LIFE STINKS
Yep you read that right. Just think for a minute how many things in your life have repulsive scents… B.O. is the easy one but the list is long.
Our sense of smell has evolved over millennia in order to protect us. We can all detect rotting food and excrement for examples. Stuff we have learnt to avoid!
As a species we have gone above and beyond to get rid of the “Stench of life”! Historians say that the first “perfumes” were created around 3300 BC in south Asia. When you consider just how many things needed to be taken care of nearly 5000 years ago and humans decided to deal with the stench of life then?! That should give you an idea just how serious of a problem it was.
Fast forward to today and our desire, need, addiction to smelling good is enormous. Everything has to smell good! As with so many things that started out of a passion to improve life, greed and corruption have perverted the perfume industry which has turned to dubious and/or flat out dangerous chemicals as cheap substitutes to recreate natural perfumery ingredients. Lowering their production costs and increasing their profits.
Yes, we can argue that going synthetic to recreate various scents is a noble effort. Case and point; musk! We can also reason that with the loss of crops we need an alternative to make up for the lost flowers and plants. But I fear that the simplest explanation is the correct one.
The high demand for things that smell good and the high profit margin have perverted the industry. The result, fragrance allergies are now rampant. In turn this opened the door to the rise of “scent free” or “unscented” everything.
Now-a-days, someone that smells good is almost an oddity in a world of near nothingness.
I love fragrances. I love smelling good and love discovering exciting scents on people and things. I don’t want this nothingness.
I also don’t want to think that we have to give it up on fragrance, but we do have to make better choices. Look at the ingredients on that bottle of body spray, if you don’t know what most of the 35 listed items are, odds are you should put it back on the shelf regardless of how affordable it is.
Check out artisans, they generally have incredibly exciting things. If you are feeling experimental, go out and buy a kit of essentials oil along with some empty bottles. The whole thing will most likely be less than a big brand name fragrance and a way more fun.
When done right, smelling good is a gift for everyone.