Perfume in Prayer and Meditation

Perfume has been used by humans to alter their natural state of worry and negative emotions in order to open themselves up to the divine. Powerful and intoxicating scent can transform a room into a prayer chamber of sheltered privacy. Applied to the body, scent travels to all the hidden tense points and opens the mind up to receive tranquility.

Incense is one type of perfume that immediately changes the atmosphere of a room. A little good quality incense goes a long way. Incense should not fill a room, obstructing normal breathing, but should be burned sparingly, preferably away from people. I like to tuck a short stick of incense in a closet and leave the door open a crack. The scent slowly emerges but a person walking into the room would not be assaulted by an overpowering smell. As long as you secure your incense so that it cannot fall or be moved, this is a good way to perfume the home.

Another type of spiritual scent is perfumed oil. There are many varieties out there, and most of them are not great, but every once in a while it is possible to find some treasures. Oudh is a Middle Eastern perfume made of a type of wood that grows in Asia. Oudh can be made into oil or burned as incense. While real oudh is prohibitively expensive, one can purchase affordable oudh oils from trusted sites online, such as Agarscents Bazaar. The oils are not inexpensive but not so outrageously priced as to be completely off limits.

And of course, for those of us whose perfume budget is tiny, there are some Indian oils which are not bad. One of my favorites is Attar Bazaar. Their oils are very affordable, which makes it easy to accumulate a good collection of oils which can be mixed to create new scents.

Start applying some heavy perfumes, such as amber, musk, sandalwood and myrrh before praying and see if there is any benefit. A really creative way is to perfume your clothes with incense by standing over the smoldering censer. Since ancient times, women in the Middle East, Asia and Africa have perfumed their veils by wafting incense through them. TPV stands for The Perfumed Veil.