouTube and Facebook @tabvumamentalhealth and subscribe to our mental health care packages for tips, resources and culturally safe mental health support designed for you.

Until next time,

Tabvuma Mental Health