Emotions pass more easily by touch and smell. When we touch someone, we inevitably smell their odor. The two actions: touching and smelling cannot be separated in an exchange of affection. We must always smell before touching. In fact, since odor calm and reassures us, it helps us remove our masks to facilitate emotional abandon. Odors monopolize the activity of the brain. When we deeply inhale the scent of a human body, we stop thinking because our level of consciousness is modified. We thus lose the ability to concentrate and evaluate time. The most probing example to support my proposals on is the following. If hunger makes itself felt at the moment that we are in the middle of doing something, the odor of food distracts us. This monopolization of the brain by the olfactory senses allows for emotional abandon through touching. So affection is an emotional bath of both good and soft emotions; by perfuming ourselves, we modify our natural odor, then, we camouflage our emotions by doing this. Cologne thus considerably prevents an exchange of affection because this requires an authenticity and a transparency on the part of the two partners.

Body odors can stimulate the parasympathetic or sympathetic nervous system, depending on the situation. Unpleasant odors make us hide, make us nervous and uneasy while those which stimulate the parasympathetic are agreeable, appeasing and reassuring. The region of the brain which analyzes the olfactory information possesses in its memory the data inscribed genetically to differentiate between body odors. Each scent recognized is associated to a specific body reaction. Body reactions are one of two kinds, either emotional or physiological.

To really understand the body's functioning in relation with odors, take for example food. The first reaction of the body is emotional. In fact, the smell of food is an agreeable sensation. From this emotional state a physiological reaction occurs which sets off the reflex process of digestion. This starts by an increase in saliva which corresponds to the first stage of digestion, followed by blood circulation in the digestive tube, production of gastric sugar and bile by the liver, etc.

Certain odors inhibit cerebral functions, such as in the previous example where there is a loss in concentration when we smell food. So feeling hungry is an emergency for the body because it can not survive without food. Hunger is thus suffering, and just like any suffering, it pushes the body to produce a hormone to fight it. It is this anti-pain hormone which blocks our concentration.

Smell is the emotional aspect of our nourishment. In fact, if we can't smell food, we lose the pleasure of eating (for example, when we have a stuffed up nose because of a cold, food loses all its flavor). Taste and smell function together; they use elsewhere the same type of receivers, that we call chemical-receivers, to differentiate between chemical substances. It is by the addition of the olfactory information and taste information that we can evaluate the taste of all food. The taste will be, as for it, the rational side of our nourishment. It has a cultural or learned aspect. Thus, each population has dishes heightened by particular flavors which only they can appreciate. Japanese, for example, have dishes that very few people in Quebec would dare try, such as dried raw fish and algae.

The smell of food gives us an appetite and this is associated with the pleasure of eating. So, we lose our appetite when our nose is stuffed. Finally, nourishing ourselves is an action essential for our survival. People who lose their sense of smell lose interest in food, they lose weight, and they are more depressive. This proves the importance of the emotional role of odors. They are paradoxically more important than food itself. In the same way, our partner's body odors are essential to desire an exchange of affection.

They carry messages that the olfactory center of the brain can recognize. Thus, for each body odor recognized, there are a series of corresponding reactions. Body odors equally play a large role in the non-verbal communication because this is done at the level of spontaneity and by reflex, that is to say, on an emotional level. The other level of communication is intellectual and it is by this that we distinguish ourselves from other animals. This is done largely by words and it is the result of a thought. Thinking signifies power to use the concept of time-space to make comparisons, judgments, analysis, and discoveries by trial and error to interpret events. The verbal language is done mostly through our intelligence. It is due to our intelligence that we can be aware of our emotions in order to analyze them.

When we verbally express our emotions, their meaning stays at an intellectual level. On the other hand, the intonation of the voice has emotional meaning. I can thus express to someone by words that I am sad to have lost my job all while expressing the contrary with my non-verbal signals (the expression on my face and the intonation of my voice). There is thus a difference between understanding words and feeling emotions since these do not circulate at an intellectual level, but through the spontaneous reactions of the body. They are made up of information which make our body react and are interpreted with the help of our intelligence. Since men experience as many emotions as women, the difference comes from the fact that women intellectualize more easily their emotions while men have trouble putting their feelings into words. Faced with this difference, men should double their efforts to try to express their emotions to their partner and women should force themselves to imagine the emotions experienced by their partners. Emotions are a fascinating subject of discussion for a woman and making efforts to understand our partner is what makes up love.

In spite of their greater ease to intellectualize the emotional experience, women are in a position comparable to men faced with emotional communication, seeing that this is done spontaneously. An exchange of affection uses mostly emotional communication. The challenge in affection is the same for both sexes, to be able to physically abandon ourselves to each other. To emotionally abandon ourselves, we must concentrate on our interior feelings in order to neutralize our tendency to intellectualize our feelings.

The fact of intellectualizing our experience excessively is thus a mask. This lowers the parasympathetic tone, which prevents us from giving in to our emotional experience. Paradoxically, as much the intellectualization of our feelings can prevent affectionate behavior as well as it can be the spark. In fact, by experience, we can rationally recreate the elements and situations which favor the appearance of an exchange of affection.

Such an exchange always starts by the action of deeply inhaling our partner's body odor. Her odor, like in the case of food when we are hungry, provokes the secretion of a hormone which modifies our state of conscious. Since the need for affection comes when we are suffering from insecurity, this hormone thus diminishes this state of suffering and makes us lose notion of time, in such a way that our intellectual faculties also lower. By stopping from thinking, we let go more easily. Physical abandon instigates the secretion of other hormones by contributing to a state of well-being and which characterizes affection. An exchange of affection depends thus on the paralyzing effect of body odors on the brain.

The procedure to smell our partner's body starts with a visualization followed by a deep inspiration. Visualization is a concentration technique allowing us to center our mind on one thing. Thus we are continually worried about something throughout the day. And all that we see or hear must be digested by the brain in order to eliminate information from our memory which doesn't matter. This digestion makes us constantly think about things that happen one after the other. So we must use concentration to interrupt this falling out of ideas and being present for one thing at a time. Tasks requiring manual dexterity, that are dangerous and require enormous responsibility; like flying a commercial plane, require a high level of concentration. The more we concentrate on our work, the more we do it well and quickly. In this way, we don't see time passing and we forget all our other worries of life. This feeling well describes what happens when we experience the present moment. High-level athletes, for example, use the technique of visualization in almost all disciplines. Thus, a diver will see in his head all the movements that he should do to perform a good dive. This interiorization prevents them from thinking about anything else, and so he isn't distracted by the crowd and lets him control his stress better.

For what concerns affection, visualization consists of creating an image and a thought which are worthy of our partner. We must see our partner as the most beautiful and sensual woman that there is, and we must stop and realize how much she means to us, how important, agreeable, soft and fine for us. This visualization creates an emotional opening up towards our partner, necessary for an exchange of affection. It also allows us to put aside any worries so that we are entirely present mentally and physically for our better half.

To inhale the odor of our partner, we must place our nose against their skin by gently inhaling the air (by the nose) and while having our eyes closed, then take a short respiratory pause before rapidly letting the air out (by our mouth). By concentrating on sniffing, we let ourselves be more easily carried away by the effect of the hormone that our body will secrete. Its effect will make us lose control of ourselves, making emotional communication easier.

Memory exists because of emotions. Thus, the brain fixes in its head all the information captured by our sensory organs in relation to a situation associating them to the emotions experienced during it. The more an event makes us experience strong emotions, the more we will hold it in long-term memory. Since odors are intimately linked to emotions, this explains our larger ability to remember them more than anything else. We can even say that we keep in memory events only because they are associated with particular odors. Odors are thus evoking. When we come across an odor that we were in contact with in our childhood, our memories will spontaneously come up. We will flashback to the situation in our head and re-experience the emotions which happened then.

We live in a universe of smells which are associated with almost all of our emotions. And we don't always notice all the odors which are around us. Thus, where we live, there is a smell which belongs to us, but only strangers can notice it. This also happens each time that we visit a friend; we notice his odor at first, but after a period of time, we don't notice it anymore. In fact, the brain sends information concerning above all the changes of odors in our environment. On the other hand, even if we do not smell the odor of our residence, our unconscious mind takes it into consideration.

Thus the odor that our body gives off relays unconscious information about our emotional state. This functions according to feedback allowing the body to adjust in function of the moment. This self-regulation functions as follows: from a feeling of being tired, our body gives off an odor which will make a hormone be secreted which will act like a sleep inducer. In the same context, our body will give off a calming and reassuring odor when we are stressed. There is thus a direct link between the olfactory center and the limbic system (the center of emotions). They function in synergy. Our odor stabilizes our emotions. Take for example sadness. The odor will eventually diminish the intensity of this emotion to make another one come about.

Emotional identity is defined by body odor. This natural odor contributes to the formation of our personality and gives us the feeling of existing. Our odors favor the affirmation faced with others to obtain respect. They carry emotional messages which make those around us react to us in relation to the circumstances. Thus, we send out an agreeable odor to people with whom we feel comfortable and to the others, a scent to make them back off. Body odors make social links. The agreeable odor of one person incites us to engage in a discussion with her.

Odor coming from the region of the anus differentiates us from each other. Animals in the forest detect us due to that - it smells like a human being, it smells like a humans anus. This odor is impregnated in our residence and it is associated with emotions of comfort which reassures us. It marks out our intimacy or our personal space. Our lodging is thus a physical place and an emotional place by our intimate odor.

The odor of the anus plays a role in a loving relationship. In general, our body odors are linked to our feelings of weakness and vulnerability. The anus is the most intimate part of our body because it is associated with defecation. We all are extremely vulnerable in regards to the strong odors that our fecal matter gives off. Vulnerable also because it is a embarrassing thing as well as essential for our survival. By realizing that our partner can detect the odor of our anus, we become uneasy: this signifies that we are not ready to share our intimacy. In the contrary case, it is because we feel pretty safe for an exchange of affection. The odor of our partners anus gives us the feeling of being part of their most intimate being. This odor reinforces the links in the couples relation by the strong emotions that they make us experience and helps us to physically abandon ourselves. When we notice the odor of each others anus, we no longer have any secrets from each other.

The genital region, as well as the armpits, have sudoripary glands called apocrins which secrete a milky and odorous liquid. They are mostly responsible for the odors that our body gives off. Odors coming from these regions of the body play a part in sexuality. They are responsible for sexual attraction in the meeting of a sister soul, they are aphrodisiacs by stimulating the libido and finally, they are erotic. We can say that the main effect of these odors is sexual excitement. This provokes an erection in the man and the lubrication of the vagina in the woman. The more the man is excited, the more his ejaculation will be clear and abundant, thus favoring the mobility of the sperm.

The apocrine glands also secrete pheromones. These don't have any odor but they are detected by the vomeronasal system hidden in a niche in the nasal cavity. They carry chemical messages which unconsciously influence the behavior of people. The armpits of men secrete androsterone which stimulates the woman's libido and favors the regularity of her menstruation. These pheromones should play a role facilitating an exchange of affection. When I previously spoke of the effects of body odors, I also included those of pheromones.

Each part of our body gives off a particular odor. But generally, they all play a role in physical abandon. Each odor of our body makes our partner react differently on a physiological and emotional level. It is thus possible to make an olfactory map of our partners body to smell a region to obtain a desired affect. Thus, if we desire being excited sexually, we will go smell our partners genital parts, if we desire to be comforted and calmed, we will go smell our partners neck or between her breasts; if we wish to talk to her, we will go smell her hands, if we feel depressed, we will smell her hair to raise our moral. If we need affection, we will go smell her armpits, and so on. In knowing the effects of her smells, we can use them for our own well-being.

Our smell is the most intimate thing about us. We feel more comfortable showing our nudity than letting our partner smell us. If we or our partner are bothered by our odors, this will create an obstacle which will prevent us from abandoning ourselves emotionally. By taking off our clothes, we physically strip ourselves, while letting our partner sniff our bodies, we psychologically strip ourselves. Intimacy corresponds to what we are emotionally, without our masks.

Perfume is used to camouflage our natural odors and at the same time, our emotions. Our clothes protect us from the physical environment and preserves our intimacy. Clothing our natural scent with perfume is socially acceptable, but in a couples relationship, perfume makes an exchange of affection almost impossible. It creates a mask and emotionally cuts us off, preventing us from revealing our intimacy to the other. Perfume stresses us while the odor of our partner reassures us. The body odors allow us to have a good communication in the couple by revealing information on our respective emotional moods.

We are linked to our partner by their body odors. All the feelings that we feel for her are linked to her particular odor. During prolonged absence, it is these odors that we miss rather than anything else. This is explained by the fact that in her presence, her scent relaxes us, calms us and makes us feel good. The body odors of our partner stabilizes our emotional state. In fact, they contribute to maintain our psychological good health by preventing us from being stressed or anguished. It is during the first exchange of affection that we associate the odors of our partner with well-being. When we are single, it is our own body odor which secures us and enables our emotional stability, but much less than if we were part of a couple. In fact, living as a couple leads to better psychological equilibrium and better physical health. People living as a couple have in general a better quality of life that people who are single.