Let’s Get Intentional About Using Our Senses

I read a good book recently, titled, Better in Every Sense: How the New Science of Sensation Can Help You Reclaim Your Life. The main message of the book is that by taking time to pause and engage with your senses (seeing, hearing, touching, tasting), you can feel better right away. You can do this indoors or outdoors.

University of Toronto psychology professors – Dr. Farb (neuroscientist) and Dr. Zindel (clinical psychologist) urge you to “break out of negative thought patterns by engaging your senses.”

Grounded in decades of research, the authors explain, “we often think that when we are struggling with a problem or a bad habit or life in general, we think we need to try harder, or tough it out. However, this rarely works. When we do this, our brains double down on thinking patterns that got us stuck in the first place.”

This book explores the power of sensory experiences to liberate us from our ruts and dead ends.

Your Brain Has Two Networks

According to Farb and Segal, your brain has two networks: the habit and the sensory networks.

Your Habit Network Manages Essentials

The habit network is devoted to rapid problem solving. You do need what the authors call your “house of habit” to glide through the essentials of your daily life. This is the hardware of your brain that you cannot adjust. It is also called the default mode network or DMN. The DMN system prioritizes self-judgement which can lock you into resistance mode. Here is where you can get stuck.

Your Sensory Network Needs Your New Mindset

Your sensory network is devoted to fresh insight. This is the software of your brain. This part you can adjust. You do this by 1) pausing and 2) noticing by using your senses. So, for example, if you are in your house and the lamp is on – you can notice where the light is cast on the wall, where it is strongest, and how far out the light reaches, and the quality of the light in different places.

This simple type of activity can change your brain. This change is called neuroplasticity. And you need the right mindset to get there.

In my book, Take Back Your Outside Mindset: Live Longer, Stress Less, and Control Your Chronic Illness, I give you 101 ways to engage your senses and notice when you are outside in green space. For example, when you notice a tree, this taps into your DMN and tells it to let go – to relax.

As I say in my books, your time in green space is non-pharmaceutical therapy that provides immediate relief, increases your ability to pay attention, think clearly, and solve problems, increases your working memory and recall, helps you to regulate your behavior, increases your positive mood, lowers your resting heart rate… and let’s your brain restore itself.

Make a Game with Your Senses

What I like about Better in Every Sense is the simple exercises to practice noticing by engaging your senses. Here are some that are provided in the book:

1. Seeing – look around and name the first 5 things you see. Close your eyes, open them, and name five things that you didn’t see.
2. Touching – ask a friend to collect small objects for you in a bag. Close your eyes and feel the objects; try to name them.
3. Sound – before you go outside, think of 5 sounds that you have heard out there. When you get outside, try to check off the 5 sounds.
4. Smell 5 things and name them as vividly as possible – name what each smell reminds you of (memory and smell are connected).
5. Taste – the next time you eat something, try to name each distinct taste (salty, sweet, sour, bitter, or savory). When you recognize a taste – say it out loud.

Learn to “Sense Forage”

When you feel stuck, stressed, lonely or bored, Farb and Segal ask you to “sense forage” – to get intentional about noticing your senses. The authors want you to remember that the world is dynamic, alive and ever changing. The main idea is to move out of your “house of habit” and notice how something smells or feels or changes how it looks. And listen for sounds or for silence.

Practice using all of your senses – to immerse yourself in pure sensation. Often there are many other things that are going on and it is sometimes difficult to pay attention and take the time to simply notice.

The authors suggest that even when you are busy to try and notice the feel of your feet in a crowded street, the breeze on your face when you first step outside, the sight and sounds of people’s faces and voices. Or try noticing the height of trees, the repeating patterns in the tree branches and leaves, their movement, the sunlight as it filters through the branches.

Take off your shoes and reconnect with the earth, get out of the office/house to buy a coffee and look up at the sky, eat your lunch outside. Suddenly, you are connected to a larger world. These are simple choices and the return on your investment is high.

Noticing and Balancing Your Nervous System with Green Space

In my book Optimize Your Heart Rate: Balance Your Mind and Body with Green Space, I explain why getting out in green space moves your nervous system into calm and back into balance. By simply looking around at fractals or nature’s patterns in the clouds, grass, shrubs, leaves, trees, flowers, weeds, stones, waves, and more your mind and body settles down.

This happens automatically as your nervous system goes back to the rest-digest side and away from the fight-flight side. When you get stuck on the speedy fight-flight side for too long, your heart is at risk of sudden cardiac arrest.

Research on thousands of people over decades shows that time in green space lowers your resting heart rate (a sign of wellness) and increases your heart rate variability (a research measure of your mental and physical wellness).

So, take this new information on the power of your senses. Add this to your repertoire of noticing new things. Immerse yourself in your senses. Have fun, play games with your senses, and know that you are changing your brain and body.

Let’s Start a Conversation:

Which of your senses are you more tuned into? Do you let your senses swirl? Would you like to play games that make you focus on the sensory details of your daily life? Would you consider noticing how you feel during or after you have noticed a particular scent, sound, sight or touch?