Certain Smells Can Give you a Better Nights Sleep

“Ew, what’s that smell?” – is certainly not the way we want to feel just as we’re turning in for the night. Bad smells aggravate and alert us, doing exactly the opposite of what we want to do as we fall asleep.

We often associate our olfactory senses with food or the outdoors, but it’s important to remind ourselves that smell plays a key role in the bedroom as well. Just think about how pollen, mould or dust react with our lungs to disrupt our sleep; it’s no different when taking into account the thousands of other scents in the world. After all, inhaling something merely causes a chemical reaction in our brains which leads to a motor response – some positive, and some negative.

And while we fondly remember the smell of fried bacon or freshly mowed lawns to calm ourselves, it’s about time we really connected smell and sleep and controlled it to our advantages. Cash in the sleeping pills, and switch to aromatherapy.

Pretty much everyone knows how lovely lavender smells, but few know that research actually suggests that inhaling lavender oil decreases heart rates and blood pressure, and even lowers skin temperature; all great reactions to garner some sleep. The study further concluded that lavender promoted lengthier deep sleep in the REM cycle, allowing subjects to assess themselves as more relaxed and refreshed in the morning after a decent night’s rest.

It doesn’t stop there. Camomile and bergamot have also been known to assist relaxation, making a few drops of their essential oils on your pillow a great way to welcome some sound sleep. And if you’ve had, in contrast, a bad night’s rest, sniff some peppermint or rosemary, and you won’t find a better pick-me-up on par with a cup of coffee.

And spritzing and mists are definitely the way to go today. With diffusers available to change the smell of a large space, you can rework the ambience of a room to feel incredibly sleepy with the push of a button. Alternatively, you can purchase small bottles of mists specifically designed for pillows, or even dab a few drops of essential oils on cotton balls to achieve the very same effect.

So there you have it. That’ll get you some good olfactory sleep.