“Self-awareness is your awareness of the world, which you experience through the five senses (sound, touch, sight, taste, and smell). Pay attention to your sensory impressions, and be aware of those five ways that the world comes to you.” (Deepak Chopra)
When you awake first thing in the morning your five senses
are at work for you. Here is an example. Chances are the first thing you hear
in the morning is either the sound
of your piercing alarm clock (or smartphone) telling you it’s time to get up.
You might feel on your skin those warm, cozy bed sheets touching you. They beckon you to sleep just a little longer.
You will soon start tasting
your dreadful morning breath.
From the kitchen you can smell the freshly-brewed coffee (life juice) your automatic
coffee maker prepared for you to start your day with. At the foot of your bed
you see the sight of the
family dog (a dark brown Labrador retriever named “Chocolate) curled up on your
bed, and snoring away (with no cares in the world). You love that old man just
like he was one of your children. Below is a quick overview of the five senses.
Hearing-Hearing (audition) is a powerful sense that
can bring you joy, or alert you to potential hazards. When you listen to the
voice of a loved one, your sense of hearing allows your brain to interpret
another person’s voice as familiar and comforting. The tune of your favorite
song is another example of audition at work. Your ears collect this kind of
sensory information for your brain. And it comes in sound waves (a form of
mechanical energy). Each sound wave is a vibration with a unique frequency.
Your ears receive and amplify sound waves and your brain interprets them as
dialogue, music, laughter, and much more. A partial or total loss of hearing is known as
deafness.
Sight-Sight (vision), and is created by your brain and a pair of sensory organs
(your eyes). Vision is
often thought of as the strongest of the senses. This is because humans tend to
rely more on sight, rather than hearing or smell, for information about their
environment. Light on the visible spectrum is detected by your eyes when you
look around.
Red, orange,
yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet are the colors found along the spectrum
of visible light. The source of this light can come from a lamp, your computer
screen, or the sun. When light is reflected off of the objects around you, your
eyes send signals to your brain and a recognizable image is created. Your eyes
use light to read, discern between colors, or even coordinate clothing to
create a matching outfit. A complete or partial loss of sight is called
blindness.
Smell-Smell (olfaction) is unique because the sensory organ that detects it is
directly connected to the brain. Smells enter your body through the nose.
Inside your nose is a large nerve called the olfactory bulb. It extends from
the top of your nose and plugs directly into your brain. The airborne molecules
breathed in through your nose trigger a nervous response by the olfactory bulb.
It notices odors and immediately informs your brain.
Higher
concentrations of odor molecules create deeper stimulation of the brain by the
olfactory bulb. This makes strong scents unappealing and nauseating. Lighter
fragrances send more mild signals to your brain. You need your sense of smell
for a variety of reasons. Strong, unpleasant smells are great at warning your
brain that the food you are about to eat is spoiled. Sweet, agreeable smells
help you feel at ease. Odors given off by the body (pheromones) even help you
bond with your loved ones. The loss of
smell is known as anosmia.
Taste-Taste (or gustation) allows your brain to
receive information about the food you eat. As food is chewed and mixed with
saliva, your tongue is busy collecting sensory data about the taste of your
meal. The tiny bumps all over your tongue are responsible for transmitting
tastes to your brain. These bumps are called taste buds. And your tongue is
covered with thousands of them. Every week, new taste buds replace old ones to
keep your sense of taste sharp. At the center of these taste buds are 40–50
specialized taste cells. Molecules from your food bind to these specialized
cells and generate nerve impulses. Your brain interprets these signals so you
know how your food tastes. There are
five basic tastes sensed by your tongue and sent to the brain. They are sweet,
sour, bitter, salty, and savory, which comes from foods like broth and meat. A complete
loss of taste is called ageusia. (My mother has this.)
Touch-Your skin is
the largest organ in the body, and is also the primary sensory organ for your
sense of touch (mechanoreception). Touch seems simple, but is a little bit more
complex than you might think. Your body can detect different forms of touch as
well as variations in temperature and pressure. Because touch can be sensed all
over the body, the nerves that detect touch send their information to the brain
across the peripheral nervous system, which are the nerves that branch out from
the spinal cord (and reach the entire body). An inability to feel touch is
known as somatosensory loss.
Your senses often work together to provide you with a
specific kind of experience. Before you ever taste a delicious, favorable food
you smell it. Have you ever noticed that food doesn’t quite taste as good when
you have a cold, and your nose is all stuffed up? Is there a certain smell or
flavor (like the smell of your maternal grandmother’s favorite perfume or her
gingerbread cookies hot out of the oven) that bring back pleasant memories of
this woman from your childhood that has been deceased for many years.
Taste and see
that the Lord is good.
Blessed is the person who goes to him for safety. (Psalm 34:8, New International Reader's Version) God wants you to
experience His thoughtfulness with all of your five senses (hearing, touching, seeing, tasting, and smelling). Your
heavenly Father wants you to worship with all the talents you have inside you
(whether it could be singing, dancing, writing, painting, or even crocheting).
God will never stop someone with a heart dedicated to Him from giving Him all
the glory. (He gave you all the abilities you have.) How can you best serve God
with all the unique attributes that make you who you are as His child?[i]
[i] Sources used:
“Sensory loss” from Wikipedia
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