The ability to see is one of the most important senses for living things, especially animals. If you cannot see things correctly it has a great impairment, which could be corrected by lenses or operation. However other senses like hearing, touch, smell, and taste are equally important and should not be neglected since they convey important messages which are of importance to health well being and even survival. Healthy eating and exercise is always the best solution to many problems. However, I have found tips to improve your senses which could be useful to you if you intend to improve your senses including vision.
Hearing
Most people think of the ears when they think of hearing, but your ears are just the gateway to your brain. The brain is what processes and interprets sounds, so you need to improve both your brain and your ears.
The best way to do this is by practicing listening skills in all different kinds of environments and situations.
To start improving your sense of sound, practice listening for soft sounds, then loud sounds, high-pitched sounds, and low-pitched sounds.
Finally, try listening to several different noises at the same time (like a busy street corner).
Touch
Your sense of touch is the best way to feel your environment, so let’s work on improving it! The best way to improve this sense—and pretty much every other one—is by playing.
But instead of Candy Crush, try these fun games instead:
Hide something small in a room and have someone find it by touch. You can have them close their eyes and tell them when they’re getting warmer or colder, or blindfold them and give directions with only words.
Play catch while blindfolding yourself. It might sound scary, but hey—you’re in control! If you don’t like what’s happening (i.e., if you trip into the coffee table), just stop. Then get up and go back to playing (and maybe move the coffee table).
Active touch: Feel around with your hands, fingers, feet…all the parts of your body that aren’t super sensitive! We recommend walking around barefoot outside for this one (wear socks indoors in case there are sharp objects lying around).
Passive touch: Let everything else touch you! This can be hard since we usually want to avoid itchy things, but we recommend a gentle hug from a loved one or petting a dog or cat with soft fur as long as they’re okay with being touched.
Hide some objects from your view and try to guess what they are by scent or touch.
This exercise can help sharpen your sense of smell. It is also a good way to have fun with family members or friends.
- Gather different objects such as a banana, an apple, an orange, and so on.
- Put the objects in a box or bag and close them up so you cannot see them. You do not need to see the objects to guess what they are!
- Use only your sense of touch or smell to identify the object that is in your hand without looking at it.
- Try it again with other objects!
Smell
With the many different scents that make up everyday life, we tend to forget how important our sense of smell is. While it’s often brushed aside on the daily, this subtle element can be a crucial source of information for picking out threats or choosing between food options.
The smell is also linked to memory, emotion, and mood, and can help us save money by remembering an item on a grocery list or throwing a birthday party that doesn’t involve expensive flowers.
Taste has long been considered an enemy of smell because foods that you eat don’t affect your sense of smell too much—but
What if I told you there are ways to improve your sense of smell? Would you believe me?
Certain foods can boost scent receptors in your nose, which means that certain flavors will actually be more noticeable in order for you to tell them apart from other aromas.
In essence, some food combinations will create specific smells, but some combinations will be indistinguishable from the background.
So next time you’re at the store and debating between two different snacks—take a sniff!
Taste
Taste is a sense that we increasingly take for granted. As the daily grind of work, responsibilities, and obligations becomes more hectic, our diets often end up neglected. We fall into habits of eating the same foods day after day, sometimes with little regard to whether or not they’re actually healthy choices.
This is why it’s important to focus on your sense of taste when you’re trying to improve your senses holistically.
Here are a few easy tips you can use to engage your entire mouth and palate:
- Try new foods whenever possible
- Try foods you don’t like—especially ones that have been popular forever but never captured your attention before
- Eat-in different contexts (at restaurants instead of at home, alone instead with friends; during the day instead of at night)
- Eat with different people (friends instead of family, colleagues or acquaintances instead of close friends)
- Try new kinds of food from different cultures (Thai food instead American food; Japanese food instead Thai food)
- Try new kinds of food from different countries (British food instead American food; Korean bbq instead german sausage)
Sight
If you have good eyesight, try wearing glasses that are blurry. The prescription needs to be strong enough that it clouds your vision, but not so strong that they’re uncomfortable. These glasses will help you get a sense of what it’s like to be legally blind.
Look around you at all of the objects within view without focusing on any one particular item. Make mental notes about them or say them out loud without making it obvious to anyone else that you are doing so.
Stand up and focus on an object in the distance. Take a few slow deep breaths. While still standing and breathing, close your eyes and relax. Now look at the floor, then back to the distance. Repeat by looking at the ceiling, then back to the distance.
Close your eyes again, take a few more deep breaths, open them again and look as far right as you can, then as far left as you can. Repeat twice more.
Try to guess what it is by its feel
Close your eyes and pick up a pen. Take a moment to notice the texture, weight, and shape of the object in your hand. Can you tell me what it is?
Now try it with a coin, a book, a block of wood, or a coffee cup. Give yourself time to explore the differences between them.
Psychologists have shown that people are surprisingly good at identifying objects by touch alone. In one study, participants were able to tell apart pairs of everyday objects as diverse as an egg timer and scissors and an electric toothbrush and comb by feel with around 70% accuracy. “You don’t need any special equipment,” says Dr. Stephen Cowen from Goldsmiths University London, who was involved in the study and has since developed materials for schools on how to use simple objects for tactile perception experiments.
Practice improves your senses
If you’re still wondering how to improve your senses, the short answer is practice! The more you practice, the better you’ll get at those senses. You see, when you do something over and over again it becomes easier to do that thing. As a result, your senses will become stronger each time you use them. Eventually, it’ll be as though they were naturally good at sensing things in the first place!
