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Scent

Don’t Underestimate the Power of Scent to Seduce

Self-seduce
Self-Seduce: Scent

 

Smell

The Unassuming Sense

Many of our memories have a smell.  

It is a powerful sense that can trigger nostalgia or even deja vu.  I once told that if I wore a certain perfume on a romantic getaway or my honeymoon than I could return to that memory easily later by just wearing that scent.  I tried this. It worked, but I have since realized that specific smells are more difficult to place than generic ones. The cotton vanilla fragrance I put on while in Punta Cana five years ago doesn’t have nearly the effect that my suntan lotion has.

Last winter, I ran out of body moisturiser and applied the after sun lotion I use in the summer. Instantly, I was taken back to a time of sun and heat. On another occasion I changed my shampoo. I had not realized that it was the brand I used when my husband and I first dated until he buried his nose in my hair and gave me ‘that look.’

Do not under estimate the power of scent.

Use it to your benefit.

While getting ready for a romantic evening perhaps dab on that perfume at the back of the shelf collecting dust. Or ditch the perfume and rub on baby oil or suntan lotion. Close your eyes and breathe in its scent. Where does your mind take you? A place? A time? If you are reminded of fun, youth and freedom you have found your scent for the night. Don’t over do it by putting on too much or by applying it too often. It will loose its effect.

When ever I smell aerosol hairspray, I am reminded of my early twenties and going out dancing. I feel like an episode of Sex in the City and I am instantly in the mood for a little fun. My husband is more than happy to hitch a ride on that little buzz of nostalgia.

Self-seduce with scent

What I am saying is that smell is the unassuming sense that is easily forgotten until someone is cooking fish. Then see how quickly it is able to cripple a romantic mood. If used correctly, you can enhance your own arousal by tapping into past romantic moments to create new ones.

What did your first apartment smell like? Did you use potpourri, incense or candles? Did you use to wear baby oil, body spray or fruit scented shampoo? It is that simple.

There are smells that turn you on. Find them.

Consider the most erotic time of your life. When you feel sexy, sensual and aroused. What did it smell like?

Beware of this power. Unpleasant odours can just as easily have an adverse effect.      

 

Self-  Seduction: Chapters Coming Soon!!

1-Taste Sensual

2 – Scent of Seduction 

3 – Sound: Talk Dirty 

4 – Watch Yourself (coming soon)

5 – Touch and be Touched (coming soon)

Taste

The mouth is very sensual.

Taste
Taste can alter mood
A soft tongue hides behind luscious lips and slick pearly whites. Our mouths are essential to the art of seduction and love making.  Kisses after-all are at the heart of all human affection.  

Beyond the physical.

There are two types of taste.

Taste
Self-seduce with taste

The first is the most recognized. It is why cooking can also be an art of seduction. Having exquisite flavours burst in your mouth is one of life’s most enjoyable sensations. Food, itself can be an aphrodisiac.

I want to focus on the second type; the subconsciousness of taste. Just as scent has the power to trigger nostalgia,  

taste has the little-known power to alter mood.

Spoonful of Nostalgia
Tastes fun

I associate peanut butter with my childhood.  As an adult, I very rarely eat it, however, when I find myself surly or sullen, I will scoop a spoonful right out of the jar into my mouth.  To me, I no longer savour the thick buttery flavour but, within a half-hour, my mood is lighter. I barely notice the transformation, unlike scent it is not instantaneous. It is more like taking an aspirin for a headache. After a few minutes, I notice that I feel better. It is as if my mind associates the taste of peanut butter with a calmer, less worrisome time and reverts back to then.

Taste
Taste Nostalgia

This phenomenon can help set the tone for romance too. Do pina coladas taste like paradise, barbecue taste like summer or hot cider taste like Christmas? It doesn’t have to be your favourite flavour, it just needs to be a taste you associate with a pleasurable mood. Chicken noodle soup may comfort you and mint chocolate chip ice cream may leave you jubilant.

Not convinced? Consider tequila.  If even the thought of this murky liquid causes your stomach to roil that is because you probably had a drunken tequila night that ended badly. The brain remembers and has since rejected the taste of (and possibly the sound of the word) tequila. On the other hand, if you are grinning with the thought of licking, shooting, and sucking…well, then cheers. But I would bet you know someone who would groan or gag at the same thought.  
Still not convinced? One word.

Chocolate.

Taste sexy
Self-Seduce with taste

This heavenly creamy flavour has so many benefits and for the purpose of this article, it is commonly associated with childhood, holidays and love. No wonder women (and men) crave it and indulge in it because it holds the power to alter your mood. Better than any drug. 

Please practice moderation with the consumption of any mood altering substance.
Fruit
Tastes like childhood

Before a night of romance, especially if the weather has taken its toll, put your subconscious taste buds to the test. Even if your plans include an evening of strawberries, wine, lobster and stuffed chicken; consider sneaking in an abstract appetizer or cocktail. It could boost your mood and widen the gates to the path of romance, seduction, and passion.  

This is an example of simple mind over matter. Allow your sense of taste to alter your mood to one of arousal.
I stash a tub of gummy bears in the car and a six pack of Corona in the fridge just in case we happen upon a night with the unexpected promise of romance. I trust in the flavours to nudge my mood to ensure my ultimate pleasure.
Happy Romance.
Continue to the other senses…

1 – Sounds Dirty – Talk Dirty

2- Scent – The Unassuming Sense

3- Touch and Be Touched (coming soon)

4 -Sight – Watch Yourself (coming soon)

This Victoria Has No Secrets

An excerpt from Sex Drugs & Working Moms

A special thanks to Emily Wright for letting me post here on your website. Thanks Em.

It was Valentine’s Day, four years ago, and I was expected to step out of my powder room donning Victoria Secret’s newest super sexy show stopper. The evening was meant to be oh so romantic.

Lit only by the glow of our fireplace, my love handed me the suspiciously large gift bag with excitement and anticipation dancing in his eyes.  I tried to pull my libido from its hibernation to match his enthusiasm,

 …but I am a Canadian girl and it was February.

This means I was still carrying my post holiday weight, nothing below my collar had seen the sun since September, and I was sporting homegrown insulation.  In short, I was doughy, pastey, and hairy.  Yes, I said it. 

There I was under the harsh lighting of my bathroom unveiling the wonder that was my Valentine’s Day gift. You know the outfit; every man’s fantasy.  A lacy full-bodice number with reinforcement enough the hold cleavage at an unnatural altitude, thigh high stockings and garters of course.   By the time I presented myself, I was wild eyed, red faced and completely dishevelled.  One might be flattered that their husband bought a size too small. I, on the other hand, know my hubby all too well. In his mad dash to the store to meet Hallmark’s Valentine’s Day expectations, he picked the sales clerk who looked most like me or who was closest to him in the store and asked her her size.

Don’t get me wrong, the black ensemble was beautiful with its iron boning, 72 hook and eyes lining the back and impossibly tiny claps for the garter belt to be fastened just below the butt cheeks. I am sure it looked amazing on the porcelain manikin. The headless, armless figure also had the advantage of not having flesh or flab to hinder the shape. More importantly, the manikin had assistance strapping the sucker on without the pesky inconvenience of having to breathe.

I am sorry, when Valentine’s day is on a Tuesday night, a school night,

…you are just happy to get the kids in bed early enough to share a bottle of wine, whisper some sweet nothings, take top, and go to bed.

Instead, there I was with my breasts up my nose, tugging and reefing on the least agreeable fabric known to man.  Imagine 72 tiny curls of wire that need to slip into loops of thread that run down your spine.  The only way to fasten every delicate hook was to put the corset on backwards.  I did mention that it was too small, right?  I remember looking in the mirror and seeing the elegantly laced breast cups sitting on my back as I wrestled and wiggled trying to twist it into place.  At one point, my husband asked if I was okay because I had spun myself into the vanity so violently that it was a wonder I didn’t wake the kids.  Once the death trap was facing the correct way, I was an enraged, unlikely contortionist, who still needed to fasten the garter straps. I was bound so tightly that my breaths were short and sharp. How the hell was I going to bend at the waist to locate the tiny gold clasps, let alone secure my nylons to them?

Somehow I managed to get it on, not without sacrificing skin and my air supply – I got it on.  My gliding to the bed wasn’t exactly by choice as the stockings, again too small, limited my movement. I did reign in my frustration, discouragement, and overall self-loathing for the sake of the occasion.  When my husband began to release me from my torture chamber, I was mixed with relief and outrage.

What was it all for?  Better yet, who was it all for?

Afterwards, when he was still giddy with the memory of his gift, he started making birthday and anniversary requests. There must have been something in my expression that said divorce or homicide because he abruptly stopped talking.  I haven’t gotten lingerie for Valentine’s Day since.   

Happy Valentine’s Day!! 

Look for more advice, anecdotes, and steamy stories to be posted in the weeks to come.

The Secret of the Center Stall

 …..Let us poop in peace please….

Sometimes keeping up with the neurosis of being a woman is just too much.  I have enough on my plate without feeling the familiar rise of anxiety and insecurity when using the ladies room. ladies As a mother of a little girl, I am doing my best to curb these shared experiences of irrational modesties and needless embarrassments.  The problem is not only that we put these pressures upon ourselves. It is that we also refuse to sympathize with those suffering. It could be argued that this internal commotion is socially constructed or deeply rooted in old fashion upbringings. Regardless it is a well known, shared and understood and we do nothing to change it.

…..stupid hang-ups that denied my generation…..

When I look back to my adolescence, at a time when I was innocent and as flawless as I was ever going to be, I am infuriated with locker room behaviors and decisions.  None of us girls sneered or snickered at one another. We were all too busy covering up and facing the wall when changing our clothes. Making eye contact let alone speaking to one another was out of the question. It is only decades later that I realize that

…this was a collective panic and fear of criticisms and judgement.

I hope my daughter’s generation is stronger, smarter and are able to reject such stupid hang-ups that denied my generation the courage to shower after grade nine gym.  Think about it.  All 25 of us refused basic hygiene as a way to avoid full nudity in a locker room full of other girls with the exact same anxieties.  How bloody ridiculous is our gender?

  Meanwhile, the boys are floundering around buck naked engaging in horseplay and literal sword fights on the other side of the cinder block wall.  Can I get a what the hell?  Unfortunately, this asinine dichotomy follows us out of high school and right into adulthood.
Where I work, there are three stalls in the women’s wash room.  If one uses the guy code of urinal selection, no one should ever use the facilities in the middle.  Who wants neighbors? Given that theory, the stall in the center should always have bathroom tissue and be the cleanest. I can only assume this folklore to be true for I never use door number two.  But if women are neurotic about their nudity than natural bodily functions catapults that same anxiety into a realm of incomparable insanity.
  It irritates me to no end when I slip into the soundless rest room to only find a closed stall door whose occupant is obviously trying to go unnoticed.  Seriously, I mean they don’t move.  Except for their feet, the wad of clothing bunched up on their shoes and (on occasion) the not so pleasant odor that one would (sorry should) expect in a bathroom, the person in the stall is absolutely still and quiet.

Only a woman could stop in mid-movement to prevent being embarrassed…

by her own bodily sounds, smells…function.  Like I don’t know what she is doing in there.  What’s more, I don’t care.  Why do we do this?  Unfortunately, I am no better.  The food court, ten flights down, has a full public wash room; one with two long aisles of stalls. It is almost as if the first bank is designated ‘express’ and the second for, let’s say high maintenance. It is like a dream that’s only 10 stories, 2 escalators, and a half an underground block away.
   On those days that I happen to pop into the ladies room on my floor and there is a poor soul pretending the be invisible, mercifully I act as if she is.  stallOkay, that is not exactly true.  In fact, I usually respect her efforts to go unnoticed and do what I can to avert stage fright, up my PSI, wash my hands as quickly as possible and leave.  I do not do my hair, file my nails or apply lipstick.  What I don’t understand is why some women feel the need to chat or lounge around.  It is one thing to do that when you are in the wash room alone, I mean really alone.  It is another thing to stand around when you know there is someone sitting behind a closed stall. She is probably holding her breath waiting for you to get the hell out so that she can unburden herself.  Why do women torture one another like this?  I am not saying that it is rational for someone to be embarrassed while in a washroom, but we all know where that comes from.  Hell, who hasn’t heard that you should always wear clean underwear in case you get hit by a bus?
 …Is your underwear clean in case you get hit by a bus?
This was something a grandmother would say. Imagine how horrible it would be for the doctor or nurse to cut your blood soaked clothes from your mangled body to find dirty bloomers?  It did not matter that if you were actually hit by a bus that you would surely poop yourself anyway.  What matters is that you are always proper even at a time when being proper should be your last priority.

…comes down to building confidence, silencing judgement and prioritising our values.

  Point being, these warped insecurities, regardless where they stem from, will hopefully phase out eventually.  Until then, be kind, don’t linger.  Why would you want to be putting on makeup or brushing your teeth when someone only five feet away is doing what we all would like a little privacy doing?  Even my dog gives me that pleading ‘don’t look at me’ glance when I happen to catch his eye when he’s crouching.  Let us poop in peace, please.  We will address the irrational modesties and needless embarrassments by teaching our girls to be stronger and smarter.  It all comes down to building confidence, silencing judgment and prioritizing our values.