Relaxing with essential oils
Stressed? Stress is the modern disease, accepted as an inevitable part of normal life, and so you allow stress to take its invisible toll of body and mind.
It may be, in a particular case, that there is little you can do about the causes of the stress, nor possibly even about the subjects ability to handle it, but you can do something to relieve the symptoms.
Aromatherapy is essentially a gentle way to improve well-being and restore proper functioning, using natural substances whose powers were studied and respected many centuries ago.
These days, the gentleness which is central to aromatherapy, combined with the therapeutic qualities offered by nature, produce a treatment for stress which is as harmonious as it is effective.
Of course, nobody is suggesting you should be wandering around in a state of aromatic, spaced-out bliss the whole time. You need a bit of stress to spark you off, but too much causes fatigue and may shorten life expectancy.
Quite a number of essential oils are relaxants but several are preeminent among them, and these can be used singly or in combinations to suit you. This article is not going to examine the psychological roots of anybodys stress, which may indeed need to involve other forms of therapy; individuals may be predominantly depressed, or anxious, or a mixture of the two, or may confuse the two states. This article can only provide general guidelines for mood therapy. If at first you dont succeed, try another essential oil.
Types of essential oils for relaxation
The oils most widely used and frequently commended for their virtues in relief of stress are those of lavender and sandalwood. Any first attempt to relax someone should be with one of these.
Also highly commended would be patchouli, sweet marjoram, vetivert and chamomile.
Other oils with permutations of the right qualities include clary sage, frankincense, lemongrass, petitgrain and tangerine. Ylang ylang is also on the list but perhaps should be kept for special occasions, plus rose otto and true neroli if the stress is caused by being a millionaire.
Blends can really be as simple or as complicated as you like, but simple ones are probably preferable. Were you to become an advanced student of aromatherapy you might investigate synergistic blends for the treatment of guilt, or conduct experiments into the best proportions of which six oils should be employed against helplessness and bewilderment. When things are as bad as that, perhaps a more fundamental, stringent treatment is required than aromatherapys gentle benefits.
Meanwhile, you might like to deal with a case of old-fashioned nerves by using a blend of equal amounts of lavender and vetivert. Alternatively, when the mood is gloomy, try lavender, chamomile and clary sage. If the stress in your subject tends to produce tense snappiness, then treat him or her to a massage of chamomile and sweet marjoram.