Recently, we’ve been going a bit mental for candles. This was primarily inspired by our reading of Tanizaki’s fabulous essay In Praise of Shadows earlier in 2017, in which the novelist states contemporary electronics distort you psychologically, especially when nighttime arrives.

Most of us now have an array of gadgets with their blue screens burning into our brains and making us stressed, angry, and maybe even a little psychotic. AHAHHAAHAH! Anyway, we’re here today to not so much tell you how to lead your lives (bloody nanny state), but to suggest you discover a fantabulous new world of candles, matches, and being moderately cautious so you don’t accidentally burn your home down.

Candles

It’s unusual we get in such a reflective and calming mood given some of our posts, eh? Heck, even deranged sorts such as ourselves need moments of introspection! Indeed, a favourite literary quote of ours is taken from Tanizaki’s essay:

"If light is scarce then light is scarce; we will immerse ourselves in the darkness and there discover its own particular beauty."

This is where the humble candle comes in useful, as the solitary flame dances about the place bouncing shadows off objects around your home, allowing one to head towards bedtime in a more natural and relaxed state of mind. In-bloody-deed. It’s a rather relaxing, calming, and salubrious (we use this word simply to show off) experience.

It’s a form of meditation, then, although one which barely requires you to do anything. The physical effort of striking a match is about it. However, there’s also the aromatherapy aspect – get yourself a scented candle and you’re away with the fairies. Vanilla, spiced apple, cinnamon, aardvark (we made that one up) and more! Cripes, there’s a whole world of candle-based incandescence out there!

The Candle Conclusion

Anyway, this is a short post today as we tell you how to lead your lives. This may be horribly invasive of us, but we have our readers’ collective health at the very forefront of our agenda. That’s exactly why we told you last week to try out our invention the doorbull. With that in place, along with some candles… why, you’ll be sorted!

Anyway, what we’ve learnt today is candles are great for stress relief, they’ll facilitate sleep, smell good, sort you out psychologically, and you can ram them into peoples’ eyes for self-defence purposes. Good, we’re glad we’ve got that sorted.