Within the field of cognitive semantics, the author studies the phenomenon of polysemy. She analyses the systematic relationship between distinct senses of single lexical items belonging to the pragmatic category of linguistic action verbs. The study shows that in Bahasa Indonesia, cognitive models conceptualizing specific types of physical action and object manipulation are systematically used for the conceptualization of discourse situations, and that the function these physical actions fulfil with respect to external objects in the spatial environment is also transferred to the conversational domain. These phenomena are interpreted with respect to conceptual metaphors that structure the experience of conversation.