Something quiets. The noise in your head softens. The to-do list dissolves, at least for a moment. And you are just... here. Present. Breathing. Somehow both small and expansive at the same time.

That feeling has a name. It's awe. And science is discovering that it may be one of the most powerful medicines available to us, and one of the least prescribed.

In a world that seems to get louder, faster, and more demanding by the day, awe is not a luxury. It's a biological necessity. And the good news is that you don't have to travel to the Grand Canyon or witness a once-in-a-lifetime miracle to find it.

It may be closer than you think.

What Is Awe, Exactly?

Dr. Dacher Keltner, professor of psychology at UC Berkeley and founding director of the Greater Good Science Center, has spent decades studying the science of human emotion. His conclusion, after years of research and a global study asking 26 different cultures about their experiences of awe: it is one of the most universal and transformative emotions available to us.

Keltner defines awe as our response to things that are vast, mysterious, and beyond our current understanding of the world. It's the feeling that rises when something stops us in our tracks, not from fear, but from wonder.

And here's a lovely surprise: awe doesn't require the extraordinary. Keltner's research identified eight "wonders" that reliably evoke awe in people across cultures: nature, music, moral beauty (witnessing human courage and kindness), collective movement, visual art and design, spiritual experience, life and death, and moments of sudden insight and epiphany. 

What speaks loudest to you? Most of these are available to us every single day. We've just forgotten how to look.

What Awe Does to Your Brain and Body

This is where the science becomes genuinely astonishing.

When we experience awe, something specific and measurable happens in the brain. The default mode network, the area responsible for self-referential processing (your mental to-do list, your pesky inner critic, your endless worries) quiets down significantly. The chatter about what you did wrong, what you should be doing, what other people think of you: it softens. Sometimes it even stops entirely.

At the same time, the vagus nerve, that long bundle of nerves running from the brainstem down through the heart, lungs, and gut, activates. So, your heart rate slows. Digestion improves. Your body opens, literally and neurologically, to something larger than itself.

The physical effects are just as striking. Research by Keltner and his colleagues found that awe:

• Reduces inflammation, as measured by the biomarker interleukin-6, one of the most reliable markers of chronic stress in the body
• Lowers blood pressure and cortisol levels
• Triggers the release of oxytocin, the bonding hormone that promotes trust, connection, and warmth
• Alleviates anxiety and pain
• Reduces symptoms of depression

In short: awe is not just a feeling. It's a full-body reset.

For those of us navigating the unpredictable pressures of midlife, that matters a lot. Chronic stress, hormonal shifts, caregiving demands, and the relentless pace of modern life all drive up inflammation and cortisol. Awe works in the opposite direction. It is, in the truest sense of the word, an antidote.

Nature: The Original Doorway

Of all the pathways to awe, nature is the most reliably, consistently documented in the research. Keltner calls it "wild awe," and its effects on the mind and body are not fully appreciated.

The sights, sounds, scents, and textures of the natural world trigger vagus nerve activation, reduce the fight-or-flight response, lower blood pressure, reduce cortisol, and decrease inflammation. Pretty potent! Even a single walk in a park improved concentration in children diagnosed with ADHD. Imagine what it does for those of us carrying the weight of overstimulation and overload (most everyone today...)

Nature has her own wisdom, her own timeline, and her own transcendent presence. And awe is how we experience her.

There is something about standing under an ancient tree, listening to the sound of water moving, or watching the light change across a hillside that reminds us we are part of something much older and much larger than our own story. Transcendent and grounding at the same time.

In a world full of the cacophony of chaos, this kind of presence isn't an escape. It's a recalibration.

7 Doorways to Awe

You don't have to wait for a mountaintop moment. Awe is available in the ordinary, when we slow down enough to receive it. Here are seven ways to invite it in, starting today.

1. Step outside with new eyes. The most accessible doorway. Even five minutes in a garden, a park, or under an open sky can shift your neurological state. Leave the phone inside. Breathe. Let your eyes soften and take in what's actually there rather than what you expect to see. Trees, clouds, birdsong, the quality of afternoon light. I can remember lying in the summer grass, just mesmerized by the languid movement of the clouds. Nature is endlessly generous. We just have to show up.

Action Tip: Take a "slow walk" this week with no destination. Your only job is to notice three things you've never noticed before in a place you pass every day.

2. Let music move you. Music is one of Keltner's eight wonders of awe, and for good reason. A piece of music that gives you chills, brings tears, or makes you want to move is producing a measurable neurological response. That response is awe. Create a playlist of pieces that genuinely move you, and give yourself permission to just listen, without multitasking, without doing anything else at all.

Action Tip: Schedule fifteen minutes this week to listen to one piece of music that has always moved you. Close your eyes. Let it in.

3. Witness moral beauty. Research consistently shows that watching acts of human courage, kindness, and resilience produces one of the most powerful forms of awe. A documentary about someone who rebuilt their life. A video of a stranger helping a stranger. A conversation in which someone tells the truth with grace and courage. This kind of awe, sometimes called "moral elevation," also increases our own impulse to act generously. It's contagious in the best possible way.

Action Tip: Seek out one story this week, a film, a book, a podcast, an article, about a human being who moved you. Let yourself BE moved.

4. Look up. This one is almost embarrassingly simple, and it works. Stargazing, cloud-watching, standing under a cathedral ceiling, or watching a sunset all produce the same neurological response: the vastness we perceive signals the brain to quiet the self and expand the sense of what's possible. The universe is 13.8 billion years old. Our worries, real as they seem, exist within a context that is incomprehensibly large.

Action Tip: Step outside tonight and look at the sky for five minutes. No phone. Just the sky.

5. Encounter great art. Visual art, dance, architecture, and poetry have provoked awe in human beings across every culture and every recorded era of history. You don't have to visit a museum, though if you can, do. Find a painting you've always wanted to understand. Watch a dance performance. Read a poem slowly, more than once. Memorize your favorite song. Allow yourself to sit with something beautiful without immediately moving to the next thing.

Journaling Prompt: What is a piece of art, music, or writing that has stayed with you for years? What emotion does it evoke in you?

6. Be part of something larger. Collective experiences produce what Keltner calls "collective effervescence," the awe that arises from moving, singing, praying, or gathering in shared purpose with others. A concert, a spiritual practice, a march for something you believe in, a community ritual. These experiences remind us that we are not alone, and that we belong to something larger than our individual story. For women in midlife, who are often the ones holding everyone else together, this kind of belonging is both rare and deeply nourishing.

Action Tip: Identify one group experience you have been meaning to try: a choir, a yoga class, a meditation circle, a community event. Put it in your calendar this month.

7. Slow down for the small miracles. A hummingbird hovering. The geometry of a spider's web at dawn. Your own hand. The fact that your heart has been beating without your conscious attention for every moment of your life. Awe doesn't require scale. It requires presence. When we slow down enough to really look at what's already here, the ordinary reveals itself as quietly extraordinary.

The philosopher Simone Weil wrote that attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity. That's also a pretty good description of how we find awe in the everyday.

Action Tip: Choose one small thing today, a plant, a candle flame, a cup of tea, and give it your full attention for one minute. That's it. Just one minute of real looking.

The Awe Practice

Dr. Keltner's suggestion, from decades of research, is beautifully uncomplicated: "Give yourself a few minutes a day, slow down your schedule, put away your devices, start breathing deeply, and open your mind to something larger than yourself."

That's it. A few minutes. An open mind. A willingness to be surprised.

You are not too busy for awe. In fact, the busier and more depleted you feel, the more you need it. This is not indulgent. It is, as the science now clearly shows, one of the most evidence-based things you can do for your brain, your body, and your sense of what this life is actually for.

You're not alone in having forgotten. The world we live in is not designed for wonder. It is designed for urgency.

But wonder was here first. And it's waiting for you.

One Last Thing

Awe has a way of reminding us of what we already know: that we are woven into something vast and alive and mysterious, and that this is not a problem to be solved but a gift to be received.

What's one doorway to awe you could walk through this week?

I'd love to hear what it is. Leave a comment below, and let's share what moves us.

Sources:

Keltner, D. (2023). Awe: The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life. Penguin Press.

Monroy, M., & Keltner, D. (2023). Awe as a pathway to mental and physical health. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 18(2), 309-320. doi: 10.1177/17456916221094856

Stellar, J.E., John-Henderson, N., Anderson, C.L., Gordon, A.M., McNeil, G.D., & Keltner, D. (2015). Positive affect and markers of inflammation: Discrete positive emotions predict lower levels of inflammatory cytokines. Emotion, 15(2), 129-133.

Anderson, C.L., Monroy, M., & Keltner, D. (2018). Awe in nature heals: Evidence from military veterans, at-risk youth, and college students. Emotion, 18(8), 1195-1202.

Horikawa, T., et al. (2020). Awe and reduced activation in the default mode network. Neuroscientific Studies, referenced in Monroy & Keltner, 2023.

Weil, S. (1952). Waiting for God. G.P. Putnam's Sons. (Simone Weil quote on attention.)