Beginners Guide to Fragrance #11: How to Enhance Your Sense of Smell

In this Beginner's Guide, we'll explore how enhancing your sense of smell can enrich your life, elevating your sensory experiences and turning the ordinary into the extraordinary.

Join us on this olfactory journey as we uncover the significance of our sense of smell - and why delving deeper into it is both pleasurable and profoundly rewarding.

Everyday Scents

Have you ever paused to consider the role your sense of smell plays in day to day life?

A scented trail starts from your waking moments... with smells such as toothpaste, body wash, fluffy towels, hair spray, toast, melting butter, coffee.

Your morning commute might be punctuated with scents like dewy foliage, traffic fumes, freshly laundered clothes, pastries in a paper bag.

... and so it continues.

Scented Bookmarks

Stand out scents may form bookmarks of important chapters in your life - some now closed, some ongoing and others yet to come... a grandmother's baking, rolling down hills on freshly cut grass, laundry blowing in the wind, a special holiday, romantic meal or the remembered scent of a loved one.

Our Olfactory System

Our sense of smell deeply connects us to the world around us and plays a profound role in our experiences. It's always been there... sometimes we just need to tune into it.

Nestled in the primal depths of our brain, our olfactory bulb is intricately linked with our limbic system - the seat of emotions. A whiff of a familiar aroma is all it takes to ignite a cascade of memories... fragrant threads intertwining seamlessly with our emotions.

Our olfactory senses have the power to evoke memories, stir emotions, and even influence our behaviour.

Scent Associations

Think back to the day you've just had and consider how many different smells you can remember... you might be surprised how quickly they add up. In the days and weeks to come, make a mental note of smells you notice throughout your day - and those you recall from childhood or another stage in your life.

Often, we subconsciously attach specific scents to an occasion - or we might consciously create new scented associations with a significant event, such as a wedding fragrance.

Personally, I love to bring STORIES Bougie Parfumée Perfumed Candles with me on my travels, creating new scented memories as I go. And I love the idea of gifting fragrance as each time that person spritzes, you're re-gifting them, embellishing the memories they make and enhancing their own personal story.

Six ways to enhance your sense of smell

1. Mindful Smelling - pay attention to smells in your daily life... simply take a moment to consciously notice the smell of your own skin, food, flowers, or surroundings.
2. New Scent-sations - challenge your nose with a wider variety of scents - such as herbs, spices, essential oils, perfumes, flowers and fruits.
3. Aromatherapy - experiment with essential oils to stimulate the olfactory system - notice how lavender, peppermint, or citrus oils affect your sense of smell and wellbeing.
4. Taste and Smell - our sense of taste and smell are closely linked. Try holding your nose for a moment while tasting food - then release and notice how much the aroma enhances your sense of taste.
5. Scented Memories - smells have the power to trigger memories... try to recall past memories associated with specific scents to help improve your scent memory.
6. Scented Moments - incorporate scented candles, incense or aromatherapy oils into your relaxation time and notice how this makes you feel.

If you'd like to explore this on a 1:1 basis, you're welcome to join me on a private, online Scent Discovery Masterclass, where I'll share how to choose a signature scent and how our sense of smell, the most powerful of all our senses is closely linked with our emotion, memory and mood!

Enhancing your sense of smell takes time and practice... enjoy the process of exploring the world of scents around you and please do share your experiences with us in the comments below.