Life in five senses : how exploring the senses got me out of my head and into the world / Gretchen Rubin.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 235-240).

Seeing what was missing -- Coming to my senses -- Seeing: the voluptuousness of looking, or why no one notices the gorilla -- Hearing: snow on water, or how silence can be noisy -- Smelling: the fragrance of hot sun, or why "unscented" is a scent -- Tasting: the taste of the tea and the cake, or why Ketchup is magic -- Touching: my brain out on my fingers, or why holding this stone is lucky -- Onward: the chief inlets of soul, or how the body can minister to the spirit (and vice versa) -- Epilogue: wider than the sky -- Acknowledgments -- Try this at home: a five-senses jump-start -- Further resources -- Notes -- Suggestions for further reading -- List of works from the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

"The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Happiness Project discovers a surprising path to a life of more energy, creativity, and love: by tuning in to the five senses. For more than a decade, Gretchen Rubin had been studying happiness and human nature. Then, one day, a visit to her eye doctor made her realize that she'd been overlooking a key element of happiness: her five senses. She'd spent so much time stuck in her head that she'd allowed the vital sensations of life to slip away, unnoticed. This epiphany lifted her from a state of foggy preoccupation into a world rediscovered by seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, and touching. In this revelatory journey of self-experimentation, she explores the mysteries and joys of the five senses as a path to a happier, more mindful life. Drawing on cutting-edge science, philosophy, literature, and her own efforts to practice what she learns, she investigates the profound power of tuning in to the physical world. From the simple pleasures of appreciating the magic of ketchup and adding favorite songs to a playlist, to more adventurous efforts like creating a daily ritual of visiting the Met and attending Flavor University, Rubin show us how to experience each day with depth, delight, and connection. In the rush of daily life, she finds, our five senses offer us an immediate, sustainable way to cheer up, calm down, and engage the world around us-as well as a way to glimpse the soul and touch the transcendent. A Life in Five Senses is an absorbing, layered story of discovery filled with profound insights and practical suggestions about how to heighten our senses and use our powers of perception to live fuller, richer lives-and, ultimately, how to move through the world with more vitality and love"-- Provided by publisher.