Aromatherapeutic Quality Control

Essential oils are highly concentrated extracts of flowers, herbs, root, or resins, sometimes diluted in a neutral base oil. Try to ensure you are using natural oils instead of manufactured, chemical-filled perfume oil; the synthetics lack any real energy. Also, approach oils with caution and don’t get them in your eyes. Clean cotton gloves are a good idea to keep in your kitchen for handling sensitive materials. You can avoid any mess and protect your magical tools by using oil droppers. While you are learning and studying, find a trusted herbalist or the wise sage at your local metaphysical shop; usually their years of experience offer much in the way of useful knowledge you can use to your advantage. I have included as much as I can in this at-a-glance guide to oils:

These essential oils are excellent choices for anointing lamps as well as yourself:

• Cinnamon is energetic, spicy, and warm. It stimulates the mind as well as the body.
• Ginger is vigorous and revitalizing and heightens desire and comfort.
• Jasmine sparks sensuality and inspires feelings of positivity, confidence, and pure bliss.
• Lavender is soothing, calming, nurturing, and relaxing.
• Orange is a light, citrusy oil that restores balance and lifts moods while enhancing playful emotions.
• Rose brings youthfulness, enhances self-esteem, aids circulation, and relieves tension.
• Sandalwood is a woody aroma that relieves tension and relaxes tense muscles.
• Ylang-ylang’s sweet floral aroma is used as an aphrodisiac; it is relaxing and reduces worry and anxiety.

How to Use Essential Oils

Most of the home remedies I personally prefer are either essential oil massage treatments or essential oils diffused into the bath or air. The best base oils for essential oils are cold-pressed vegetable and seed or nut oils. The most affordable are sunflower, safflower, corn, and grapeseed. Add essential oils to base oil at a ratio of one drop per five milliliters. Twenty drops of an essential oil come out to approximately one milliliter, so add twenty drops to a hundred milliliters of base oil.

A few drops of an essential oil from a dropper in the bath is sufficient for therapeutic use, and a few drops in water in a diffuser will fill a room with healing molecules. A drop on a cotton ball wiped on a light bulb or on a radiator will also gently diffuse the oil into the air. Here’s another helpful tip: try a few drops in a small bowl of very hot water. Shut the doors and windows, and the essence will permeate a room in five minutes. This is a particularly easy way to create a nice ambience in a room with soothingly scented air.

My sister suffers from osteoarthritis in her shoulder. She takes baths with synergistic blends of fourteen essential oils: fennel, cypress, juniper, cedarwood, sandalwood, petitgrain, pine, ginger, lavender, rosemary, black pepper, birch, nutmeg, and marjoram. These, combined with sea salt and Epsom salts, have turned her into a true believer in the amazing therapeutic effects of essential oils!

There are hundreds of essential oils used by herbalists, but for general therapeutic use in the home, these are my recommendations as far as what you need to have at the ready.

Ageless Skin Spa Facial

You will notice that many an herbalist appears ageless. There is a good reason for this; we manifest a lot of joy in our lives, including creating potions to take excellent care of our skin for goddess-like youthfulness.

Combine these oils in a sealable dark blue bottle

• 2 ounces sweet almond as base oil
• 2 drops chamomile essential oil
• 2 drops rosemary essential oil
• 2 drops lavender essential oil

Shake very thoroughly and your potion is now ready to use.

Clean your skin with warm water, then gently daub your face with the mixture. You can also make a salve or balm using my recipe if you want to turn the clock backwards. Prepare to be asked for your beauty secrets a lot.

An Herbalist’s Green Thumb Rules

If you have children, get them involved so they will learn a love of gardening early.

Find a nursery you like and ask which is the best book for your zone and climate to read and understand what to plant where, so you’ll have the best chance for success.

Always grow vegetables and fruits that you and your family love to eat.

Your kitchen garden should be a sunny, open spot that is easy for you to see and tend.

If possible, have an herb garden that is separate and easy to access for daily use when warm.

Check your soil type and use containers or raised beds if your soil is too poor or damp and swampy. Of course, a compost pile can fix your soil soon enough.

Preparation is everything, even with soil. Remove rocks and weeds; loosen the soil so it “breathes.”

Develop your garden’s soil by mixing in compost. Once the plants are established, serve them compost tea!

Patience is a virtue. Don’t sow too early—wait until the soil is warmed up.

Magic by the Bushel

The very act of growing your own herbs will be healing, and, as you continue to practice herbalism, you will learn more and more of what works in your recipes and which herbs, teas, and plant-based potions and infusions cause you and your loved ones to flourish.