10 Things You Should Know About Essential Oils

 

• Essential oils are not really oils. They do not contain the fatty acids that constitute what we would consider an actual oil.

• Essential oils are a excellent addition to your homemade cleaning preparations. Oils that are best for cleaning are: Lemon, grapefruit, eucalyptus, peppermint, tea tree, lavender, and rosemary.

• Essential oils are miniscule in molecular size, which means they are absorbed well by the skin making them perfect ingredients in personal care items intended to heal, soften, and nourish. However, they do not accumulate in the body over time – they simply offer up their healing properties and then pass on through.

• Fragrance oils and essential oils are NOT the same thing. As a rule of thumb, if you see the word “fragrance” or “fragrance oil” or even “perfume” on anything, you can assume this is synthetic and NOT natural. (Even if it says natural fragrance.)

• Essential oils are wholly natural and cannot be patented; which means that you’ll never see an essential oil in a pharmaceutical drug. As such, you can expect that the vast majority of mainstream healthcare practitioners will never recommend essential oils as therapeutic alternatives to drugs. More importantly, because essential oils cannot be patented, drug companies will not waste money studying them. This limits our scientific knowledge of essential oils GREATLY, and the majority of what we know about them are things that have been passed down through thousands of years of personal use and experimentation.

• Enormous amounts of plants are needed to produce essential oil. In fact, on the extreme end, it takes 4000 pounds of Bulgarian roses to produce 1 pound of essential oil. Other plants like lavender only take 100 pounds of plant material to produce a pound of essential oil. Still, can you imagine how concentrated essential oils must be, in light of how many plants are used to produce them?

• Always read application and dilution information located on bottle.

• If you are pregnant, please ask your Enroller which oils your should avoid.

• To test if you’re sensitive to an essential oil (which is probably best to do before using it in a skincare preparation): Combine one drop of essential oil with 1/2 tsp carrier oil (like olive, grapeseed, V-6 or coconut oil). Rub this on the inside, upper portion of your arm and wait a few hours. If no redness or itching develops, you’re most likely not sensitive to that essential oil.

• Keep all essential oils out of the reach of children and avoid contact with your eyes. This is just standard safety precautions, but must be mentioned.  If oils get into your eyes, do NOT use water.  Water will intesify the oil properties.  Put a drop of carrier oil into your eye to slow down the absorption of the oil.  If you find that your skin is sensitive to essential oils, mix with a carrier oil.

 

Take a look at our essential oils guide or one of our popular starter kits! And remember…as you get educated on the benefits of essential oils, don’t be fooled by low quality knock offs. At Young Living Essential Oils we proudly stand by our claim of providing only 100% PURE therapeutic-grade essential oils. Young Living's "Seed to Seal" and first time distillation process ensure the highest quality oil.  Other companies distill use second, third and even complete distillation producing a less pure and potent oil while YL distill oils one time.  This sets Young Living apart from all other therapeutic-grade companies.  This unsurpassed commitment to quality began with our founder over 20 years ago…and we still stand by it! Come join us!!