We are often so preoccupied that we don’t even take deep breaths, let alone use and enjoy all of our senses. For many of us, vision dominates our senses. Next in line for most is hearing, then touch followed by taste, and finally smell. Sure, we’re told that scent is far more significant than we realize, but how often do we sustain awareness of our sense of smell?

Right now, quick, what do you smell? Are you at home, at work, in your car, on the bus, still rolling around in bed? Does it smell good? Bad? Weird? Strong? Are there intermittent waves of scent as the breeze passes by, doors are opened, or people cross your paths? What’s your favorite scent? Are there scents that evoke powerful memories? More than we realize, our memory is intertwined indelibly with scent.

What sounds can you hear? Is there music, the rumble of cars, the whistle of a train, the rustle of leaves, or maybe the commotion of others (especially small others)? Maybe there is silence around you. Do you have tinnitus? Is it loud? It is now, isn’t it (if you know, you know)! All those background noises, even those within your ears, may have faded into the background until called to the fore. When you are focused, can you tune out the ruckus around you? Or are the conversations of those in close proximity impossible not to hear? I’m terrible at eavesdropping. I get nothing, even when I try. This made my mom batty when I was a kid. I never knew what was going on around me. There is a surprising amount of information one is expected to simply overhear. Is music a comforting accompaniment? Do you like high or low tones? Do you hum? Yah, you know who you are! One way or another, our sound preferences are often strong.

Sight is the strongest sense for many of us. A primary tool in navigating the world around us. Even here, there is a huge range of experiences with sight. Are you color blind? Are colors unusually vivid for you? Are you a super sensor in sight with an exponentially larger range of detectable colors than most humans? How do we even compare our experience of sight to account for those for whom colors are vivid and for those for whom colors are more muted? When was the last time you disagreed about something being purple or blue? Beyond the detection of color, how do they make you feel? Are bright colors pleasing or disconcerting? Do you favor warm or cool colors in your clothing or interior decor? Are there particular hues you dislike? Can you explain why? I usually can’t justify the biases I have against certain colors. It’s just how it is for me. Texture is another layer of sight. Smooth, rough, fuzzy, soft, slick, the list is endless. MORE

English has a huge descriptive vocabulary. A feature that not all languages share. Arabic, Korean, French, and Japanese are other languages that also have an abundance of descriptors. Some languages have many words for aspects of their lives that aren’t echoed even in a language as prolific in descriptors as English. Languages like Inuktitut (of the indigenous people of the Canadian Arctic) or Icelandic have dozens of words for snow. This gives them ways to describe far more precisely the nature of a particular snowfall so prominent in their existence. The rest of make do tacking on adjectives as needed to even begin to approximate such precision.

I’m sitting outside in the sun at this very moment to warm up. It’s cold in my treehouse-like apartment in the mornings and I insist on keeping the windows wide open for fresh air. Down here on the ground, the wind just picked up and I’m momentarily chilled. But wait, which sense do we use for temperature or wind? If we define 5 senses, then touch would be it. Touch encompasses a lot more than immediately comes to mind. Are your clothes snug or loose? Is the ground beneath you firm or soft? Are there textures that give you the creeps?

Taste is an unforgettable and marvelous sense. It is the enjoyment of food. It is the detection of harmful substances and spoilage. Were you one of those kids who licked everything? Ask your mom. For many young children, taste is a primary sense through which they learn about their world. Those kids will try to give everything they come across a taste. Exasperating, but quintessentially human. As a kid, I didn’t have my adenoids removed until I was 7 years old. Adenoids are fleshy glands that can block the breathing through nose and mouth in the back of the throat if they are unusually large. This meant that along with no sense of smell, I had little sense of taste because it is intimately linked to our olfactory sense. After they were removed, watermelon blew my mind. It tastes like flat water without a sense of smell. I still managed to be a picky eater, except I distinguished foods by texture and color in the absence of taste and odor. Forever ever, I have deeply appreciated the taste of foods having known a world without them. 

The thing is, we all have a range of acuity of our senses. Some don’t have all the senses having been born without them or having lost them via accident or illness. Indeed, those who do not have or lose a sense will often develop stronger and expanded capabilities in those remaining. Amazing adaptations may ensue. One of my favorites is that some deaf people can echolocate. For reals! Incredible, though apparently super scary for their parents in the early days. The brain equilibrates to our individual suite of senses in exquisite ways. Each of us knows a different and equally human experience amongst an incredible range and variety of abilities. 

There are those who believe that there are more than five senses. Without delving into the complexities, let’s consider some of the things we sense that don’t obviously fit into the big 5. Senses are all about how we experience the world around us and within us. Senses are both measurable and immeasurable. I can demonstrate that this rock is hard with a defined scale, but my experience of emotion is not easily quantified. We pick up body language, detect emotions, ruminate incessantly, and feel deeply. Difficult to define, but these are everyday senses without which we would be lost.

Think about that tingly feeling when you realize someone is watching you, then looking around, find that, indeed, someone has you squarely in their sights. Kind of a spidey sense, yah? A kind of intuition sometimes called our sixth sense that can be really abstract. That inner undefinable, often difficult to explain, knowing what something is or isn’t. Intuition covers a huge range of possibilities. We might be able to explain in relatively concrete terms how we’ve learned to intuit people’s potential capability to excel at a new role. On the other hand, that feeling that this is going to bad day may be impossible to defend. As we get older, most of us learn to trust our intuition which grows and evolves as we do.

Movement and balance are senses we take for granted until they are diminished then our world can literally start spinning. The sense of life is detected from cues to multiple senses. Sensuality. There’s a lovely thing. That delicious indescribable feeling. There are so many sensations to consider. 

With even a spare minute, one can spend precious time extending our awareness of our senses. Standing in line, sitting in traffic, and waiting for someone to get ready are all opportunities to consciously think of what you can sense. Think about it, people watching and sitting in nature have always been engaging. It has even been offered as a stress and anxiety reduction technique to stop and step through awareness of each sense. With more time and focus, it can enrich the very experience of our lives. Spend time with the colors, sounds, textures, and scents of the wide and wonderful world around you. Take a moment for your senses.