Your senses, (touch, sound, sight, taste, smell) affect how you perceive any given environment and engaging them effectively can have a positive impact on your wellbeing.
Compare the two experiences; music you dislike annoyingly being played loudly by your neighbour, to how you feel listening to your favourite tunes as you drive along the road. The same sense is being used, but how it makes you feel is altogether different.
Our nervous system can often become overloaded with the stresses of modern life due to a sensory overload. Too noisy, pollution and overcrowding for example can all play havoc with our wellbeing. Or for some quietness may be unnerving, we are all wired differently!
If we think of something we enjoy that absorbs us, for me, that’s creative writing and imagining worlds, we can engage our senses to fully feel any given scenario. For me, that adds depth to my experience. If we go outside into nature and listen to birdsong or smell freshly cut grass, our senses can enhance our perception and bring joy into the smallest of things.
Grounding is a technique commonly used in mindfulness and to help with worries and anxieties. Activities that allow you to be in the moment can help to calm us down, if we notice the texture of an object, for example, or feel the ground beneath our feet, we are experiencing a moment, which allows a busy brain to take a break too. It can be a useful tool, if we are feeling unsettled to stop and deliberately engage our senses to take in what is actually happening through our senses.
Occasionally, if I am feeling down in the dumps, or having a moment of feeling unsure, I tend to listen to music from my teenage years, which reminds me who I really am at my core. The sense of sound acts as a fast track to my brain that remembers the vibrant girl that is still there, even if temporarily forgotten! Smell can act in a similar way. My granny used to always have Imperial Leather soap, and even though she is sadly no longer with is, I always use it as it reminds me of safety and happy times.
There are incredibly practical benefits to engaging your senses too. One very obvious way is noticing danger, a loud noise, or the smell of smoke for example. Understanding that, that piece of cheese you’ve been hanging onto has actually gone off! We can protect ourselves and others by being sensory aware.
The sense of wellbeing at work
By keeping your brain stimulated, you can also help to keep it in good shape. Activities that involve one or more sense, like dancing to music, cooking or gardening can be beneficial. This cognitive stimulation can be incredibly helpful for us to take into our work environments too.
Grounding exercises that use the senses can be a quick way to stress reduction and support employees to do their best. Deep breathing can really support this. It can also help with focus by letting go of distractions happening around you. By tapping into our senses, we can in many ways regulate how we are feeling. This is a skill, like any other and can really help in heated moments, when taking a step aside and engaging our senses can really help.
Active listening and engaging our senses to read non-verbal cues, can really help with engagement and enhancing communication skills. This can be especially beneficial in team building to help foster connections and team spirit.
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