Chapter 9: Giving Voice to the Warrior’s Body

In the last two chapters, we saw that the body carries a story, not just the mind. We started reclaiming it by recalling sensory details.

Now we’ll fold those details into our story. 

You did the hard work. This step is lighter and more about organizing. We’re just plugging the sensations you uncovered in the last chapter into the story you’ve already written.

You've reached a turning point. We're not just retelling the story. We’re giving voice to the version our body has carried in silence.

Steps for this section

This round is simple. It's more like fitting puzzle pieces together.

Up to now, we used handwriting because it helps details surface slowly. For this section, switch to a digital document so you can edit easily.

1. Open a new document on your phone or laptop and copy over your handwritten story. (Speech-to-text can speed this up.)
2. Keep the document double-spaced.
3. We'll work on one small chunk at a time (2–4 paragraphs). Keep your Chapter 8 notes open beside you. 
4. Choose which sensory details to keep. Keep the ones that pull you into the scene, mark an important change, or help you feel the moment in your body as you read it back. Not every sensory detail you uncovered in Chapter 8 needs to be included. If a detail doesn’t pull you deeper into the moment or affect what you feel, set it aside for now. When in doubt, keep it. At this stage, more sensory detail is better than less.
5. Weave in the details. Add the sensory details you kept to the sentences where they belong in your document.

Here’s one way that can look:

Example

My draft from Chapter 6 (first-person)
A car is pulling up to me at the checkpoint. Looks like another Iraqi local. Middle-aged. Male. I lean my head down to the passenger side window, point to my M4, and ask, “Ayu 'aslihatin?” <any weapons?>. He shakes his head no. I point to the glove compartment and say, “Aiftah hadha” <open this>. He seems confused. My eyes scan around while I wait for him to respond. Wait, what is that? Is that a rifle barrel poking out from under the passenger seat? Ahh shit, c’mon dude, why not just say something? A voice in my head says, "He’s not a threat. He looks like he's a father. Let him go to his family." Another voice says, "What if I’m wrong? What if he shoots someone on my team?" I notice he looks worried. I raise my rifle, point it at him and shout down the road to my squad leader, "Need some help here!"

My notes after asking the Eight Questions (things I remembered):

• Smell: the afternoon air was hot and dusty
• See: he stared straight ahead
• Thoughts: I remember thinking I had power over him, and that he didn’t seem like a threat, he seemed like a dad. I also worried about what would happen if I was wrong.
• Body Inside: my heart started pounding when I saw the rifle tip. His body was trembling. My arms tingled.
• Body Surface: flak jacket pressing into me. Shirt was sweaty.

Revised Draft (after weaving in the sensory details)
A car pulls up to me at the checkpoint. The afternoon air is so hot it smells hot. Looks like another Iraqi local. Middle-aged. Male. My flak jacket presses into my uniform. My brown undershirt is soaked with sweat. I lean toward the passenger side window and point to my M4. “Ayu 'aslihatin?” I ask. He shakes his head no, eyes locked forward, staring through the windshield. I point to the glove compartment. “Aiftah hadha.” He seems confused. My eyes scan the tiny car, waiting for him to respond... Wait, what is that? Is that the tip of a rifle poking out from under the passenger seat? Ahh shit. It is. My heart starts pounding. C’mon dude, why not just say something? I notice a faint trembling in his rigid body. Tingles crawl up my arms. He’s afraid of me. The power I have over this old man hits me all at once. A voice in my head says, "He’s not a threat. He’s probably a father. Let him go home to his family." Another voice says, "What if I’m wrong? What if he shoots someone on my team?" His face tightens. He looks worried. I raise my M4 and point it at him. Dammit, this feels wrong. But what choice do I have? I turn my head down the road and shout, “Need some help here!”

Why sensory details matter

When I stepped back into that memory and asked the Eight Questions, new details came up naturally. Those details draw me back into the scene just enough to feel it clearly and safely, so I can understand it more fully.

Remember, the goal here isn’t to embellish or “tell a good story.” It’s to describe what really happened, as true to life as we can.

Keeping the focus on how our body remembers it.

This helps our survival brain make sense of what happened. It’s no longer too much or too fast. Now we can digest those old emotions and nervous system signals, one bite at a time.

The more sensory detail we add, the more vividly the memory comes to life, and the more our nervous system can reframe its relationship to that moment from a place of safety and understanding now.

I’m reminded of something Dr. Bessel van der Kolk wrote in The Body Keeps the Score:

The trauma that started “out there” is now played out on the battlefield of their own bodies, usually without a conscious connection between what happened back then and what is going on right now inside. The challenge is not so much learning to accept the terrible things that have happened, but learning how to gain mastery over one’s internal sensations and emotions. Sensing, naming, and identifying what is going on inside is the first step to recovery.

Like I wrote earlier, our nervous system is like the black box on a plane. It doesn’t just record the crash; it remembers the terrain, the weather, and the moment before the storm.

We pulled the black box from the wreckage in the last chapter. That's when we started sensing and naming what had been going on inside.

This step gives the body’s record a voice.

Let’s keep at it. Set a short timer and start weaving those sensory details into your story. Weaving is a warrior skill when we’re mending a torn story.

If the emotional charge rises while you're doing this, soften your jaw, and drop your shoulders. Long, slow breath in, filling the lungs to the bottom. Long, slow breath out. Pause. Check in with your support teammate if you need to.

Then keep writing. Stay with it until the timer goes off. Stay steady. This is the victory lap. Enjoy bringing this home.

We’re building the full story now, one piece at a time. The body’s version is finally part of it. Nothing left behind.

When your new version matches what your body remembers, you've finished the storytelling work of Part I: What Happened?

Move on to Chapter 10: Two Antidotes to Pain

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