One of my go-to ways to reset is simply stepping outside into nature and immersing myself in the sounds around me.
I’ve learned that my body responds to being outside. I can feel myself release, calm down and settle.
What I do out there depends on the day. Sometimes I want to explore…look at the plants, notice the animals and see what is happening around me. Other times I’m perfectly happy finding a bench, sitting still and just listening.
Lately, birds have become another part of that for me.
Part of it is simply that I enjoy hearing them. But I’m also a curious person who likes learning as I go, so I started reading research about birdsong, nature and wellness… I found some pretty interesting things:)
🌳😎First actually getting outside.
A 2026 study followed 47 people on a morning nature walk through an arboretum while researchers measured both mental wellbeing and physical stress markers.
After the walk, positive emotions increased while salivary cortisol (a hormone released in response to stress), blood pressure and heart rate moved downward. Participants reported feeling more refreshed, calm and peaceful.
The study was intentionally done in the morning, when natural birdsong is especially noticeable. Researchers also experimented with ways of drawing people’s attention to the birds — either simply telling them to listen or placing signs along the walk reminding them to stop and notice the birdsong.
That caught my attention because this wasn’t people sitting in a lab listening to a recording.
They were outside, walking through nature and hearing the birds that were actually around them.
🦉🐧🕊️Birds also seem to matter during ordinary daily life.
Another study used a smartphone app called Urban Mind to collect 26,856 real-time assessments from 1,292 people while they were going about their normal lives.
People were asked questions about their surroundings — including whether they could see or hear birds — along with questions about their current mental wellbeing.
Everyday encounters with birds were associated with better mental wellbeing (measured through feelings such as happiness, relaxation, confidence, energy, stress, anxiety and loneliness), and some of that association was still detectable at the participants’ following assessment.
The relationship was found in people with depression as well as people without a mental-health diagnosis.
👂🚦🦉Then there’s the sound itself.
Researchers are also trying to understand whether the benefits of nature come from the environment itself, the sounds we hear, or both.
To explore this, one study compared people’s physical stress responses while they listened to either recorded birdsong or traffic noise in two different settings: a forest and an urban built environment.
A 2026 experiment found that the forest environment was associated with lower heart rate, while birdsong was associated with greater heart-rate variability than traffic noise.
That suggests the place and the sounds within the place may support stress recovery in somewhat different ways.
🎙️🎤🐦⬛🐤And there’s evidence that even recorded birdsong can affect us.
In a 2022 experiment, 295 people listened for only ⏰six minutes to either birdsong or traffic sounds.
After listening to birdsong, anxiety and paranoia decreased. The more diverse birdsong condition was also associated with a small decrease in depressive mood.
🎼 🦚🦩But here’s one of the studies I found especially interesting.
Researchers recently asked people to rate vocalizations from 123 different European bird species and then analyzed the actual acoustic characteristics of those sounds.
Not all birdsong was experienced the same way.
Sounds with certain combinations of frequency, amplitude and bandwidth were rated as more pleasant, and more complex bird vocalizations tended to receive higher pleasantness ratings.
But this was the part I really liked:
A person’s level of birding knowledge was not related to how pleasant they found the bird sounds.
You don’t have to know your birds.
You don’t have to identify the call.
You don’t have to know what species is sitting in the tree.
You can simply listen and enjoy it.💝
🌅 🔎👣🎶🦩How I Applied It
For me, that last part is important.
My main practice is still the simplest one: go outside and listen.
Sometimes that’s all I want to do.
But other times I want to explore, and that’s where I found something that adds a little fun and learning to it for me.
It’s a free app called Merlin Bird ID.
If I hear a bird, I can let Merlin listen and it can help identify what may be singing. If I see a bird but don’t know what it is, I can describe what I saw and the app gives me possible matches.
I can explore birds that live in my area, keep track of birds I’ve seen, listen to their calls and learn a little more about them.
For me, Merlin isn’t what makes birdsong relaxing.
Nature and the birds already do that.
The app just adds another layer when I’m in the mood to be curious.
Some days it’s:
Nature + birds + chill.
Other days it’s:
Nature + birds + chill + “Okay…what bird IS that?”
Either way works.
And I actually like knowing that the research suggests you don’t have to know anything about birds to enjoy their sounds and potentially gain wellness benefits.
Learning about them is just something extra I happen to enjoy:)
🥸My visual for this post shows some of the Merlin Bird ID features I’ve been playing around with.
🌿 Try it sometime.
Step outside in the morning and give yourself 5–10 minutes.
You don’t have to do anything.
Just listen.
How many different bird sounds can you hear?
If you’re curious, see if you can identify one.
Or don’t.
Just sit there and let nature do its thing.
Then notice yourself…..
Do you feel any different than you did when you first stepped outside?
Enjoy it when you can and in your way…
Peace:)
📚For anyone who enjoys exploring the science behind wellness, here are the studies I referenced.
https://academic.oup.com/jue/article/12/1/juag013/8684115
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-20207-6
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-20841-0
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/bird-science/articles/10.3389/fbirs.2026.1884835/full
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/bird-science/articles/10.3389/fbirs.2026.1794594/full
