What does it actually mean for a chemical bond to store energy and "release" it in an exothermic reaction?
For example in a combustion, the hydrocarbons are being split and produce heat/light. What specific process is actually occurring here?
I can understand potential energy in the form of springs or from gravitational/electric fields. These are simply a function of distance, the closer (or farther) 2 objects are they store more and more potential energy and once they are released. They gradually move apart (or closer) which gains kinetic energy and loses potential via the work done by the field.
But I can't conceptualize this for chemical bonds. Maybe it's because I don't fully understand what chemical bonds are. But how does severing (or creating) these bonds just spontaneously produce photons and radiation? Where is this heat coming from?
How does it lead to movement in the case of more complex stored energy like ATP?