Smell Steers Your Mind

Keywords

Snob, allergic, mistrust, dreamy, withdrawn, passive aggression, instinctive, discerning

Lost in Reverie

When your mind is steered by smell, you may react strongly to particular scents. Some of your strongest memories might be associated with smells. You can get lost in the reverie of a fragrance you enjoy.

Sniff Out the Truth

Past experiences with smells can subconsciously influence your interactions, potentially leading to standoffish or withdrawn behavior in social situations. Trust issues or difficulty recognizing the truth may arise, with a lingering sense that something doesn't feel right. You know something isn’t right, yet can’t point to what it is.  Something just smells off.

Cornered by Strong Smells

You are likely sensitive to chemicals and artificial fragrances. If you can’t get away from a bad smell or allergens, you may act passive-aggressively. Being in enclosed spaces with strong smells is super challenging.

Captivating Smells of Home

The smell of cooking or baking is your downfall. You can’t resist the smell of those cookies or a home-cooked sauce. It draws you in.

Smell Your World Meditation

A simple practice to tame your sense of smell is to dedicate a few minutes to consciously notice and reflect on the smells around you, cultivating awareness and understanding of smell’s impact on your emotions

Why Understanding Your Senses Is Valuable

As part of the animal self, the senses are driven by pleasure and pain, appetite and distaste, craving and revulsion. They move toward what they desire and away from what they dislike.

One sense may dominate or a few may conspire to rule your mind.  This can lead to feelings that your life is out of your control and your senses drag you hither and fro.  May you numbly aimlessly wander through your day as the senses seek to satisfy their appetites.  Anxiety, depression, hopelessness, restlessness, insecurity, and sensitivity are symptoms of your senses steering your mind.

The results of this quiz can help you improve your relationship with your senses.  Like a horse-whisperer subtly communicates with a horse to steer them, you can learn to guide your senses through self-empathy.  As your senses relax and trust your conscious guidance, they operate as a powerful team that you rein in the direction of your choosing.

I logged my experiences and shared the practices that taught me how to improve the relationship between my senses, mind and will in my new book, Rein: Harness the Wild Power of Your Senses.