Your Personal Guide – How To Test New Essential Oil

Or… Building A Lasting Relationship With Your Essential Oil

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Congratulations on your purchase of a brand new bottle of oil.

We recognize how exciting it is, because we feel the same sense of anticipation every time one of our searches for an oil reaches its climax too.

Your bottle asked us to whisper a few concerns it had as we packaged it up carefully to send to you. So, we thought we’d give you a few pointers to avoid your bottle getting left sad and dusty at the back of the shelf.

Here’s the thing…

Essential oils are very shy beings. They rely on other people to tell you things about them and if you are not careful, you miss a lot.

Plant extracts realize people want to be friends, but that often their reputations precede them. Many users assume things about them before they ever have chance to call on their medicine. That can be dangerous but also a little sad for our aromatic friends.

After all, they never mean anything but goodness… but sometimes it takes time to understand how to use them well.

So, when you open your package, we would encourage you to take a wee moment to get to know your oil before you place it on the shelf.

Please don’t rely on other people’s interpretations of how the medicine of the plant might make you feel. Everyone’s relationship with a plant extract will be different.

That’s the beauty of our art.

In just the same way as we have people whom we adore and trust and those who we would only call on at the very last resort… your relationship with the oil will be the same. Some you will want to spend the rest of the day with…others you won’t be able to get away from quickly enough. That’s OK… often that reaction changes with your mood.

Another bizarre quirk of the interaction of the plant’s chemistry with our own.

Odd… and yet magnificent.

Gently inhale its vapors and ask the oil what it would like to teach you. Notice your reactions… does it relax or invigorate? Do you trust it… or does it seem a little sharp for you…? Does it belong in a tranquil and hallowed place, in a clinical hospital perhaps or can you feel the explosion of a samba leaping from the bottle as the molecules dance round your nose?

What place does the magic entice your mind to go?

Perhaps it inspires memories of time, places or people long forgotten as the molecules trigger dusty recesses of your brain. What treasures or nightmares lie behind those locked cupboards of long-ago dreams?

Listen and observe.

Not all oils take you to happy places, but likewise the chemistry can sometime trigger joy you thought you might never again recover. And, just as one oil may be sad to you, it might be a great source of comfort to another. Its language is strange and arcane, but if you listen, I promise you, you will know it.

Aromatherapy is a spectacular blend of alchemy and neuroscience…one can never predict what pathways might become illuminated by an oil.

Next look up any contraindications with any medications or health issues you might have (here’s a good source to check all cautions). Always use the mantra: First, Do No Harm.

Dilute the oil and try some on your skin.

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How does it feel?

Does it warm or cool? Does it soothe or perhaps irritate? (If it does…smear more carrier oil to dilute it on the skin a little more)

Please don’t leave testing the oil on your skin until a day when you need it, or you feel too ill to care!

This is how accidents happen. Be mindful and aware.

Take time to wonder about the nature of the oil and how you might be able to use it better.

After all, using a drop at a time…you want to make sure you don’t just waste an oil and leave it to go off. We want you to use it dynamically, holistically and imaginatively.

Many people find meditating with the oil very soothing and illuminating as a means of understanding the plant medicine on a much deeper level too.

Just one final request, this time from us…

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When we sourced these oils, we made the conscious decision not to exploit the planet’s resources any more than we had to. Please treat your oil with love, kindness and respect. Use it consciously to make a difference to yours and your families lives around you and always give gratitude to the plant and the many families involved in its cultivation, gathering and production. Many give much larger sacrifices than you can imagine to carefully place this magic into your hands.

We are trusting you with this beautiful thing. Treat it well, and please come back and see us soon.

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Read next:

• How to Store Essential Oils
• The Truth About Therapeutic Grade Essential Oils