Where's The Stress?!

A study I once read showed that men feel stress and tension more in the thighs and buttocks, whereas women feel their stress more in the upper bodies! (Maybe this accounts for why men’s butts tend to stay slim as they grow older? All that tension must keep the gluteal muscles nice and taut!)
Seriously, stress- producing emotions, like all emotions, live in our bodies – in every cell! I don’t need research - recent or otherwise - to tell me this; I feel it in my own body. I feel love in my chest, anger in my jaw, worry in my neck, caring in my cheeks, loneliness in my shoulders, and humor in my stomach & collar-bone(!).
Do you know where in your body you feel your various emotions? I am sure you have a rough idea of where you take your stress. In my experience, most people are usually aware of 2 or 3 places. After increasing our self-awareness, we can often quickly notice 30, 40 or more and a whole new dialogue develops, a dialogue that can inform us often long before we otherwise would be conscious of an emotion ‘brewing’ like for example irritation, offering us the opportunity to intervene, take a break and change it. OR if we catch ourselves feeling say appreciation, which could be fleeting, our awareness can allow us to relish it, and extend it to last and benefit us for sometimes hours! The body is an amazing source of information and paying attention to what it is telling us can actually improve our stress- management, our communication skills and even our intelligence – give it a try!!