Where Doubt Lives in the Body: Anxiety, Overthinking, and Self-Worth
Some people think of doubt as a voice in the mind.
I tend to notice it first in my body. My breath as it shortens, followed by a low hum of unease in the stomach, with a small part of me watching from the outside, trying to make sense of it. Then comes the thinking:
What am I doubting? Is it valid? If so, why? If not, why not?
Can I trust myself and what I’m feeling?
This is how it shows up for me: anxiety first, overanalysis next. What about you?
I know for my clients and others it can be different. Some go quiet and look away; one professional I know deflects with a quick laugh every time something lands a little too close. Another binge and purge when things feel out of control, someone else ghosts, not because they don’t care, but because the vulnerability feels unbearable. It makes me wonder, perhaps you’ve been ghosted, and the silence left behind taught you something about your own worth.
We all have our ways of protecting the most tender parts of ourselves; these aren’t quirks, they’re clues. Somatic signals from a system that's still waiting to feel safe enough to trust your worth.
In Internal Family Systems (IFS), we understand these reactions as protective parts at work, for example, intelligent, overworked, and often exhausted. The internal parts of us learn to scan, to guard, to intercept anything that might reawaken pain, but the threat they’re working so hard to avoid is often no longer here. Still, the strategies stay. Why? Because they’ve kept us alive, because they once worked, because we’ve forgotten there might be another way.
I’m nearly finished reading Worthy by Jamie Kern Lima alongside some of my clients. We’re still exploring what it means to separate our self-worth from our survival strategies. To stop performing and start belonging, as well as to stop proving and start softening. With this I’ve noticed we’re beginning to ask:
What gets buried when we stay in protection mode?
What parts of us never got to come forward?
What might it mean to come home to ourselves, piece by piece?
If you’d like to read along, you can find the book here: Worthy by Jamie Kern Lima (affiliate link)
Working Through This Yourself?
If any part of today’s reflection touched something in you, you don’t need to hold it alone. I offer individual therapy for adults navigating identity, relationships, cultural pressure, or emotional overwhelm — and I run The Navigate Collective for young people aged fifteen to twenty-three who want a gentler place to land.
