How to Use Essential Oils! First off - what are they?
This could take a while but let me start by saying I took the course on aromatherapy because I was having a horrible time trying to figure out who on the internet was telling the truth about them and who was spreading out and out fiction. The amount of misinformation on the web about essential oils is STAGGERING! I hardly know where to begin. But here we go>>>>
Essential oils are plants essences - they are NOT in fact even OIL! They are a chemical mix of things such as terpines, aldehydes, alcohols, oxides esters, etc etc. There are NO fatty acids in essential oils. And what are oils/fats/butters made of? Fatty acids. We classify them with oils because they are hydrophobic - they do not mix with water. They are very complex chemically speaking and this is why they are so good at what they do. What do essential oils do? They help plants communicate with each other, with other species, even with the climate - in the rainforest they can even cause it to rain if they need water - it's rather complex how they go about that (it's not like they have a mind in the sense that we do of course) and I will do a post just on that but for now this info is to elucidate how VERY AMAZING they are!
We can use essential oils for many things. Some common examples are in cleaning solutions and as medicine. It is their chemical diversity and complexity that allows them to heal our bodies. For cleaning solutions we can just split off d-limonene (citrus terpenes) and use that alone to aid us in mopping up the floor. But in order to cause a biological reaction in our bodies, what makes essential oils effective is the number and combination of chemicals that make them up. It is phytochemical diversity that folks are lacking in their diets and that lack is likely the cause of alot of the chronic disease that humans are experiencing. What essential oils offer is TONS of diversity - lots of little chemicals that will switch on or off lots of little cell receptors in your body that will then aid you in healing. (When we get prescribed an allopathic - read Western - medicine it usually is one or maybe 2 or 3 chemicals that act on one or a few kinds of receptors in the body - or at least are designed to only act on a small number of receptors - we all know sometimes they do more than intended.. You can see why this might help in emergencies but over the long-haul this doesn't meet a body's needs. What's more it is safer for a human to take a substance with multiple phytochemicals than a single chemical. The plants evolved with us and we and other creatures have been communicating on a chemical level with them for ...well ...EVER basically.)
Some examples of misinformation that I see almost everywhere are as follows: that one should take essential oils by the droplet in water, that if one has a seizure disorder they should avoid essential oils, that you can wear them like perfume (this is not untrue but the manner of just putting them on straight is unwise), and that something like rose essential oil is only about $40 per ounce.
One doesn't want to take essential oils by the droplet in a glass of water because since they are hydrophobic they do not mix with water or saliva. Also they are so concentrated that an oil that has not been mixed with a suitable carrier such as honey or olive oil or milk (with at least 1% fat) can burn you or it can disrupt the lining of your esophagus and I could go on but I don't want to scare folks off of essential oils - suffice to say that hitting your tongue with a drop of peppermint essential oil (or any other essential oil) is akin to hitting it with 30 cups of peppermint (or any like) tea all at once. And when you take it in water since it won't mix with the water this is in essence what you are doing (there ARE exceptions to every rule but for the very most part this is not a good way to take essential oils, certainly not the way aromatherapists would advise for them to be taken!!).
Folks with seizure disorders need to take care certainly but essential oils do not wholesale cause problems for folks with seizure disorders more than say folks who don't have seizure disorders - this is just a common myth. If you would like to wear an essential oil or blend of essential oils for fragrance it is best if you mix it with a carrier and a standard mix will include tops of 5% essential oils (1-2% is the standard usage rate to wear them as scent - less for some of the stronger essential oils such as cinnamon bark and there are some essential oils you probably want to avoid altogether such as pennyroyal or rue or even winter savory) to 95% carrier oil such as almond oil or apricot kernel oil or jojoba oil (wax actually - jojoba is also not an oil. haha Fact!).
Finally, as to our myths, rose essential oil - the real deal - costs on average at a place that is selling it for a "good" deal about $200/ounce although it is not only not unheard of to sell it for 6 times that amount, one can get a real rose absolute (not essential oil which this is complicated but for most folks an absolute is the best way to go here and it is VERY similar to an essential oil - the only difference really being the way it is collected) for $200/ounce but at the more legitimate but expensive places it will be $200+ for 5 ml (1/6 of an oz - the essential oil would be even more pricey, and by a good margin. Well and for good reason as it takes approximately 5000 lbs of rose petals to make 1 lb of essential oil, I do not believe it takes quite that much to make the absolute though - still quite alot.). Well and then some places charge $25 for an ounce of lemon eucalyptus essential oil when in reality it should cost more like $8!! So prices are both inflated unnaturally and deflated but you're not getting what you think you are (in the case of the more pricey essential oils that are deflated in price, most likely the essential oil is adulterated or you are not reading closely enough and they are selling ROSE ESSENTIAL OIL that is in fact jojoba oil with 5% rose absolute).
So please don't just take folks you do not know at their word including me but rather investigate thoroughly before using any essential oil (better yet take a free Introductory course on aromatherapy at a reputable school! I took it a step further but the good schools have introductions that have enough info in them to get you by.)
The information on this website has not been evaluated by the FDA and is not intended to diagnose, treat, prevent, or cure any disease.
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