Happy AWEdventures

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Happy AWEdventures The world hasn’t lost its wonder—we’ve just forgotten how to notice it.

Nature-based experiences, mindful movement, soundscapes and animal connection to help you reconnect with yourself, nature and the present moment.

23/09/2026

This week's awe lens is sound, so here's today's challenge:
wherever you are right now, close your eyes for twenty seconds and count how many separate sounds you can pick out, not just "noise" as one big blur, but individual sounds, one by one.

You might be surprised how many show up once you go looking for them.

How many did you get?

∘ Keep noticing

23/09/2026

I love listening to what is around me, especially when the sun goes down and everything is somehow instantly louder.

I took this video at the paddock, with just one bird calling out on its own at the start, then more voices joining in from every direction until the whole thing is going at once.

Have you ever stopped everything you were doing just to listen to how a place really sounds, especially at night?

∘ Keep noticing

22/09/2026

Check out this AWE study: Researchers had a group of young adults keep a daily diary of the positive emotions they felt, things like joy, contentment, love, pride and awe, then took blood samples to check a marker of inflammation in their bodies. Out of all of those emotions, awe was the one that predicted the lowest levels of it, more than any of the others they tracked. It's a 2015 study out of the journal Emotion, Stellar, John-Henderson, Anderson, Gordon, McNeil and Keltner, if you want to look it up yourself. Which makes perfect sense to me, honestly, because a real moment of awe does feel like something settling in the body, not just in your head.

Has a moment like that ever left you calmer physically, not just mentally, more than you expected?

∘ Keep noticing

21/09/2026

There's so much sound already happening around us, underneath whatever we are actually paying attention to. Most of it never makes it through.

That's kind of the whole point of learning to listen for it on purpose.

∘ Keep noticing

20/09/2026

I love walking by the river and watching it flow by. I stopped and watched fish moving slowly through the current, catching the light differently every time they turned. Nothing about it needed to go anywhere, and maybe that's exactly why it was so easy to just sit with.

Are you starting to notice more, without trying to? That might just make you an AWEdventurist.

∘ Keep noticing

19/09/2026

I went to visit a friend the other day, and she's got a foal in her stable now, only three weeks old. I ended up standing mesmerised, just watching him nurse, the whole steady rhythm of it, his mouth working away at his mum's side, so gorgeous... There was something so satisfying about watching that motion over and over, nothing complicated about it, just this intimate, steady thing happening right in front of me.

Have you ever gotten caught up watching something that simple, something with no real story to it, and just not wanted to look away?

∘ Keep noticing

18/09/2026

I keep thinking about how much movement is happening around us all the time that we basically tune out. Curtains shifting in a breeze, a dog wagging his tail, traffic somewhere in the distance. It's all technically moving, but most of it we barely register.

What's something in motion near you right now that you'd actually watch all the way through, if you gave it the chance?

∘ Keep noticing

17/09/2026

This week's awe lens is movement, so here's today's challenge: find a local creek, lake, or any body of water near you, and give it a minute of your full attention.

See if you can spot a fish swimming by, or if you're lucky, one jumping clear of the water. Either way, just actually watch instead of walking straight past it like you usually would.

What did you find?

∘ Keep noticing

16/09/2026

I was walking along the river the other day when a whole school of fish caught my eye, just moving together under the surface, not going anywhere in particular. I ended up standing there for a while, not really doing anything, just watching them swim. No agenda, no rush, nothing I was trying to get out of it.

And somehow I felt calmer afterward than I had in days. I don't know exactly what it is about watching something move like that without needing it to go anywhere, but it gets me every time.

Have you ever stopped to watch something moving in water and lost track of how long you'd been standing there?

∘ Keep noticing

15/09/2026

Researchers had people watch footage of awe-inspiring nature scenes instead of ordinary ones, and the awe group came away with the biggest lift in mood out of anyone in the study, on top of feeling smaller and more humbled by what they'd just watched. They were more generous toward others afterward too. It's a 2015 study out of Frontiers in Psychology, Joye and Bolderdijk, if you want to look it up. Which tracks, honestly, because I think most of us know that feeling of watching something move in nature and coming away a little lighter than when we started.

Has a video or a moment like that ever shifted your mood more than you expected it to?

∘ Keep noticing

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