Three fixed points for when everything else is upside down
You don't get to choose how the week comes at you. What you do choose is what happens in your space at three moments of the day: when you get up, when you get home, and before bed.
You don't have to invent those three times. You already get up, you already get home, you already go to bed. The only new thing is the incense that goes with you, and that it's the one that fits that hour.
Why the same stick doesn't work at every hour
Almost everyone buys an incense they liked and lights it at any hour. That's the mistake, and you notice it fast at home.
Woods and resins linger. Light one in a closed room at ten at night and the scent is still hanging there when you go to bed, and it's still there in the morning. Florals do the opposite: they fill the room, then settle into the background. They're still there, but they stop taking over the whole room.
It's how each material behaves. That's why morning calls for citrus, getting home calls for something a little more assertive, and night calls for something floral and subtle.
Buenos Días
The morning one has to open things up. Citrus on top, wood underneath, a thin smoke.
The Buenos Días set goes that way: two Ispalla stick incenses on a palo santo base. Good Mornings crosses palo santo with jasmine and lemon, so the lemon comes in first and the jasmine stays underneath. Palo Santo & Tangerine is drier, from the tangerine peel. It also comes with a polished topaz, small enough to fit in your pocket.
Light it while the coffee brews. By the time you sit down, the citrus is already there and the wood starts showing up behind it, quieter.
A night incense at that hour leaves the room heavy before you head out. That's why these two and not others.
En Casa
This is the one you notice most, because it marks that the day outside stayed outside.
Light it as you walk in, before you change. By the time you drop your keys and take off your shoes, the house smells different from how you left it in the morning.
The En Casa set comes with Ispalla's Palo Santo & Honey, which is woody with sweetness on top, like warm honey over wood, and the lotus from Soul Sticks' Aztec line, which is floral and green, drier. The two scents don't step on each other, so you can alternate them by the day without the house ending up smelling like a mix of everything. It comes with the wooden burner, with the long channel that catches the ash as it falls.
What makes a stick last
Soul Sticks are masala, and that changes how long they last and what they smell like.
In masala, the herbs, spices and flowers are ground and kneaded into the paste, and that paste is rolled onto the bamboo stick. Dipped incense is made the other way around: a stick with unscented charcoal paste is dipped in liquid fragrance and left to dry. It takes seconds per stick and is done on an industrial scale.
Because in masala the scent is in the material and not in a liquid bath, the burn is slower and the aroma comes out evenly all the way to the end.
Buenas Noches
The night one is the one that doesn't take over.
The Buenas Noches set is Soul Sticks' two florals: chamomile and lavender. The chamomile smells just like chamomile tea, sweet and herbal, but rounder as smoke. The lavender is floral and clean, with the green edge of the fresh plant.
Light it a while before bed, not once you're already in bed. The room is left with a soft scent, and by the time you get into bed it has settled into the background.
It also comes with an amethyst palm stone, smooth and flat, just the right size to close your hand over. Amethyst has traditionally been associated with calm. Each one has its own veins, and the purple shifts depending on how the light hits it.
Aire Nuevo, for when it's the room that feels heavy
Some days the problem is the place, not the hour. The office with no windows. The room that's been shut for weeks. The house after a long week.
That's what Aire Nuevo is for, and it works differently from the three above. Copal and California white sage, both dense smokes, plus a raw black obsidian. Copal smells like resin: dry, clean, with an edge of pine and lemon. California sage is herbal and dusty, with no sweetness at all. Neither one is a room fragrance.
You notice it fast. In a room that's been closed up, the air stops feeling still and the shut-in smell sinks beneath the smoke. Open a window if the room is small, because these go a long way and fill the space.
Copal is the resin of a tree, and in Mexico and Central America it has been burned for centuries. The word comes from the Nahuatl copalli, which means incense. Obsidian is volcanic glass, lava that cooled so fast it never formed crystals. This one comes raw, unpolished, so it keeps the edges and shine of broken stone.
Three minutes
If you want the pause to be more than lighting it and moving on, a short exercise fits in while the stick gets going.
Sit wherever you are, on the edge of a chair with your feet flat on the floor. Count your breath: inhale, exhale, count one. Again, two. Up to ten, then start over at one.
You're going to lose count. You'll get to seven and realize you've been thinking about something else for a while. The moment you notice and go back to one is the whole exercise.
Three minutes is enough. If you stay until the stick goes out, even better, and that's what the guide to meditating at home is about.
Why three and not one
A routine that depends on you remembering falls apart in the first bad week, which is exactly when you needed it.
The three points attach to things you already do every day without thinking: the coffee, the keys, the bed. That way you don't have to carve time out of anywhere. And if one of the three slips one day, you still have two, and tomorrow it's three again.
The short version
- Pick your three times. They already exist: when you get up, when you get home, before bed.
- Citrus in the morning, to open things up.
- Something a little assertive when you get home, so the house changes.
- Floral at night, which fills the room and then settles.
- Woods and resins linger. Save them for the daytime, not for ten at night.
- If what feels heavy is the room and not the hour, that's copal and sage, with the window open.
- Three minutes of counting breaths fits into any of the three stops.
Never leave incense burning unattended. Keep away from children, pets and anything that can catch fire. Aromatic and decorative product; no medical or therapeutic benefit is attributed to it.