The 1-Minute Trick to Calming Down Your Nervous System
Your brain is very good at traveling through time. At any point, it could be replaying what has already happened or rehearsing what could go wrong next. How to quickly return to reality? Try “active noticing,” a simple way to pick up your thoughts from where they have gone astray.
“It’s just about coming back to the present moment and being fully there,” says Arati Patel, a mindfulness-based psychotherapist in Ventura, California. “When you’re present, you can’t really be anxious – you can’t think about the future or be concerned about things that happened in the past, or be very depressed and funky. You can actually feel the joy of being in that moment.”
The best news: Active detection only takes a minute out of your day.
Why you should do it
Active noticing helps your nervous system realize that it doesn’t need to be on alert. When you are in a calm place and your attention is anchored in the present moment, your brain receives signals of safety and stability. “It can really regulate the nervous system, because when you engage all your senses, you’re like, ‘Oh, I’m experiencing being here instead of being projected into the future, or what’s going to happen tomorrow, or what’s going to happen 10 years from now,'” Patel says.
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Research suggests that regular mindfulness practices, such as active observation, can reduce anxiety and overthinking, increase emotional resilience, and improve the ability to respond rather than react. Actively noticing also allows you to become aware of subtle stress signals before they become worse, says Patel. You will become a more engaged global citizen rather than a passive observer.
How to do it
People put different spins on active remark. Patel likes this simple, repeatable practice:
- Pause and breathe slowly, extending the exhale.
- Notice three things you can see, without calling them good or bad.
- Notice two physical sensations in your body (like your feet on the floor or the weight of your body in a chair).
- Notice a sound, near or far.
- End with a foundational statement: “This is what is here right now. » Or: “This is what I’m noticing right now. »
The exercise takes less than a minute and works best when done often, she says. To make it a habit, Patel suggests pairing it with your existing routines, like when you’re waiting for your coffee to be made, washing your hands, or transitioning between tasks.
What’s especially nice, she adds, is that you can do it anywhere, whenever you start to feel stressed, and no one will know. “You can do it in a meeting or in the car,” she says. “You can actually be present behind the wheel and get where you need to go, instead of just being on autopilot.”
