Fragrant by Mandy Aftel

Author:Mandy Aftel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2014-09-30T04:00:00+00:00

MOMENTS OF PERFECTION

The transcendent powers of scent are a reminder that our relationship to the material world is not merely purposeful, industrious, progressive. Fragrance is fleeting and elusive and enters us stealthily, at the edge of consciousness, transforming mood, unearthing long-forgotten memories, influencing us without our conscious assent. This transformative effect is what makes them so beneficial to our well-being. And the ephemerality and liminality of scent, bound up with love and memory and death, makes it a vehicle that transports us to states of heightened consciousness.

For me, to create with scent is to touch magic, in a process that eludes words. Trying to capture the experience verbally, I fear, ranks me with those who feel that by naming nature they own it—and threatens to exile me from what most excites me about working with aromatic materials. Rather, the perfumer is like the alchemist, who undertook to convert raw matter, through a series of transformations, into a perfect and purified form. The philosophy of alchemy expressed the conviction that the spark of divinity—the quinta essentia—could be discovered in matter. The ultimate goal was to reunite matter and spirit in a transformed state, a miraculous entity known as the elixir of life (also sometimes called the philosopher’s stone). Following the dictum solve et coagula (dissolve and combine), the alchemist worked to transform body into spirit and spirit into body, to volatilize that which is fixed and to fix that which is volatile.

Beautiful smells minister to the human need for transformation and transcendence. Yet transcendence does not mean ignoring the mundane world; indeed it is rooted there, in our conscious attention to the details that surround us. Mindful of the texture of the very air we breathe in, we break through the glass walls of predictability, repetition, and pragmatism: we are inspired.

Almost every meditation practice focuses on breathing as a way of connecting with the here and now, of cultivating a sense of inner peace and participation in the beauty that’s around us, all the time. Consciously smelling is a form of breathing, accepting an invitation to an inspiring journey.

Consider what the painter Agnes Martin called “Moments of Perfection”:

I would like to consider further those moments in which we feel joy in living. To some, these moments are very clear and to others a vagueness that can only be described as below the level of consciousness. Whether conscious or unconscious, they do their work, and they are the incentive to life. A stockpile of these moments gives us an awareness of perfection in our minds and this awareness of perfection in our minds makes all the difference in what we do.

Moments of perfection are indescribable but a few things can be said about them. At such times we are suddenly very happy and we wonder why life ever seemed troublesome. In an instant we can see the road ahead free from all difficulties and we think that we will never lose it again. All this and a great deal more in barely a moment, and then it is gone.

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