Harvard-trained psychiatrist reveals the fastest way to change your life: You need only one sticky note

A partner rolls their eyes, a colleague replies briefly, or someone fails to respond when expected. Within seconds, the mind may create an entire explanation for what happened, even when the facts are limited.

Psychiatrist Kavetha Sundaramoorthy, trained at Harvard and known on social media as Dr. Kavetha Sun, says this pattern appears in relationships at home, among friends and at work. Something happens, people assign it a meaning, and they then react to their own interpretation as if it were an established truth.

In one of her videos, Dr. Sun places three sticky notes on a board: “experience,” “story” and “reaction.” The experience is the event directly observed, such as a wife rolling her eyes while her husband speaks. The story comes next: assuming she did so because she thinks he is stupid. That interpretation can quickly trigger anger, anxiety, fear or a sense of rejection.

The reaction follows. One person may start shouting, another may withdraw, and someone else may spend the rest of the day avoiding another confrontation. Dr. Sun says emotional distress often begins when people fail to separate what actually happened from the story they built around it.

To interrupt the pattern, she adds a smaller note between “story” and “reaction”: “awareness.” Instead of automatically accepting the thought “I am angry,” she suggests saying, “I notice that part of me feels anger.” That wording creates psychological distance, allowing the emotion to be observed rather than treated as a complete definition of the self. Dr. Sun compares thoughts and emotions with clouds passing across the sky: they come and go, while the sky remains.

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I notice that part of me feels anger.