“I will celebrate every time the wave of emotion hits me…and then it’s gone”
Lives are getting busier all the time, making it feel impossible to get everything on our to-do lists done while still managing our overall well-being. Sometimes even 10 minutes of stretching can feel like a Herculean task. But the good news is that when it comes to mood regulation, you might only need to spare a measly 90 seconds.
While the “90 second rule” might initially come across as a passing TikTok hack, it’s a concept coined by Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, the neuroscientist who famously survived a severe stroke, which provided her a unique, firsthand perspective on brain function.
How the 90-second rule works
As Taylor explains it: “We’re only doing three things inside of our brain at any moment in time. We think thoughts, we feel emotion, and run physiological loops to what we’re thinking and feeling.”
Taylor claims that it takes about a minute-and-a-half for any feeling–be it anger, anxiety, or fear, etc.—to pass through organically. So our job is to allow that feeling to metabolize, essentially. And by the end of that process, your brain has a nice reset.
Taylor added that she even tries to “enjoy” whatever she’s feeling during those 90 seconds. “I will celebrate every time the wave of emotion hits me…and then it’s gone,” she says.
In an interview with Bustle, Djuan Short, LCSW, a licensed trauma therapist and founder of Dahlia Rose Wellness Center, added that another benefit of the 90-second rule is that it “interrupts the urgency” of everyday life, and suggests intentionally incorporating them into “high-demand days.”
“Most people are not exhausted because they are doing too much. They are exhausted because they never fully stop,” Short says. “In a culture built on notifications, deadlines, and visibility, even a brief pause can feel radical. Ninety seconds feels small enough to be possible, but meaningful enough to feel like something that belongs to you.”
How to practice the 90-second rule
- Catch the urge: Immediately recognize when you feel stressed, angry, or triggered.
- Set a timer: Allow yourself exactly 90 seconds to feel the sensation without judgment.
- Breathe and feel: Focus on where the emotion exists in your body (e.g., tight chest, hot face) and let it pass.
- Release: After the 90 seconds are up, check in with yourself. Taylor explains that if you do happen to still feel lingering emotions after those 90 seconds, that means you’re rethinking the same thought, which restimulates the same emotional and physiological response. Recognize this in a mental loop and consciously choose to stop feeding the emotion.
At its core, the 90-second rule reminds us that many of our emotional reactions, while valid, are a cocktail of hardwired survival instincts and chemical processes. Learning to work with these sensations, rather than stuffing them down or being ruled by them, gives us power back in the only thing in life we do have control over: ourselves.
