The Power of a Glimmer - The Neuroscience of Noticing the Good — and Why Small Moments Matter

The Living Apothecary | Research & Reflection

Sometimes, the smallest moments leave the deepest impressions.

A bird singing outside the window.

The warmth of a cup of tea held between both hands.

Sunlight falling across a familiar room.

A moment of unexpected kindness.

The sound of somebody laughing.

Nothing extraordinary has happened.

And yet, for a moment, something feels different.

Perhaps we smile.

Perhaps our shoulders soften.

Perhaps we simply become aware that, in the middle of everything else happening around us, something good has occurred.

I call these moments glimmers.

It is a word I frequently use within my work at The Sanctuary, and one that has become increasingly familiar in conversations about emotional wellbeing.

But the more I think about glimmers, the more interested I become in a question sitting beneath this rather lovely idea.

What actually happens when we notice something good?

Can a fleeting moment of pleasure influence our emotional experience?

Does deliberately paying attention to positive moments make a difference?

And what does contemporary neuroscience really tell us about the relationship between attention, positive emotion and resilience?

The answers are more interesting — and more complicated — than some popular wellbeing explanations suggest.

What is a glimmer?

The term glimmer has become particularly associated with the work of therapist Deb Dana and her application of polyvagal theory.

It describes a small moment or cue that we experience as pleasant, reassuring, connecting or comforting.

Glimmers are often presented as the opposite of triggers.

Where a trigger may be associated with distress or an uncomfortable response, a glimmer is something we notice as positive.

That is an appealing distinction.

But scientifically, we need to be careful.

A glimmer is not an established neurological event with its own measurable signature.

There is no recognised glimmer centre within the brain.

Nor can we assume that noticing something pleasant automatically switches the nervous system into a particular physiological state.

Some of the broader claims made around polyvagal theory remain scientifically debated.

Nevertheless, the experience that the word describes connects with several well-established areas of psychological research.

Attention.

Positive emotion.

Reward.

Memory.

Emotional regulation.

And something psychologists call savouring.

Perhaps that is where the more interesting scientific conversation begins.

The science of savouring

In 2007, psychologists Fred Bryant and Joseph Veroff published Savoring: A New Model of Positive Experience.

Their work explored how human beings attend to, appreciate and sometimes prolong positive experiences.

Savouring is not simply feeling happy.

It involves the way we respond to something positive.

We might notice it.

Pause to appreciate it.

Share it with somebody.

Remember it afterwards.

Or anticipate something enjoyable that has yet to happen.

This distinction matters.

A pleasant event and our awareness of that event are not necessarily the same thing.

Something lovely can happen while our attention is elsewhere.

Equally, a very ordinary experience can become meaningful because we give it our attention.

Bryant's subsequent research has continued to explore how people regulate positive emotions and how savouring differs from coping with distress.

Rather than focusing exclusively on reducing negative experiences, this research asks another question:

How do people make room for positive experiences within everyday life?

I find that a particularly useful question within complementary healthcare.

Much of our clinical conversation quite understandably begins with what is troubling somebody.

Pain.

Stress.

Fatigue.

Poor sleep.

Anxiety.

Overwhelm.

But there may also be value in asking what brings somebody pleasure, comfort, connection or a sense of meaning.

Not to dismiss the difficult experiences.

But to recognise that wellbeing involves more than the absence of distress.

Can noticing the good influence our mood?

A 2012 daily diary study explored the relationship between positive events, savouring and happiness.

Researchers followed 101 participants over 30 days, gathering reports of everyday positive experiences, responses to those experiences and momentary positive mood.

The findings suggested that savouring was associated with how strongly positive daily events related to feelings of happiness.

In other words, the way people responded to something positive appeared to matter alongside the event itself.

That is an intriguing finding.

It suggests that experiencing something pleasant and consciously appreciating it may be meaningfully connected.

But we must also recognise the study's limitations.

Participants reported their own experiences.

The research identified relationships between positive events, savouring and mood, but it did not establish that a particular glimmer caused a measurable neurological change.

Nor does it mean that deliberately noticing positive moments will improve everybody's emotional wellbeing in the same way.

Nevertheless, it gives us a useful foundation.

Perhaps a glimmer is not simply about the pleasant thing that happens.

Perhaps it is also about our relationship with that moment.

Whether we notice it.

Whether we allow ourselves to experience it.

And whether we carry something of it forward.

Positive emotions and the capacity to flourish

Another important contribution comes from psychologist Barbara Fredrickson.

Her broaden-and-build theory proposes that positive emotions may do more than create pleasant feelings in the moment.

They may also help people broaden their attention, explore possibilities, develop relationships and gradually build psychological and social resources.

In 2008, Fredrickson and colleagues published a randomised study involving 139 working adults.

Participants were assigned either to a loving-kindness meditation programme or to a waiting-list comparison group.

The researchers investigated whether cultivating positive emotions over time was associated with changes in personal resources and wellbeing.

The findings suggested that participants engaging with the meditation practice experienced increases in positive emotions, which were associated with improvements in resources such as mindfulness, social support and a sense of purpose.

These changes were subsequently associated with greater life satisfaction and fewer depressive symptoms.

There are important qualifications.

This was a specific meditation intervention.

It was not a study of glimmers.

The benefits were not identical across participants, and the researchers identified the importance of engagement with the practice.

We cannot take those findings and conclude that noticing a flower or hearing birdsong will produce the same outcomes.

But the study does suggest that repeated positive emotional experiences may have significance beyond the immediate moment.

And that raises an interesting possibility.

What if the small, ordinary experiences we often overlook have a place within the wider picture of emotional wellbeing?

Not as a treatment.

Not as a cure.

But as part of how we experience our lives.

What about the nervous system?

This is where the conversation becomes particularly interesting.

Glimmers are frequently described online as signals that tell the nervous system it is safe.

It is an attractive explanation.

But human autonomic regulation is considerably more complex than a simple switch between danger and safety.

The autonomic nervous system continuously participates in regulating heart rate, breathing, digestion and other bodily processes.

Its activity changes in response to many influences, including movement, posture, breathing, illness, emotion and the environment.

One measure frequently used in research is heart rate variability, or HRV.

HRV describes variation in the intervals between heartbeats.

Certain HRV measures can provide information about aspects of autonomic regulation, although they cannot independently establish whether somebody feels safe, relaxed or emotionally well.

In 2013, Kok and colleagues published research investigating positive emotions, perceived social connections and cardiac vagal tone.

The researchers found evidence consistent with a relationship in which positive emotions and perceived social connection could reinforce one another over time, alongside changes in their physiological measure.

That is fascinating.

But it does not mean that every pleasant moment increases vagal tone.

Nor does it validate every neurological explanation attached to the word glimmer.

The research examined a structured intervention and relationships developing over time.

It did not measure individual glimmers.

What it offers is a more carefully defined possibility:

Positive emotional experience, social connection and aspects of physiological regulation may interact in meaningful ways.

The challenge for researchers is to understand precisely how, for whom and under what circumstances.

The brain remembers good things too

There is another piece of research that I find particularly compelling.

In 2017, researchers writing in Nature Human Behaviour investigated whether recalling positive memories could influence responses to acute stress.

Their work combined behavioural and neuroimaging approaches.

The researchers reported that positive memory recall was associated with effects on mood and stress responses, while neuroimaging identified activity in brain networks involved in reward and emotion regulation.

This is important because it moves beyond asking whether people simply report feeling happier.

It begins to investigate how recalling positive experiences may relate to measurable responses.

But once again, the distinction matters.

Remembering a positive experience during an experimental task is not identical to spontaneously noticing a glimmer in everyday life.

The study does not demonstrate that every positive memory protects us from stress.

It does, however, suggest that our relationship with positive experiences may extend beyond the moment in which they occur.

Perhaps remembering something good deserves more attention than we sometimes give it.

Glimmers are not about denying difficulty

There is something I feel particularly strongly about.

The idea of noticing positive moments should never become another demand placed upon somebody who is already struggling.

People experiencing grief, trauma, chronic illness, exhaustion or significant emotional distress do not need to be told to look on the bright side.

Sometimes life is extraordinarily difficult.

And sometimes the most compassionate response is simply to acknowledge that difficulty.

A glimmer should never be used to invalidate pain.

Nor should it become a measure of how successfully somebody is managing their wellbeing.

We do not fail because we cannot find something positive in a particular moment.

There may be days when simply getting through the day requires everything we have.

That deserves understanding, not another exercise to complete.

For me, the value of glimmers lies in their gentleness.

They are invitations rather than obligations.

They allow the possibility that something difficult and something lovely can exist within the same day.

One does not cancel out the other.

Glimmers within The Sanctuary

Within my clinical practice, I often encourage people to become curious about the small moments that bring them pleasure or comfort.

Sometimes these are sensory experiences.

A familiar scent.

A piece of music.

Warmth.

The sound of water.

A beautiful colour.

Sometimes they involve connection.

A kind word.

A shared laugh.

A moment of feeling understood.

And sometimes they are entirely personal.

Something that might mean very little to another person can hold enormous significance for the individual experiencing it.

This is one reason I am so interested in person-centred care.

We cannot prescribe somebody else's glimmers.

We can ask questions.

We can listen.

We can create opportunities for reflection.

And we can recognise that the things people find comforting are shaped by their memories, experiences, preferences and relationships.

Within The Living Apothecary Method™, sensory exploration is an important part of our wider wellbeing philosophy.

Scent, sound, touch, environment and ritual can provide opportunities to explore what an individual finds meaningful.

But their effects should never be assumed.

A scent that evokes comfort for one person may be unpleasant or distressing for another.

A sound that encourages one person to settle may irritate somebody else.

Even silence can be experienced differently.

The person matters more than the technique.

And perhaps the glimmer matters because it belongs to them.

A small practice in noticing

There is a gentle exercise I sometimes suggest.

Not a formal therapeutic intervention.

Not a promise of improved health.

Simply an opportunity to pay attention.

At some point during the day, notice something that feels pleasant.

It does not have to be extraordinary.

Perhaps it is the warmth of your morning drink.

A familiar face.

The garden after rain.

A moment when somebody makes you smile.

If you wish, pause for a few seconds.

Notice what you appreciate about it.

You might choose to remember it later, write it down or share it with somebody.

And if nothing comes to mind, that is perfectly all right too.

There is no target to achieve.

No required number of glimmers.

No expectation that you must feel better afterwards.

The practice is simply an invitation to become curious about the experiences that make up your day.

Perhaps resilience is not only about enduring

When we talk about resilience, we frequently focus on how people manage adversity.

How they cope.

How they recover.

How they continue when life becomes difficult.

These are important questions.

But I wonder whether our understanding of resilience also needs room for something else.

The capacity to experience pleasure.

To remain connected.

To recognise kindness.

To appreciate beauty.

To notice the small things that continue to matter even when life is complicated.

This does not mean that positive emotion alone creates resilience.

Resilience is influenced by many factors, including physical health, social support, resources, circumstances and access to appropriate care.

It should never be reduced to an individual's ability to think positively.

But perhaps our conversations about wellbeing can hold both sides of human experience.

The things that challenge us.

And the things that nourish us.

The moments that ask something of us.

And the moments that give something back.

Where science meets soul

There is a reason I love the word glimmer.

Not because it provides a neat scientific explanation for the nervous system.

It doesn't.

And not because I believe every positive moment must have a measurable physiological benefit.

We simply do not have the evidence to make that claim.

I love it because it gives a name to something deeply human.

The experience of noticing that, even within an ordinary or difficult day, something can still touch us.

A little kindness.

A little beauty.

A little joy.

The science of positive emotion, savouring, memory and attention offers fascinating ways to explore these experiences.

It also reminds us how much we have yet to understand.

And perhaps that is enough.

We do not have to turn every lovely moment into a clinical intervention.

Sometimes a bird singing outside the window can simply be a bird singing outside the window.

And we can enjoy it.

Perhaps the real power of a glimmer is not that it changes everything.

Perhaps it is that, for a moment, we notice something worth holding on to.

The Research Café Question

If you were designing a study to investigate glimmers, where would you begin?

Would you ask participants to record small positive moments throughout the day?

Would you examine whether deliberately noticing those moments influenced their reported mood?

Would you compare spontaneous positive experiences with structured savouring exercises?

Could physiological measures such as HRV add useful information?

And how would you account for the fact that one person's comforting experience may be another person's source of discomfort?

Perhaps the most interesting question is this:

Are we investigating the positive experience itself, the attention we give to it, or the meaning we attach to it afterwards?

And how might we design research capable of distinguishing between those possibilities?

References and further reading

Bryant, F.B. & Veroff, J. (2007). Savoring: A New Model of Positive Experience. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Bryant, F.B. (2021). Current progress and future directions for theory and research on savoring. Frontiers in Psychology. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.771698.

Fredrickson, B.L., Cohn, M.A., Coffey, K.A., Pek, J. & Finkel, S.M. (2008). Open hearts build lives: Positive emotions, induced through loving-kindness meditation, build consequential personal resources. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 95(5), 1045–1062. DOI: 10.1037/a0013262.

Kok, B.E. et al. (2013). How positive emotions build physical health: Perceived positive social connections account for the upward spiral between positive emotions and vagal tone. Psychological Science, 24(7), 1123–1132. DOI: 10.1177/0956797612470827.

Reminiscing about positive memories buffers acute stress responses. (2017). Nature Human Behaviour. DOI: 10.1038/s41562-017-0093.

Research note: The studies discussed here investigate related but distinct aspects of positive emotion, savouring, memory, social connection and physiological regulation. They do not collectively establish a single neurological mechanism for glimmers or demonstrate that noticing positive moments treats medical or psychological conditions.

The Living Apothecary encourages thoughtful engagement with scientific research and individual lived experience. This article is intended for education and wellbeing information and does not replace appropriate medical or psychological advice.

The Living Apothecary Method™

Where science meets soul, wellbeing begins with trust.