Self stimulated reminiscing.......

Someone asked me the other day whether I am ever reminded of past events using scents. Well the truth is that , and I am sure I am not alone in this but I reminisce through all five senses.  Sometimes through a sixth sense, I am definitely not alone in that one.

On a serious note though, today I shall elaborate on a few things that I use to self stimulate reminiscent  thoughts. 

My most useful tool so far has been soul music. Do you remember the times in your life that you were truly happy. I'm not talking about some short instance where you got a new toy and you were happy but you got bored of it the next day thing , I mean a state of complete surrender to joy. I am pretty much not happy anymore, unhappy job, unhappy town and not being constantly able to spend a day with a loved one at will takes a toll on you. In order to keep myself from jumping over the deep end I try to take my mind back to those joyful moments in my past. 

I do it by listening to music, sounds simple right? It is pretty simple, probably all of the happiest moments in my life have had soundtracks on them. Whether the songs I use were playing at that time, I wouldn't be able to tell you but my mind constantly linked a song to a particular moment in history for years now. For the last couple of days I have been listening to Night shift by "The Commodores", not only is it the first of their songs to win a Grammy but it basically takes me back to my childhood. As a kid, my parents used to play every single genre of music imaginable and that has influenced me over the years to look for music as the pure art form that can change a rainy day into a happy thing. Soul music in particular used to be played during festive times and thus every time I listen to any of the songs from that genre I just travel back to that time. You would play illusions near me and suddenly I would just start smiling like I had just absorbed some drugs out of thin air. Beat goes on by the whispers was the ones song I'd play over and over in the office while I was thumbing away at a report that was needed before the end of the day. With this said and done you can see why I had an entire previous blog post titled MUSIC IS MY SAVIOUR.

Ever felt a scent in the air that could only be someone or something from your past. Well this is the one tool that I cannot use often since a scent can't be easily recorded and reused over and over again. This is one tool they gets the undesirable title of "unpredictable one". For quite some time I could probably relate a particular scent to a particular person which made for some comic relief every time I stopped and looked around expecting to spot someone in a crowded room. Scents did not apply to people alone but you could probably remember a scent from your first house, a loved one or even Christmas. There was a scent that came out for many occasions or situations that I may not list here but you get the picture.

I would delve into sight but it is the most obvious and probably easiest to use.

Someone is probably going to ask my why I thought if this , it's not like I have had a nasty couple of days but I did have a wonderful trip and I didn't want it to end so I asked myself " How do I live in the past while the present moves on?"