The Health Benefits of Paying Attention: Noticing the Feedback That Was There All Along
Updated: Aug 11
Thought For The Week
Life is busy.
We rush from one thing to the next, filling our days with work, meetings, school runs, exercise classes, shopping, meal preparation, washing, cleaning, and all the other jobs that keep piling up on the to-do list. Before we know it, it's bedtime, we fall asleep, the alarm goes off, and we’re up doing it all over again.
But when our attention is always focused on the next thing, we can move through entire days paying little attention to how we’re feeling.
We don't notice that we're tired until we become exhausted.
That we're carrying tension until we’ve got a raging headache.
That we've been saying yes to everyone else and neglecting our own needs.
That we don't quite feel ourselves around certain people.
The signs are often there long before they become impossible to ignore.
All we need is a pause.
A chance to slow down long enough to notice the things that are so easy to miss when life's moving at full speed.
That a walk outdoors leaves us feeling calmer.
That cooking from scratch leaves us feeling better than grabbing something on the go.
That we laugh more around certain people.
That we're at our best after a good night's sleep.
We can only learn from, appreciate, and respond to the signals we notice. And the more we pay attention, the richer the feedback becomes.
We begin to understand what leaves us feeling energised, and what drains us. The habits that support our wellbeing, and the ones that gradually chip away at it.
Perhaps that's one of the greatest benefits of paying attention. It helps us spend less time living on autopilot, and more time making choices that leave us feeling healthy, happy and more like ourselves.
Exercise Focus
Many of us approach exercise by focusing on the weight we're lifting, the number of reps, the calories we're burning, or how quickly we’re getting through the session.
Last weekend I ran a couple of Movement Quality workshops. Instead of focusing on external outcomes, we slowed things right down, turned our attention inwards, and paid closer attention to balance, stability, alignment, tempo, and breathing.
As soon as the focus shifted from performing the movement to experiencing it, people started picking up on the body's more subtle signals.
They created tension through their core without holding their breath.
They felt the spread of their feet and built a more stable foundation.
They maintained the full range of movement throughout each rep.
They recognised the moment they began to compensate.
This ability to sense where our body is in space, how it's moving, and how much effort it's producing is known as proprioception. Like any skill, it can be developed. And one of the simplest ways to do that is to slow things down every now and then and really pay attention.
So the next time you're training, rather than rushing through every repetition, choose just one movement. Slow it down, pay attention, and notice what changes. You may find your body has been giving you valuable feedback all along — you've just been moving too quickly to notice it.
Nutrition Focus
We eat at our desks, in the car, standing in the kitchen, or while scrolling through our phones, often paying little attention to how hungry we are, how satisfied we feel, or how the food leaves us feeling afterwards.
Just as proprioception describes our awareness of our body's position and movement, interoception describes our awareness of our body's internal signals, such as hunger, fullness, and satiety.
It's the ability to notice that you're starting to feel hungry before you become ravenous.
That you've had enough before you feel uncomfortably full.
That you're reaching for a snack because you're stressed, rather than because your body needs food.
That one meal leaves you feeling satisfied all afternoon, while another has you thinking about food again
an hour later.
Or that you feel more energised after some meals than others.
Research over the last decade has highlighted just how important interoception is. People with a greater awareness of these internal cues often find it easier to regulate their eating, while lower levels of interoception have been linked to emotional eating and disordered eating patterns.
Like proprioception, interoception develops through paying attention. And the more we notice, the easier it becomes to understand what our body needs and make choices that genuinely support our health and wellbeing.
Explore More
From the archive: Self-Awareness vs Self-Surveillance: How Tracking Metrics and Data Work Against You explores the difference between paying attention to ourselves and constantly tracking data. While self-awareness helps us better understand our needs, self-surveillance can sometimes distract us from them.
From the archive: Looking Back to Move Forward: Finding Clarity Through Reflection explores how taking time to reflect can reveal patterns that are easy to miss in the moment, helping us better understand ourselves and make choices that better support our health and wellbeing.
Book: In The Joy of Movement, Kelly McGonigal explores how movement offers far more than physical health benefits. When we pay attention, exercise can help us feel more connected to ourselves, to other people, and to the world around us.
Takeaway
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