Gooooood morning sunshines!!
Welcome to part 2 of my rest series, where I’m exploring how to work harder at resting (GET IT HAHA).
Todays’ deep dive is into Sensory Rest. According to the rest quiz I did, I’m really bad at this, and I’m sorry to say that I think you might be too.
BUT before we dive in I have a challenge for you (bet you can’t do it!!): when reading this little blog, I want you to sit somewhere quiet, turn off notifications, and try and focus on nothing else but what you’re reading.
Wtf is sensory rest?
The internet has told me that sensory rest is, naturally, about ‘giving your senses a break’ from ‘stimuli’.
That’s the kind of statement that makes sense at face value but falls apart on closer inspection.
Unless I am literally unconscious, my senses are hard at work. I guess I could lie down in a dark room with no noise/light/smell ? etc but that feels a bit extreme even for someone writing a 7 part soliloquy on rest.
(NB I have since realised this is literally what happens to people when they do sensory deprivation tanks)
But through my sensory rest sleuthing, I’ve reckon what they’re really talking about here is attention, I think the psychological theory underlying this premise is really neat (how’s that for a hook?!).
What’s attention got to do with this?
The “attention funnel” is a useful framework for understanding how our brains decide what, out of the millions of bits of information inundating us constantly, we should ‘pay attention to’ or be consciously aware of.
The mechanism here is quite simple: at the top of the funnel we have sensory inputs, then our brains cleverly filter based on:
Salience e.g. what stands out, such as potential risks or threats
Relevance e.g. matters to us (this is where confirmation bias comes in!! exciting)
Habit e.g. what we’ve trained ourselves to notice
Until we arrive at the final destination: conscious attention.
What our brains are trying to do is help us attend to the most important thing.
The problem is that our silly little brains are simply not designed to cope with the level and quality of input that defines modern life.
When I first started reading about sensory rest I found it hard to understand why ‘artificial’ stimulus was truly so much worse than ‘natural’ stimulus, but I now understand that it’s less about the what and more about the how (and how much).
Getting a text is kinda a little bit like seeing a lion
The problem with tech is first of all that everything is designed to be SALIENT - your phone pinging, your watch telling you your phone is ringing, email banners on your computer, the little red notification symbols on each app that simply beg us to open them.
And this is by design. The applications that ‘win’ are the ones that get the most eyeballs for the longest amount of time. That is literally the business model.
So when you think about it, pretty much everything on our phones and computers is competing to capture our attention.
There is also no end to it: the average person receives 60-80 push-notifications per day, which is one every 10-15 waking minutes, and for younger peeps it’s more like 200.
Every single notification pulls at your attention.
Let’s go back to the evolutionary mechanism here: tech is designed to capture your attention in the same way seeing a lion in the wild whilst you’re hunting for food might do. We need to attend to it to assess the risk.
Never in history have we had anything near this level of input.
We are pretty much all walking round in a state of high alert, with lions pinging out at us everywhere.
Look out for Zeigernak
Another interesting effect I’d like to draw your attention to (suckersss look who is directing your attention now!!) is the Zeigernak effect.
This is the theory that the mind focuses more on unfinished tasks than completed ones.
I love this because it honestly describes soo much of my mental noise.
I just counted, and I currently have 81 tabs open across my work, cheeky and personal chrome windows (pretty good for me tbh), each representing a little loop I am yet to close off.
I have to-do lists on my phone, calendar, work project management software, in 1:1 docs with my manager, in meeting notes, shared to-do lists with Anna - all the represent a desperate attempt to offload this mental noise.
And still, the first thing I think of when I wake up every morning is what I need to get done that day.
Interestingly, visual clutter similarly overloads our attention funnel, whether that’s windows open on our desktop or a messy physical space.
Another factors that feeds into this is that watching hundreds of 10 second reels each with a clever hook in the first 3 seconds has obliterated our attention span - but I’m not going to go into that because that is when the existential gloom really sets in for me personally.
Welcome to Time Confetti Purgatory
I first came across the concept of Time Confetti when reading about the core drivers for happiness and it has lived rent-free in my head ever since: it really captures why this constant shifting of attention is a bad thing.
The concept describes how we shred our days into micro-moments of multitasking, context switching, and being distracted by notifications, and no longer focus for long stretches of time.
This takes into account cognitive input as well as sensory input.
For example, if you were to step inside my brain for the first 10 minutes of writing this blog, you would have witnessed me:
Making a tea 2 mins in then thinking about if I need to cut back my tea intake
Checking my cal because of a notification that came through then thinking about a tricky meeting I have coming up
Responding to some messages re a lunch for next weekend
Checking my latest substack stats to see what’s landing
Listening to music, including changing playlists a few times
And this is for a task I LOVE doing. Imagine how this is amplified when it’s something we’re dreading, or when we don’t have anything to do e.g. we’re trying to rest.
Time confetti is a double threat: it both kills true rest AND deep focus.
Instead, we’re in a kind of time-confetti-purgatory: never in a state of deep flow, never truly switched off.
Think of it kind of like a coin.
On one side you have heads: deep focus.
I will have to write another blog post on deep work soon because it is sooooo interesting and so important - but finding a flow state is genuinely a key driver of joy and satisfaction in life. Think about it: is there any feeling quite like being totally absorbed in something??
On the other side you have tails: true rest.
We need this to recover and perform at our best.
hiii nervous system 💀
If our attention funnel is the mechanism that decides what to pay attention to, our nervous system is responsible for how we respond to/experience it.
Living in time confetti purgatory is kind of like gently shredding your nervous system, keeping it on a constant state of high-alert.
From a performance/recovery perspective, this means our sympathetic nervous system is constantly activated, which literally diverts internal energy away from the recovery we’re after.
I am also starting to get a glimpse into why my Oura ring always thinks I’m so stressed during the day and thus gives me shocking daytime recovery scores. It’s because I’m in time confetti purgatory!!! Huge revelation.
So really, time confetti purgatory means that that coin is just constantly spinning, never quite landing on heads or tail.
This (a) creates an artificial sense of ‘busyness’, where you’re always ‘on’ even when you’re trying to switch off, and (b) truly robs us of one of the key drivers of joy and satisfaction that is fully immersing yourself in something.
Helpppp I want to get out of time confetti purgatory!!
To briefly reframe the goal of sensory rest as I now see it, and perhaps to stretch this coin analogy to its natural limits: how can we stop the coin spinning and have more time in either head or tails?
One interesting concept I like to think about here is that of ‘negative space’, which actually originates from visual art/design.
Think of it as the ‘breathing room’ that gives the intended object of focus clarity and distinction.
You can also see it in architectural space design: it’s important to be as intentional about what areas you’re leaving empty as what areas you’re filling. Both empty and busy space play a role in directing attention and setting the feel of a space.
I’ve always thought this theory has such interesting psychological applications, especially because of how intentional it is.
How can we be intentional about creating emptiness? How can we use a lack of input to enable us to be more focused on what we really care about?
Designing systems for negative space
I’ll come back to a phrase I love to tout which is ‘you don’t rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems’.
I think for me to achieve sensory rest it’s less about setting a goal for spending an hour in a sensory deprivation tank each week, I need to go back to first principles and look at how I can design a life that stops the spinning coin.
Here are some of the ideas I came up with.
1. Turn off notifcations duhhh
Social/slack/teams/email notifications are the devil and you won’t convince me otherwise.
Do an audit and your notifications OFF!!
I legit just went into ‘notifications’ on my phone and turned it off for pretty much everything: I kept ‘badges’ (those little red circles with numbers in them) on for whatsapp and messages, and I kept banners/sounds on for phone calls.
I also just finally turned message notifications off on my watch, as some update I did last year means that it vibrates every time I get a message, and I actually hate how much it distracts from things like conversations with friends.
The different ‘focus modes’ on your phone are quite good and I know there are apps you can get that fully re-design your screen to negate the effect of notifications.
2. Reconsider your headphones
Next one which I find sooo hard to even contemplate is doing more things without headphones.
I LOVE listening to music while I work/write etc and genuinely do think that it helps me get into a flow state in noisy environments, however I also very rarely have a point in the day where I’m not listening to something.
I get up, I listen to a podcast where I get ready for my run. If I’m not running with friends, I might switch that out for an audiobook. I get home and listen to music in the shower, then back to a podcast as I get ready for/commute to work, etc etc
That is kind of terrifying. I think running without headphones is going to be some of the best negative space I can get, so I am going to aim for one negative space run per week.
3. Close the loop
Remember the Zeigernak effect! So much of our mental noise is a result of the unfinished tasks taking up space in our heads. Set up a process for you to be able to offload those things as soon as you think of them.
For me, I have a notes list on my phone that no matter what I’m doing I can jot down an idea or something I want to do.
Then I (in theory) move those actions to either my work project management software, my shared cheeky action list on notion, or my personal to-do list.
I think I need to be better at ‘closing the loop’ - moving the tasks into their relevant place, closing up tabs etc - so I’m going to try and make myself a rule of no tabs open at the end of each day.
4. Consider your environment
I don’t think I’m a super messy person but I’m also not super tidy. I really want to make more of an effort to spend time of a morning/weekend de-cluttering spaces, but also I know that I don’t always get time for this.
In the instances when I don’t, I’m going to make an effort to go work from a distraction-free environment (I love working from cafes).
5. Leave your phone at home
Final one is more a challenge I want to set for myself (I also think this is probably harder if you have dependents): can I do more things without my phone?
One of my favourite feelings in the world is when you’re overseas and don’t have data and just feel so untethered to everything that’s going on in the world. I need
There are soooo many other things you could do here, from deleting social media to stopping ‘double screening’, but I think even these things will enable me to let the coin rest.
Listen up sheeple!!
I don’t want to get all big-media on you, but I really think there is something to be said for reclaiming our attention.
William James, who is considered a father of modern psychology, said “My experience is what I agree to attend to.”
In 1890, that was easier; there were fewer things yelling for our attention.
Today, being the boss of what we to attend to requires intention.
The question you need to be answering is: What do you agree to pay attention to? And how can you design a life that enables that?
this is bloody good stuff!!
I almost stopped reading halfway through because I am in the middle of my workday and supposed to be in deep focus - but then I thought hmm better close the loop and finish reading it now <3