Blue sky at dawn. A walk without the dog. Seize a chance to be awed. You won’t regret it

Have you ever walked outside and been stunned by the color of the sky, a hummingbird’s fluttering, or a dogwood starting to bloom?

Or perhaps you’ve ambled through a museum and boom, a sculpture or painting or tapestry hits you — hard — and you halt, become drawn in, and are oblivious to the world around you.

Congratulations. You’ve felt awe.

I had no idea that that scientists have been studying the concept of awe for years. Professors Dacher Keltner (University of California, Berkeley) and Jonathan Haidt (University of Virginia) were apparently the first to raise the topic as worthy of study in a paper in 2003. They wrote that “awe is felt about diverse events and objects, from waterfalls to childbirth to scenes of devastation. . . . Fleeting and rare, experiences of awe can change the course of a life in profound and permanent ways.”

Goodness. “Change the course of a life in profound and permanent ways.”

I’m not sure my life course has been completely changed, but I’ve certainly felt enriched from experiences of awe, now that I try to notice them.

So how can we encourage that type of experience?

First, be more aware of what might be right in front of us.

I sleep in a room with big south-facing windows. Recently, when I awaken between 5 and 6 a.m., I’m lucky to see a “cerulean blue sky.” (I’ve wanted to write those words for a long time.) I’ve never seen this type of blue at other times of day. It lasts only a few minutes, but for some reason, seeing that sky grounds me for the rest of the day. I know that, as the day get shorter, it may vanish, but for now I hold onto that feeling and memory.

Second, I’m taking take “mini awe walks.” I’ve begun going out for 10 minutes in the morning, without the dog, to listen for birdsongs (different than the ones in the evening, I’m learning) or study the dusty orange-and-yellow tulip-tree blossom in my front yard. Instead of focusing on the road in front of me, I look up a lot, at the cloud formations, the birds, and the mountains. One day I almost stepped on a snake because I was looking up instead of down, but maybe that’s all part of it.

I don’t think it’s changed my life permanently, but as I said, it does give me something to reach back to during the day, if I need a calm moment or memory, if I’m searching for an image or color. And it simply helps me remember that we can control some parts of our lives and days in this crazy world.

Nancy Napier is a distinguished professor emerita and coach for the executive MBA program in the College of Business and Economics at Boise State University in Idaho. nnapier@boisestate.edu. She is co-author of “The Bridge Generation of Vietnam: Spanning Wartime to Boomtime.”