There is a change that seems to happen every spring. It stays light later, your energy starts to come back online, and suddenly you’re a person who has plans again: dinner here, a workout class there, maybe even a casual yes to something on a Tuesday night. It all feels good. Expansive, even. Until, somehow, it didn’t.
Because alongside this fresh energy, there is something more difficult to name: a weak feeling of overstimulation. You sleep a little less well. Your calendar is filling up faster than expected. You feel both energized and slightly nervous, like your body hasn’t yet caught up to the season.
I was just telling my boyfriend the other night that as spring approaches—and in a season of life that already feels busy in its own way—I want to pay more attention to my energy. Not just how much I have, but how I feel: when it aligns with the life I’m building and when it starts to drift.
Featured image of our interview with Mary Ralph Bradley by Michelle Nash.
The spring nervous system resets your body and mind that you crave
Here is an example. The other night, after a few days of that first real Portland sunshine, I fell asleep at 8 p.m. without meaning to. Nearly eleven hours later, it became a little harder to ignore what my body had been asking for all along: less.
And that’s the problem this time of year. The world is starting to open up quickly – more light, more projects, more possibilities – but your nervous system does not necessarily follow the same rhythm. It adjusts more gradually, in response to the signals it gives it.
“After the slower pace of winter, spring can feel like a sudden burst of energy for the nervous system,” explains Clara Schröderecotherapist, speaker and author of Re-Nature: How Nature Helps Us Feel Better and Do Better. “More daylight means you can do more after work, and suddenly we feel the pressure to fill our social calendars or add activities to the end of our days. »
What looks like a lack of discipline or energy is often something else entirely: a body that is still learning to cope with the moment in which it finds itself.
Clara Schroeder is an ecotherapist, speaker, and bestselling author of Re-Nature: How Nature Helps Us Feel Better and Do Better. Clara’s expertise has been trusted by leading organizations including UCSF, Microsoft, Women in Cloud, Terumo Neuro, and Aura Health. She holds a master’s degree in psychology and education from the Spirituality Mind and Body Institute at Columbia University, led by renowned clinical psychologist Dr. Lisa Miller. As a Certified Ecotherapist, Institute Certified Mindfulness Teacher, Co-Active Professional Coach, and Wilderness First Responder through NOLS, she offers a grounded, science-based path to sustainable transformation.
What a Nervous System Spring Reset Really Means
Spring is a season of expansion, but your nervous system doesn’t instantly adapt to that pace. It responds to what it is given, recalibrating itself in real time. This is why trying to force more energy, more production, or more structure too quickly can leave you even more out of sync.
Instead, this season’s reset feels a little gentler. It’s about being careful. It’s about noticing when something seems too difficult, even if it’s something you’ve been looking forward to. This allows your ability to develop, rather than assuming it already exists.
Or, as Schroeder puts it, the goal is to be “gradual and gentle with this seasonal transition” so you can actually enjoy it, instead of getting overwhelmed by it.
Why Spring Can Feel Surprisingly Overwhelming
Part of what makes this time of year so disorienting is the disconnect between what’s happening around you and what your body is ready for.
The outside world is accelerating rapidly. There is more light, more activity, more opportunities to enjoy it all. Your calendar fills up faster and you feel a subtle urge to get back to everything at once.
But internally, the change is more gradual. Longer days begin to recalibrate your circadian rhythminfluencing everything from your sleep to your energy levels to your mood. Cortisol patterns adjust in response to increased light exposure and your body begins to receive more sensory information, often before it is completely caught up with the change of seasons.
“Our bodies are more sensitive to the cycles of nature than we often realize,” says Schroeder. “We tend to experience seasonal changes physiologically as well as emotionally.” This is why even positive change can seem excessive.
Everything’s fine, until it’s not. Because your nervous system does not distinguish between GOOD stress and bad stress as one would expect. It simply saves the entries. And when this contribution increases rapidly, it reacts accordingly.
Spring often brings a subtle sense of urgency: the feeling that you should do more simply because you suddenly can. As Schroeder explains, this increase in light and activity can create pressure to fill your time in ways your body isn’t always ready for.
This is how you can find yourself in a moment that is both energizing and overwhelming.
Subtle signs that your nervous system is overstimulated
Overstimulation tends to surface quietly, through small changes in the way you feel, in the way you move through the day, and in the way you react to things that wouldn’t normally bother you.
You feel more tired, but less rested. You may first notice it while you sleep. You are more tired than usual, but you sleep less soundly. There’s a sort of restlessness that persists, even when you’ve technically had enough rest.
You feel both nervous and exhausted. There’s energy, but it doesn’t feel grounded. It could be sharper or more responsive. As if your body is running slightly in front of you.
Your reactions seem slightly amplified. The irritation comes a little faster. Your threshold seems lower. Not enough to name anything important, but enough to notice that everything seems a little louder than it should.
The projects are starting to seem heavier than expected. The things you’ve been really looking forward to start to feel like something worth experiencing.
As Schroeder explains, even positive changes (more plans, more activity, more stimulation) can create a sense of urgency in the body that it isn’t always ready for. None of this means anything is wrong. Rather, it’s your nervous system doing exactly what it’s supposed to do: responding to increased stimulation and asking for a little more space.
A Nervous System Spring Reset: 5 Ways to Feel More Regulated
If the transition to spring seems a little quicker than expected, a reset doesn’t need to be drastic. Start with these small adjustments. You can think of them as ways of working with the season rather than against it.
1. Start your day with light (before typing)
In front of your phone or inbox, get out. It doesn’t have to be long. Even just a few minutes of morning light is enough to start anchoring your circadian rhythm, signaling your body that it’s time to wake up, focus, and gradually build energy throughout the day.
As Schroeder explains, morning light plays a key role in regulating sleep, mood, and hormones, helping the nervous system move toward a more balanced state.
But more than anything, it’s the feeling. Light on your skin. Air that has not yet been filtered through a sieve. A moment when nothing is asked of you. Consider this a signal to your nervous system that it is safe to begin.
2. Take your movement outdoors
Spring makes everything a little more alive – and your body responds to it too. You don’t need a perfectly structured workout. What matters is the combination of movement and environment. The rhythm of your body moving, coupled with the sensory cues of being outside, helps the nervous system move out of this low-level fight or flight state and into something more grounded.
And it doesn’t have to be all or nothing. As Schroeder notes, even small, consistent moments in nature can contribute significantly to stress reduction and emotional balance.
3. Boost your social energy (even when you’re excited)
Spring invites you to reintegrate everything at once, but your capacity does not increase overnight.
It’s easy to confuse excitement with preparation, to assume that because something sounds good you have the energy to hold on to it. And sometimes it is. But sometimes what your body needs is a little more space between the things you’re looking forward to.
Schroeder suggests a simple check-in: Will this exhaust me or energize me? Not as a general rule, but as a way to stay connected to yourself as the pace of life resumes.
You don’t need to become your most social self overnight. (I’ve already had to tell myself this several times this spring.) Give yourself time, space, and intention to make projects that align with your energy.
4. Create small anchors in your day
Have you noticed a trend yet? When it comes to a spring reset of the nervous system, the most favorable changes are often the smallest.
A cup of coffee outside rather than at your desk. A walk without headphones. Even just a few minutes to let your mind wander between tasks.
These moments may seem almost insignificant, but to your nervous system they register as something completely different: safety. A signal that you are in no hurry. That there is space to move forward at your own pace.
Schroeder emphasizes the importance of cultivating a more mindful relationship with your surroundings, slowing down enough to notice what’s around you, rather than moving through it on autopilot.
Small things, often repeated, tend to turn everything upside down.
5. Let the season be sufficient
Spring does not escape social or environmental pressures. You might feel like it’s time to reset everything. Your habits, your routines, your energy, your life.
But expansion does not require you don’t get exhausted. You don’t need to optimize your progress through the season or keep up with the speed of everything around you. And you don’t need to prove that you’re getting the most out of it.
Sometimes the best thing you can do is let what’s already there be enough. To face the season as you are, rather than as you think you should be.
Because this is what regulation really means: staying connected to yourself as life begins to develop.
What a regulated spring day can actually look like
The morning begins before the world gets noisy. You walk out before checking your phone. Even a few minutes are enough: your body receives a clear signal: it’s time to wake up. You haven’t done anything impressive, but something already feels more grounded.
Movement occurs, but it is not forced. Maybe it’s a walk after your coffee or 10 minutes of stretching with the window open. The problem isn’t the intensity, it’s that your body is moving in a way that feels reactive and not performative.
Your calendar has shape, not just volume. There are projects, yes, but there is also space around them. You don’t rush from one thing to the next without taking a break. It’s time to reset between moments, even if it’s just a few minutes of walking, breathing, or sitting without intervention.
You check in before you leave. At some point during the day (making coffee, closing your laptop, getting ready to leave), you pause long enough to ask: What do I really need right now? Take the time to notice if something is wrong and adjust where you can.
The evening feels like a transition, not a crash. The day gradually ends. The lights soften and your energy follows. You don’t add one last thing just because you have time. You’re left to slow down your body for the day.
As Schroeder suggests, the goal is not to follow the rhythm of the season, but to stay connected to your own rhythm.
A gentler way to spend spring
Spring is a season of expansion, but it shouldn’t be rushed. Energy will build, days will lengthen, and life will naturally begin to open up around you. You don’t have to keep up with it to be part of it.
Regulation in this season is about staying connected to yourself as things change: paying attention to what feels aligned and noticing when it doesn’t. This allows your capacity to grow gradually, rather than assuming it should already be there.
Because spring will continue to unfold one way or another. Change is about learning to evolve with it, instead of being carried away by it.
The position Your Nervous System Needs a Spring Reset: Here’s Where to Start appeared first on Camille Styles.
