It’s 3:00 PM in the quiet section of the university library. Your shoulders are practically glued to your ears, your eyes are burning, and you have re-read the same sentence about macroeconomic theory four times without absorbing a single word.

We have all been there. I remember during my sophomore finals week, I sat in the same wooden chair for six hours straight, convinced that if I stood up, all the information would leak out of my ears. The result wasn’t better grades; it was a tension headache and a total inability to focus the next day.

I used to think the answer to library fatigue was another double shot of espresso and willpower. But I’ve learned the hard way that ignoring physical and mental tension just accelerates the crash. This is physiological. When we sit in prolonged states of intense cognitive load (and low-grade panic), our bodies accumulate stress hormones like cortisol.

If we don’t give our nervous system an outlet, that stress compounds into burnout. The good news is that research shows that incorporating brief, rare breaks can significantly improve sustained attention over long periods. You don’t need an hour-long yoga class; you just need a five-minute nervous system reset, right in your chair.

Here is the routine I use when the words start blurring on the page:

1. The Physical Release (1 Minute) Push your chair back slightly. Drop your shoulders… seriously, let them fall away from your ears. Slowly tilt your right ear toward your right shoulder, hold for two deep breaths, and switch sides. That crunching sound? That’s the tension leaving.

2. Box Breathing (2 Minutes) Close your eyes or soften your gaze toward your desk surface. We are going to signal your parasympathetic nervous system to chill out using “Box Breathing.”

• Inhale slowly for a count of four.
• Hold that breath for a count of four.
• Exhale slowly for a count of four.
• Hold empty for a count of four. Repeat this cycle four times.

3. Sensory Grounding (2 Minutes) Open your eyes. Silently name five things you can see (that flickering fluorescent light), four things you can physically feel (the texture of your sweater), three sounds you hear (the hum of the HVAC), two things you can smell, and one thing you can taste.

That’s it. You haven’t left your seat, no one noticed you doing it, but you just hit the reset button on your stress response. Wishing you the best in your studies!

Written by Emmett O’Meara

References

Ariga, A., & Lleras, A. (2011). Brief and rare mental “breaks” keep you focused: Deactivation and reactivation of task goals preempt vigilance decrements. Cognition, 118(3), 439–443.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2010.12.007