The smartwatch at work

I get Abnormal Heart Rate Alerts on my Garmin watch, and it goes off at specific situations at work. That in itself is unsettling, but, okay, I find it really helpful. I turn off the vibration, regulate my breathing and take stock of what’s happening. It happens in a matter of seconds, often discretely during a meeting.

Usually it’s related to a perception of urgency

• when I’m frazzled and doing multiple things at once

• when I’m running out to time to wrap up a task

• when I’ve received big news that requires immediate reaction
  

or felt pressure in conversations

• when I sense someone is trying to get me to react in a certain way, or speak before I’m ready to

• when I feel the group is stuck or drifting, and I'm responsible for getting us back on track

• when someone is recounting a stressful situation (sympathy stress?)

What I find interesting is that these aren’t situations that I’d consider particularly stressful. In fact, they’re quite common micro moments in the ebb and flow of my work day. But when my physiological experience is fed back to me in the moment, indeed I often find that I’ve stopped breathing. And if I stay in that state, my shoulders get stiff, my limbs grow cold and I end the day depleted.

I want to know, if you wear a smartwatch and have this kind of notification set up, does it buzz during work hours?

Second, if you’re not one to wear a “smart” watch, do you have such physiological responses? How do you notice...?