Well, in principle, the memories themselves do not smell. They are in memory. But do you remember the specific smell of something you liked as a child? It can be a perfume, nature or the smell of your grandmother’s cake. The smells also remain in the memory and for this reason, those from childhood can bring us aromas that make us feel good… or bad. The sense of smell is much more powerful than you can imagine.

Sometimes a simple smell takes us back to the past… in a very real way, it is as if we could teleport to a past full of happiness. Although sometimes those memories may not be so beautiful, in any case, we cannot underestimate the power of smell that can be accompanied by great and intense emotions. Why is it important to act on severe mental disorders at an early age?

Scents of memories that evoke emotions

Babies use smell to be able to know who their mother is and they remember that aroma so as not to be confused. Later, that olfactory memory becomes something more emotional when, in addition, visual memory also plays an important role.

If someone walks by you and wears the perfume of your grandfather who passed away a few years ago, it is likely that the emotions you feel are very intense. And it’s normal. When you remember certain things it is logical that you feel emotions that even make you change your mood at that precise moment.

Sometimes, that smell may make you feel things but you don’t know how to associate it with a specific visual memory. In these circumstances it is normal for you to feel some confusion even though you really know that this smell is important to you for some reason, even if you don’t know exactly why. If you try a little to remember, surely that memory will come to your head.

your brain is emotional

People’s brains are emotional, that’s why those intense links are established between smells and the emotional state they provoke in you. This is so because smell is closely linked to your emotional brain, which is responsible for making you feel one way or another depending on the circumstances around you.

The olfactory stimulus passes through the amycete and the hippocampus, both brain areas that are linked to your memory and emotions. That’s why, when you smell something that reminds you of an emotion , you experience it in such an intense way.

In children it happens even more

In children, their sense of smell is very important, especially when they are babies, as we have mentioned above. If you stop to think, there are smells that take you back to your childhood instantly, that’s why it’s such a good idea for parents to keep this in mind so that they can help their children discover new smells that make them feel things both now as in the future. For example, the aroma of your favorite food accompanied by pleasant family moments. This will remind your child as an adult of the well-being of that memory.

Another example is the perfume that mom or dad always wears. Although you may also associate a particular smell at the pediatrician’s office with bad experiences and when you are older, walking into a doctor can make you remember these less pleasant emotions. That is why it is important that pleasant memories are created in these places that may cause certain distressing emotions.

Also, the aroma of the countryside can evoke good memories such as when children spent long hours playing with their siblings and as adults, they remember it.

In this sense, it is necessary for parents to keep all this in mind so that their children, and thanks to these powerful emotional memories, feel loved and loved. Thus, they will be able to grow up with a good feeling of belonging and with the happiness of enjoying life, the family and both the present and the future.