What Smells So Good You Would Write a Love Letter to It?

Certain smells automatically make us feel better or awaken recollections of happy times in our lives.

That’s because when you inhale an aroma, it triggers the limbic area of your brain that stores emotions, memory and behavior. So certain scents you detect can flood you with emotions based on past experiences linked to that smell – both good and bad. We like finding out about people’s positive scent memories!

We’ve written about some of the traditional pleasing and stress relieving aromas on here before. And even about a citrus oil whose scent causes people to perceive you as much younger than your years.

But a recent deep dive into Reddit and Quora discussions has turned up some additional, quite specific – and surprising -- scents that trigger sweet memories and feelings of comfort and joy.

Read on and see if you agree with these!

“The smell of Play-Doh always brings back a nostalgic feeling. Whether they’re memories of me playing with it as a child, or my own kids playing with it, the smell always takes me back.”

-- Isabella Valenzuela, Quora

“Fall scents, like around Halloween. Candy corn, apple cider, popcorn balls...”

-- quickblur, Reddit

“I love the smell of freshly cut grass. This always brings me back to a memory of when I was 7 yrs old walking home from school in September on a nice sunny day.”

-- Samantha Doyle, Quora

“The smell of coffee being made over a campfire. This smell brings peace to my soul. My head becomes flooded with wonderful memories of camping with my grandpa and uncles.”

-- Daleena Nichols, Quora

“Best part about living by the ocean is being outside and the wind is just right, and [I] get the smell of the ocean that makes me happy.”

-- Dixielee Vaughn, Facebook

“Rubber cement.”

-- Mr_Truttle, Reddit

“Lilacs. When I was a little child, our yard had 5 big lilac bushes.

“I was very young, believed in fairy tales, happy endings….and when I played outside, the aroma of lilacs is a scent I remember. Happy memories…then not so happy a few years later.

“Still, love the light scent of lilacs.”

-- Sandy Parciak, Quora

“Jasmine, specifically a properly diluted essential oil sort, as opposed to soaps or perfumes. I'm not sure why, besides a few female friends who wore the sort that i like.”

-- Charles Rebello, Quora

“Bayberry candles. It's how my then-boyfriend, now ex-husband, smelled when he got off work at a candle factory.”

-- Patty Roberts, Quora

“New Cars, planes, and books.”

-- garlic_bread_thief

“Am I weird? The top of my dog’s head has such a distinct smell that I can’t get enough of. I get such a dopamine rush when I’m snuggling with him and sniff the top of his head. The best kind of stinky.”

-- ChampagneAnSuffering, Reddit

“Pencil sharpeners, and the distinct smell they produce whilst used.”

-- Manual Humberto, Quora

“It is truly amazing how a smell can immediately bring back a memory as if you were right there. I fell in love once. She wore a fragrance called Vanilla Musk. Twenty years later, I was in a store that sold fragrances. I approached the shelf, gingerly -- physically shaking -- as though I was actually going to see her after all those years. I found the fragrance, opened the bottle and took a short whiff. I was instantly transported back into her arms, weeping from loss and the 20-year desire to hold her once again.”

-- Benjamin May, Quora

“I love Christmas trees. Well real ones. but for me there is a very specific reason. Whenever I smell a real Christmas tree, I am instantly transported to a simpler time in life. All my family members are still alive, and together, the spirit of Christmas is still strong in my heart and the excitement and anticipation of Christmas morning is almost tangible!”

-- Sean O’keefe, Quora

“I admire the scent of shoe polish because it reminds me of my time in the Army and the pride I had in being there.”

-- Nancy Lapp, Quora

“I believe it depends on the person. For me, I remember the smell of Stetson cologne my ex used and I guess he still does wear it. When I was with him it was a turn-on for me as I was in love with him so when I smell it it reminds me of those days with him I was very happy then.”

-- Ronnah Banks, Quora

“A soft cinnamon aroma. Warm and inviting, home baked desserts, fresh from mommy’s oven. Good memories, simple times, always there, never forgotten.”

-- Tom Grennon. Quora

“The smell of an In-N-Out Double-Double with grilled onions. It is sacred and should be bottled and sold, but you could never capture that essence in its full glory, and its spirit cannot be duplicated by lab-made preservatives.”

-- Cory Arnold, Quora

“The smell of rain and wet earth always makes me feel at peace and relaxed. I don’t know why, but it’s like an emotional cleanse.”

-- Isabella Valenzuela, Quora

“For me it's gasoline and burnt matches. Which always makes me sound like a pyromaniac. (I'm not, I promise.)”

-- embracing_insanity, Reddit

“Horses. Aside from the fact that I always feel happy and positive around them, reminds me of my childhood when I’d be packed off to the countryside. These days I have to play ASMR with hoof beats to relax.”

-- Lily Temmer, Quora

“Thanksgiving turkey and pumpkin pie.”

-- mrmcdude, Reddit

“Johnson’s Baby Powder.”

-- Paul Ryan, Quora

“It’s a casserole that my favourite grandmother used to make often. Macaroni, cheese, tomatoes, beef, onions and spices. It was my all-time favourite food and when I realized about a month after she died that I was never going to have it again I was incredibly sad but I resigned myself to it.”

-- Jef Parker Ray, Quora

“Maybe I will sound weird or maybe everyone will get it. The smell of winter. That fresh, frosty, pure smell.

“I used to live in Romania, in a town surrounded by mountains. In the winter we had lots of snow, my loving grandpa would pull me on the sledge even though he had only one leg (he lost a leg by walking on a mine when he was little) helped by his cane. At night we would go back in the house and sit by the stove, he would tell me about his childhood, his family, the poverty, the war…”

-- Lorena Prigoreanu

“When I was a little girl, I loved the way my mom smelled in the evenings. She would layer 5th Avenue by Elizabeth Arden on top of Olay moisturizing lotion.

“That scent still reminds me of her youth and happy times when she would be relaxed and happy after completing household chores. Mama and Baba would sit in the lawn having tea while me and my sister played.”

-- Karim Rimsha, Quora

“The smell of fresh-made tapioca pudding.”

-- GlacticGatorz, Reddit

“Crayons.”

-- Sadboi202908, Reddit

“The smell of salmon at a restaurant near my aunt‘s house. The smell of that salmon makes me sing with joy.”

-- Andre Frank Ortiz Adams

“New mown hay during an Indian summer on dry dusty afternoons; while gazing down a long veering ribbon of endless tarmac, the sun radiating an intense heat, emitting a phantasmagoric buzz that as the day lingers, climaxes with an intense ‘pop’, slowly ebbing into a breathy whisper, as the gloaming bleeds into a purple, deep blue, star sprinkled twilight.”

-- Andrea Boggan

“The scent that takes me back to a memory is what I smell when a truck loaded with 25 tons of oranges passes me on its way to the processing plant. This happens doing harvest season and reminds me of the old Florida when I was a kid.”

-- Greg Ransey, Quora

What particular scents and fragrances instantly evoke happy memories or feelings of joy in YOU? Let us know in the Comments section below! -- Thanks :-)

Photos (from top): Fresh baked bread, puhimec/elements.envato.com; Play-Doh, pinterest.com; Candy corn, truetreatscandy.com; Fresh mown grass, Jan Hakan Dahlstrom/Getty Images; Campfire coffee, camping.org; Ocean, lucigerma/elements.envato.com; Rubber cement, monstermagic.co.uk; Lilacs, ronin/unsplash.com; Jasmine oil, heilenbiopharm.shop; Bayberry candles, bayberrycandlefactory.com; New cara, Esmihel  Muhammed/pexels.com; Dog head, arthurhidden/elements.envato.com; Pencil sharpener, rchilly/reddit.com; Vanilla musk perfume, nematperfumes.com; Christmas trees, gregstrees.com; Shoe polish, CC BY-SA 3.0/wikipedia.org; Stetson cologne, stetson.com; Cinnamon rolls, joythebaker.com; In-N-Out burger, in-n-out.com; Rain, natalya/elements.envato.com; Gasoline, Engin Akyurt/pexels.com; Horses, Emre Ateşoğlu/pexels.com; Thanksgiving turkey, GoodFocused/elements.envato.com; Baby Powder, Alf van Beem, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons; Grandmother’s casserole, spendwithpennies.com; Winter, Pilat666/elements.envato.com; Fifth Avenue perfume, perfumeprofessor.net; Tapioca pudding, Ceeseven, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons; Crayons, teachmama.com; Salmon, pinterest.com; Hay bales, MintImages/elements.envato.com; Florida oranges, Ebay.com.