Your navel is the small indentation or knot in the center of your belly, commonly called your belly button. It's the scar left behind from your umbilical cord, which connected you to your mother before you were born and delivered oxygen and nutrients to keep you alive. After birth, doctors clamp and cut the cord, and the remaining piece dries up and falls off, leaving your navel behind.

Everyone who was born from their mother's body has a navel, though they look slightly different on different people. Some navels poke out a bit (an “outie”) while others indent inward (an “innie”).

The word also appears in the phrase navel-gazing, which means spending too much time thinking about yourself and your own problems instead of paying attention to the world around you. If someone accuses you of navel-gazing, they're suggesting you're being self-absorbed, like you're literally staring at your own belly button instead of looking outward at what matters.