Afterglow

Afterglow is an informal word rather than a clinical one. People use it for the stretch after a meaningful session when mood, openness, or a sense of connection feel lifted. Some describe it as a quietness, others as warmth, others as things simply mattering more than they did last week.

It matters between sessions because it is temporary and because people rarely expect it to end. Reports of how long it lasts vary widely, from hours to a few weeks, and it fades at different rates. Treating the afterglow as the result, rather than as a window, is one of the more common ways to lose ground after a good session.

The more useful way to hold it is as time that is easier to use, not as proof that the work is finished. What you build during it, a habit, a conversation, a written note, is still there once the feeling has gone.

Afterglow is also not a requirement. Plenty of people report no lift at all after a session that turns out to matter a great deal later. Its absence is not a sign that something went wrong.