Scent of a Yogi
light it, burn it, cook it, spray it: a photographic montage of scent
I am really into lemongrass right now. Not to cook with, just to smell. My favorite delivery system for this scent is via the soy candle. This morning, I sliced open a grapefruit and before cutting the wedges from the peel, I lifted it to my nose for a whiff of that citrus. Lemongrass is not sweetgrass (which I also love) and a grapefruit is not an orange. Someone out there, please blend up sweetgrass and grapefruit into soy-wax, wick it up, and pour it into a candle mold.
Scent can help anchor us to the present moment, create a connection to happy memories, provide stress relief, and conjure feelings of safety and love.
I used to rabidly burn incense in my studio. Incense combines ritual with the olfactory trigger of “It’s time to meditate/practice Yoga.” Bob Richter, the husband of one of my Yoga students, says, “It smells like Yoga” when she prepares for a class at home. It also serves as a reminder to people in the household to remember that it is time for quiet.
Scotland smells like peat. Peat smells like a mixture of earth, moss, woodsmoke, and the lingering smell of a firecracker that just went off in your MAGA neighbor’s yard in February.
Canada smells like weed. (Just sayin.’)
I wish I could capture the smell of the Ishga store up in Stornoway. Ishga - the Gaelic word for water - is my new favorite facial product line, and they sell the aforementioned lemongrass-scented soy candles. When you walk into that store, it envelops you in a natural, heady scent of ocean breeze combined with lemongrass.
In the world of artificial scents from days gone by (and would hopefully be illegal now) remember scratch-n-sniff stickers from the 70s? And the purposefully fruit-scented colored markers? I also remember the smell of scented erasers - and Play-Doh.
I miss the smell of Murphy Oil Soap, which they do not have here in the UK. Murphy’s smells like cedarwood and lemon. I used it to clean my Yoga studio and home floors every week. What a great idea - a floor cleaner made from natural ingredients that smell good, and you can scent and clean the floor of your home with it. Here in the UK, there isn’t anything close to Murphy’s, so I use natural laundry detergent and a lemon to clean my floors. On my counter right now is a kitchen surface cleaner scented not only with lemon, but Italian lemon and ginger. The dish soap is camomile and clementine scented. (There is no Murphy Oil Soap and there is no “h” in the word camomile in the UK.)
I love the smell of a Yoga eye pillow, with that combined flax seed and lavender scent.
I look forward to the spring smells of the woods, of mushrooms, and of rain. The smell of wet earth, tulips, and lilacs.
The year-round scent-delights of coffee, fresh bread, and cinnamon rolls. Whiskey in a glass. Patchouli and orange essential oil behind the ears of the man you love. Life is glorious when you smell it.
Playlist: Scotland 2026
From the Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda: Chapter 5: "A Perfume Saint" Displays His Wonders
Blessings & Love,
"Scotland smells like peat. Peat smells like a mixture of earth, moss, woodsmoke, and the lingering smell of a firecracker that just went off in your MAGA neighbor’s yard in February." Best sentence of the month.