Not everything you're feeling has to do with now
Sometimes your body remembers something your mind can’t place. And when it does, the feelings that arise don’t feel like “old” feelings or memory— they simply feel like reality now, without a felt sense of pastness.
In this piece, we explore feeling memory: how the past lives in the body, how it colours and shapes your present-day experience without you realising it, and how a soft awareness can help you start to separate yesterday from today, bringing more spaciousness and choice into your life.
A familiar way of remembering
When I was a little girl, ice cream was one of the greatest delights of my world. I grew up in Kenya in the late 70s, where ice cream wasn't something you encountered very often. So in the summers, when we visited my grandmother in Germany, the local ice cream parlour felt like stepping into another universe.
I remember everything about it — the sweet smell of baked waffle cones drifting into the street, the colourful array of flavours lined up behind the glass, the coolness of the shop after stepping in from the warm pavement. I even remember the scent of my grandmother's car, and the texture of the car seat and how it would feel a little sticky and prickly on hot days, and how reliably she would park in the same place, just a few doors down from the shop.
It became our ritual: park the car, run errands, and on the way back, stop at the ice cream shop. Savour it together before heading home.
That memory still makes me smile. I can see it, smell it, feel it — as though it's happening right now… or almost. This kind of remembering is something most of us recognise — and it works in a very particular way.
A lived experiment
I'd like to invite you into a little experiment. If you like, take a moment and think of a positive memory like that from your own life — and it doesn't have to be anything like an ice cream parlour.
It can be something subtle or small, even fleeting:
⟡ the smell of a bakery you walk past
⟡ the sound of a loved one humming in the kitchen
⟡ the taste of your favourite food perhaps from your childhood
⟡ warm grass under your feet in summer
⟡ a swing at a playground
⟡ a flower you love
⟡ a moment with a friend where you felt completely yourself
Let yourself choose something that brings a sense of joy or warmth, even if it is just slight.
And now… allow yourself to let this memory become alive for a moment, feel it, sense it:
Close your eyes if that helps.
Can you remember the atmosphere?
The colours, the smells, the quality of light?
What happens in your face as you do?
Does your face or jaw soften?
Do your eyes brighten or moisten?
Is a smile starting to play with your lips?
How does your whole body feel?
More open, more soft, more settled — or something entirely different?
When body and mind remember together
In moments like the one above, something becomes very clear: your body is feeling something that happened in the past — right now. Your body is remembering with its senses, responses, and feelings. At the same time, your mind understands it as memory, because it can place the experience in time: that was then, this is now.
That shared body-mind understanding is what allows this kind of remembering to feel recognisable as memory. Your mind tracks time, placing the event, like in my case my granny and the ice cream parlour, firmly in the past... but your body doesn't. It simply feels what it feels in the present moment.
When the body remembers without a timeline
The above shared body-mind understanding doesn’t always exist. We also have feeling memory where the brain has no storyline or timeline to anchor. These are feeling memories that perhaps weren't fully integrated for your brain to make that connection to time — or because they happened so early in life, before language and the concept of time were available.
In these cases, your body is sensing and responding in the present moment — while your mind has no way of recognising that what’s being felt belongs to another time. Without that connection to time, this way of experiencing the world can easily feel like “just how things are.” These feelings don’t feel like memory at all.
Memories like this can quietly run your whole experience of life without you knowing or realising.
When old feelings shape the present
Feelings that are rooted in earlier experiences can quietly shape how we relate to ourselves, our work, and our lives. Realising that what we’re experiencing might actually be feeling memory can change how we relate to what’s happening in the present moment. It allows us to understand that what we’re feeling now may belong to the past, and belongs to a younger version of ourselves rather than something that solely has to do with the situation you’re actually in — even though it doesn’t feel that way right now.
When we begin to hold this understanding, it gives us a different way of relating to what we feel. Not by dismissing our emotions, but by orienting them in time — recognising what belongs to the past, and what truly belongs to the present. Sometimes this shift alone is enough to change how we respond to ourselves and to our lives. In some cases, we may need support to help integrate and release these emotions back into time.
When this distinction isn’t available, old feelings often show up later in life in ways that feel confusing or disproportionate to what’s actually happening.
This is a pattern I’ve seen repeatedly, both in my own life and in my work with others.
How this shows up in real life
Here is an example from my own life. In my first business, I freelanced as a translator and teacher. I started it when I left the medical profession and was ready and optimistic: I had courageously stepped onto a completely new professional path which I believed would help me on my on my journey of connecting more to the whispers of my soul. I was ready to set up a business which would give me more time and space to figure out what my soul really wanted.
But instead, I felt more and more overwhelmed — far more than the situation called for.
I couldn't relax. I got stressed with every new contract I had landed instead of celebrating. I had tension and fear around doing things wrong constantly running below the surface, even though my customers highly valued and praised my work. I even started to feel like I couldn't even speak English at all — what on earth was I doing teaching English, writing in English, and translating complex medical literature into English? Who did I think I was? It was rampant imposter syndrome and trauma that was still alive from my school days.
Until I realised that these were feelings were coming from a time in my life where I had lived through a lot of stress around language, switching countries and school systems, where I was grappling with the demands of a school life in a new country — and I was not managing. This was ‘transposed’ onto what I was experiencing with my new profession, new systems new clients and people.
It took me a few years to make that connection, because at the time I didn’t yet know what I’m sharing with you now. But once I could see that the intensity I was feeling came from real situations I had lived as a child, I could begin to respond differently to my present day situtations. With support, I started to care for that younger part — so that I could navigate the demands of my business from a much more resourced, adult place.
What changes when we notice
When feeling memories are activated — as they often are in everyday life — they rise through the body as sensations, emotions, impulses, and familiar patterns of response. Without awareness, these reactions can easily feel like present reality.
Holding this in awareness can help you realise: "Oh… I'm not overreacting. I'm remembering. My system is remembering.” This isn't an invitation to spiral into the negative feelings of the past. But what it does help you do is bring your awareness, kindness and curiosity for what you are experiencing now — and it gives you a starting place to separate the past from the present. It's a tool to give you more clarity and choice in the now.
A gentle, empowering question you might take with you and ask yourself every now and then:
"Is this feeling — or the degree of this feeling — really appropriate for the present moment?" and "How much of my past might be playing a role here?"
When you can begin to separate what belongs to now from what belongs to the past, everything softens.
You gain spaciousness. You gain understanding. And you gain a deeper freedom of choice in the moment you're actually living, even if it in challenging times.
Cultivating this kind of awareness can start to change everything. And sometimes it's easy to explore this on your own. Other times, you might need support — especially when the feelings involved are layered, confusing or overwhelming or deeply somatic.
A gift for you
And if this theme speaks to you, I recorded a video for one of my courses that explored this concept a few years ago.
The content itself is solid — the framework, the examples, the heart of it — but I'll be honest: the production quality doesn't match what I offer now. The sound and slides are very imperfect, and the pacing slower than how I'd craft it today.
I'm sharing it anyway because the message matters and can be very empowering to hold in awareness. It might serve you exactly where you are right now. Sometimes 'good enough and available' beats 'perfect and postponed.'
Step by step, it may help you change how you move through your day or specific situations.
You might even recognise parts of the ice-cream story :) So if you're curious to explore a little more, you can watch it below.
Trauma-informed intuitive guide and soulful embodiment coach with a background rooted in science and spirit.
Your energy and presence are gifts to share with the world — even if they are deeply quiet. They are the very fuel that helps you transform your life and truly flourish.
You can tap into this when you ground in the essence of being you.
That’s what this blog is here to hold: reflections from my own long journey home to myself, interwoven with the insights I’ve gained through years of lived experience and training.
Warmly, Julia
Author’s note:
This work has taken form through a mix of professional training in somatic and trauma-informed approaches, mindfulness, and parts work, and through my own lived experience.