The Body Knows
AI tells, nervous systems, and communication that actually lands...
(READ all the way to the END for a fun little TREAT!)
Something happens in my body when I'm reading a message, and I realize no human actually wrote it. I feel the wind going right out of my sails...
It's not dramatic. It's more like a small withdrawal or a short breath, the way you feel in a conversation when the other person's eyes go somewhere else. The information is still there. The message lands, but the person doesn't...at least not from inside themselves.
I've been taking note of this more lately...from emails from people I've worked with for years to contract negotiations from clients to check-ins from managers who used to write in their own unique voice.
I see it in apologies, pitches, and notes that look warm at first glance but don't feel that way after they're read. We're all using AI now. I'm learning how to use it, too.
And that's exactly why I want to think carefully with you about when it helps and when it costs you something you didn't know you were spending.
What your nervous system already knows
One of the core ideas in The Field for Human Communication™ is that the body reads for safety before the mind reads for content.
Your nervous system is running a constant scan, not consciously or defensively, but biologically. It's asking: is this real? Is this person actually here? Do I trust what's coming?
That scan happens faster than thought. It's why you can read a perfectly formatted email and still feel vaguely uneasy. It's why some messages make you feel seen and known before you've fully understood what the sender has even said.
AI-generated content tends to trip that scan. Not always, but often enough to name here and to matter everywhere. What sets it off is a particular kind of smoothness. Sentences that are well-constructed but are somehow lifeless, frictionless. A warmth that hits all the right notes but doesn't have a specific memory in it or a nuance or even a typo (rember those? 😉).
Paragraphs that are thorough but don't have a real point of view. Or a section length that feels like it's covering ground rather than saying something meaningful.
And a message that could have been written to almost anyone, not specifically you. I'm willing to bet you've felt this in your bones. I have, too...
The tells
These are some of the patterns that register in our bodies, consciously or unconsciously, as AI-generated. Read through the list and see if you can recognize some of these as yours.
» The opener that belongs to no one."I trust this message finds you well." "I hope you're having a productive week." It isn't that these phrases are wrong; I've even used variations of this before AI. It's just that the person reading knows you sent a version of this to 11 other people today. It arrived addressed to no one in particular. That feeling is subtle, and it accumulates. (I almost always reflexively hit DELETE on these...)
» The stacked fragment."She showed up for every meeting. And for every hard conversation. And for every moment that counted." It feels like emphasis, but it reads like a pattern. The people in your life who receive a lot of messages or read a lot of content have seen this exact construction so many times in the past year that something in them registers this before they've even finished the sentence. That's where your audience gets lost...
» Words you've started using that you never said out loud before. If these have crept into your written communication, that's worth paying attention to. They are words AI reaches for. Most people don't reach for them naturally, and writing that uses them sounds like no one in particular wrote it and further erodes trust and credibility, even if it's subtle. Delve. Underscore. Unlock. Etc.
» The recap at the end of something short. Your message closes by summarizing what was just said. (Nobody asked for a summary, did they?) The person reading it feels talked AT rather than talked to, like they received some kind of report instead of an actual response.
» Every paragraph the same length. Four sentences. Four sentences. Four sentences. Fully developed, evenly paced, perfectly airless. BLAH. Boring, Repetitive. Real writing has a rhythm that changes because that's how the human mind processes and shares info. It moves fast when something matters and stops short when something lands. If your messages look grid-like, they tend to create grid-LOCK for the recipient. Can't. Read. Another. Stilted. Word.
» You mention the relationship but not the moment. You say, "given your impressive work" but not which project. You say, "I know how dedicated you are" but not what you've actually witnessed. You say, "as we've discussed" but not which conversation. The specific memory of the event or sentiment or situation being referenced is the proof that someone was actually there. Human to human. Without it, even seemingly heartfelt, warm words feel like they were written by something that has never met the person they're writing to. Robot to human. Definitely not the same thing...
When using AI is fine, and when it isn't
Let me be clear here: I definitely am not arguing against AI. I work with it regulerly. Many of us do.
There are tasks where it is genuinely helpful and useful, and using it in those moments doesn't compromise your integrity or your relationships.
Here are some examples of what AI is a reasonable tool for:
Conducting research and exploring data sets
Drafting a first pass of operational or logistical communication
Formatting a document you're going to revise substantially
Generating structural options when you're stuck on organization
Summarizing your own notes back to yourself
Writing the informational parts of a message, the logistics, the details, the background, when you're going to write the opening and closing yourself
Where it starts to cost you something: any communication where the relationship is the whole point, i.e., apologies, expressions of gratitude, feedback, personal references, check-ins with people who are struggling, and/or messages to anyone who needs to feel that they actually matter to you.
And this is worth sitting with earnestly: if you are sending a message you didn't write to someone who believes you wrote it, that is a form of misrepresentation. It may not feel significant. It may even feel efficient.
But it's worth calling out what it actually is, because the accumulation of small misrepresentations is how trust erodes without anyone being able to point to the exact moment it happened; you just know it's there.
Your team is tracking this
If you are a leader, this matters more than you may realize.
The nervous systems on your team are already running that scan I described earlier, not intentionally, or even consciously, but constantly.
They notice when your communication changes, when your check-ins suddenly sound like templates and when your feedback is thorough but doesn't sound like you.
They feel the difference between a message that came from someone who knows them and a message that came from someone who used a tool to simulate knowing them.
I do a lot of work with organizations on internal communication culture. One of the most consistent patterns I see is this: what kills trust inside teams is not conflict, it's distance.
It's the slow, accumulated sense that the people leading you are not actually present and attuned, even when they are technically communicating.
AI-generated internal communication exacerbates that distance. It looks like communication, acts like communication, seems like communication. But it can actually be devoid of presence, weight, and rezonance.
This doesn't mean you can't use AI to help you communicate more consistently or clearly. But if you're going to use it in ways your team will notice, be transparent and tell them. "I've been using AI to help me structure some of my longer communications. You may notice a difference in the writing; however, thought processes and personal care are still mine."
That kind of sharing alone does more for trust than any perfectly crafted AI message ever could. Transparency is co-regulation. It brings people back into the room with you, which is where you want and need them to be.
The please and thank you question
Someone I work with asked me recently why I say, "please" and "thank you" when I'm working with AI tools.
For a hot minute, I kind of felt silly, and I had to think about it for a moment before I could answer. Then, it was crystal clear. It's not because I believe AI has feelings, it's because I do.
The way I engage with anything...a tool, a process, a person, a system, shapes who I am in that engagement. My habits of courtesy, curiosity, and care don't have an on/off switch. They go with me wherever I go.
If I am dismissive and impatient with AI (because I can be), I am practicing dismissiveness. I am training that pattern in myself, and it inevitably will show up somewhere it matters with someone I care about.
This is what integrity actually means in practice; not the big visible choices, but the small invisible ones. What you do when no one is watching, including what you do when the only thing watching is a machine. I'd rather practice something worth keeping as an ongoing practice and enactment of my inherent integrity.
That means something to me...You don't have to do it my way. But I'd invite you to notice what you bring to those low-stakes interactions. Because how you do anything is, over time, how you do everything.
The human on the receiving end
Before you hit send on anything today, I want to offer you one question. What do I want this person to feel when they read this?
Not what information do I want them to have or what impression do I want to make or how do I want to be perceived. What do I want this person to feel. Because that is the real question of communication. Always.
And it is the one AI can't answer for you. AI doesn't know your history with this person. It doesn't know what they're carrying right now. It doesn't know what it means coming from you specifically, or why that matters, or what they need to hear that only you would know to say.
You know those things. Only you. Because being a human and being with humans is complex, comprehensive work...on all of our physical, emotional, relational, and spiritual systems.
The Field for Human Communication™ is built on a single premise: communication is a nervous system event before it is a language event. What lands is what is real; what doesn't land is often what is constructed.
AI is a construction tool. Like all tools, it amplifies your choices. Used with intention and honesty, it can help you communicate more. Used without intention, it can slowly begin to replace you in your own communication, and neither you nor the person on the other end will fully know why something started to feel different, off, or just plain wrong.
You know when you've actually shown up for someone in a message. You know what that cost you and what it gave them.
That's not something to automate. It's something to regulate.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: How this article was made
Ideas & Insights: Original; drawn from lived experience and field observation by Mary Huron Hunter
Outline & Structure: Developed with the assistance of Claude (Anthropic AI)
Writing: Authored by Mary Huron Hunter
Mary Huron Hunter is the founder of The Field for Human Communication™ — a space for growing leadership from the inside out. Coaching, consulting, and feminine leadership guidance for the leader who's ready to stop translating themselves and start leading and communicating from who they actually are. Enter the Field: thehumanfield.co
➡️ PS) A little something FUN: I deliberately embedded THREE TYPOS in this piece. If you spotted them, please drop me a note. The first person who gets all three will receive a little something special from The Field and me. 🌾 To err is HUMAN!
