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We read 50 books about Essential Oils. Here’s our top pick.

Posted on May 7, 2015 by traditionalfoodadventure Leave a comment

The Complete Aromatherapy & Essential Oils Handbook for Everyday Wellness from Beeyoutiful.com

One of the hardest aspects of trying to be an informed consumer over the past few years has been attempting to determine good usage practices amongst the many (often conflicting) voices in the essential oil world.

Which applications are considered safe, which ones are risky, what oils are appropriate for which ages and in which contexts? How to mix, when to mix, where to slather, breathe, diffuse after they are mixed? Maybe it’s okay to use this or that essential oil, because my neighbor’s friend’s cousin’s daughter did, and it fixed her problem…

These questions (and so many more!) pop up on a daily basis for me, so I’ve spent years reading and researching. I have nearly 50 essential oil books, written by all sorts of experts in their respective areas. I’ve read through them all, and followed many experts in social media and on blogs and websites. Out of my personal journey and experiences grew an article with the vital information that I wish someone had shared with me at the beginning of our family’s essential oil journey.

During my own discovery process, the world of essential oils has exploded into the mainstream. There are now many resources available to consumers who, like myself, want to be as informed as possible in how to use these powerful tools.

One of the absolute best of the library of resources I’ve come across in all my years of research is The Complete Aromatherapy & Essential Oils Handbook for Everyday Wellness by Nerys Burchon and Lora Cantele.

Combining high-level best practice safety guidelines with user-friendly information and age guidelines, this handy volume also has the bonus feature of more than 450 remedies and suggested uses for essential oils. As helpful as the proactive tips and excellent suggested usages are, the cautions section is just as important to give guidelines on which oils may not be the best choice in various situations.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough. If you want to safely and knowledgeably use essential oils,The Complete Aromatherapy & Essential Oils Handbook for Everyday Wellness is a must-have. (As with any of our recommended books, if your budget won’t allow you to purchase it right now, we suggest that you request a copy it from your local library, or perhaps purchase with a friend and split the cost of the book.)

Eager for more recipes and tips on Essential Oil usage? Our email series 101 Uses for Essential Oils is packed with information you can put to use right away!

Nine FAQs about Beeyoutiful’s Essential Oils

Posted on January 30, 2015 by Beeyoutiful Toni Leave a comment

We often receive questions about our essential oils, and many customers are curious about the quality of our product, especially in relation to our low prices. We’ve assembled a few of the most frequently asked questions here for your reference.

How are your oils extracted?

Our citrus oils are extracted by a cold process of expeller pressing. The rest of our oils are steam distilled from their plant parts. Read more here about how our oils are made.

Are the oils “low heat steam distilled”?

212 degrees is the lowest temperature at which water turns to steam. Steam can be heated much higher than 212 degrees, but steam will turn back into water before its temperature gets lower than 212 degrees. We use temperatures appropriate to each kind of plant product; some plants will release their oils at lower temperatures than others. Our oils are distilled at the lowest heat possible to extract the desired component parts, and they are tested to have sufficient active components to meet our standards.

What’s the quality level, and how is it assured?

Our oils are 100% pure, unadulterated, uncontaminated, and undiluted. Every batch is sample tested to make sure that this is so, before bottling, during bottling, and after bottling. The oils are tested for purity by gas chromatography, infrared spectroscopy, or both, as well as any other testing appropriate to that oil from a wide range of available technologies.

It is possible to have a totally pure and undiluted oil that is functionally dead. To ensure maximum potency, tests are also performed to make sure that the oils meet a certain standard of active components.

My second bottle of Lavender doesn’t smell the same as my first bottle did.

Variations are natural and inherent in any plant-based product. Think of how one crop of strawberries might be sweeter, or more red than another. In the same way, two pure and undiluted essential oils of the exact same variety but different batches could smell different, and it is not because of a difference in quality.

How long do essential oils last?

Because so many essential oils have inherent antibacterial properties, they generally have very long shelf lives if stored properly (in tightly-capped dark glass, away from heat and light, refrigerated if possible). In fact, certain oils are sometimes used in small amounts as a natural preservative agent in other products. Most undiluted oils will maintain potency for 2-3 years or longer, and will be used up long before rancidity becomes a factor.

Are your essential oils “therapeutic”, “aromatherapy”, or “medicinal grade”?

Unlike the “USDA Organic” seal you have probably seen on vegetables and packaged products in the supermarket, or the United States Pharmacopoeia (USP) labeling on medicines, you won’t see official labeling on essential oil products simply because there are no official standards or grades for quality or purity. Therefore, quality control and claims of efficacy are left up to each company.

“Therapeutic grade” oil is a term generally understood to be the highest quality grade of essential oil, but without any enforcement around these terms, anyone can claim to carry “therapeutic grade” oils. Some companies have actually trademarked terms like “therapeutic grade” or “medicinal grade”. This is done in an attempt to differentiate themselves in a competitive industry and make it appear that their products alone meet some kind of higher standards. In reality, there are no official standards, and such trademarked terms are meaningless marketing.

Certainly not all oils are the same quality, and there is no way to find out the genuine quality of most oils short of sending samples for laboratory testing. It comes down to simple integrity. Beeyoutiful is committed to full disclosure and will never make meaningless claims about our products. While our oils are indeed embraced by many for therapeutic and medicinal uses, we refuse to label them with empty words.

For more information on grading oils, read this helpful article.

Is it safe to take your essential oils internally?

If we were to simply answer a blanket yes to this question, and a customer went out and drank an entire bottle of Eucalyptus Oil, they would most likely get very sick. Essential oils are very concentrated, very powerful, and should be respected and very carefully and sparingly used. Some oils are safe in tiny doses; some oils should never be used internally, ever. In addition, there is no single oil that is perfectly safe for everyone. Something that is safe for one person may not be safe for others, especially children, due to various underlying health conditions (including pregnancy), other medications, allergies or sensitivities.

We cannot tell you what is safe for you. We are not doctors and we cannot prescribe. Our goal is to be very clear about the high quality, purity, and stringent testing of our products and trust that our customers will do their own thorough research and use the products intelligently. In our personal experience, if a particular 100% pure, unadulterated, undiluted essential oil is considered by industry experts to be safe for a specific use, including internal, we are comfortable using ours in that way in our own homes.

If your oils are of such good quality, good enough to that you use them internally, why are the bottles labeled “For Aromatherapy Use Only”?

In order for us to advertise our products for internal use, we would be obliged to meet stringent legal requirements and pay literally millions of dollars each year for liability insurance. Doing this would entail a mountain of work for our very small staff and greatly increase our risk in the marketplace, not to mention raise prices dramatically for our customers. We choose instead to focus on getting quality products out into the hands of people who have learned how to use them safely, and doing our small part to educate more people in the use of great products.

How can your oils be priced so inexpensively if they are of such excellent quality?

Along with lowering our costs and liability as mentioned above, we usually try to get a species of plant that is not the rarest and most expensive. There are something like 200 species of lavender, so if you compare the Latin species names on our bottle of lavender with a different manufacturer, they will almost certainly be different. (Note: sometimes plant species is very important, e.g. German vs. Roman Chamomile, and sometimes it is not important at all. Research your oils and insist on knowing what variety is in the bottle!)

Many companies in niche industries like to use a network marketing or distributor-based business model. This means that there are many people along the chain that have to get paid in the form of commissions on each sale. These layers of costs can’t help but make the products much more expensive when they finally get into your hands.

Instead, we work directly with family-owned manufacturers who don’t gouge us on price, and we pass on the savings by selling our oils directly to you at a price that’s not artificially inflated. We have a comfortable margin of profit that lets us pay the bills, do research, and put out training materials, and that is how we choose to price all of our products, including our essential oils. In this way, we’re able to keep the prices lower than many other companies.

Read this article for an introduction to using Beeyoutiful’s essential oils. We recommend The Complete Book of Essential Oils and Aromatherapy as a handy home reference tool. Consider signing up for our email series offering 101 Ways to Use Essential Oils.

Good Scents of Balance- Fall 2008 Catalog

Posted on February 4, 2009 by stevetallent

by Nancy Webster

Essential Oils Heal the Body and Sooth the Mind

Our doctor was mystified twice over. First because he identified the painful rash on my ten-year-old daughter’s chest and neck as shingles-something only old folks are supposed to get. And second, the usually tenacious condition was already going away! “Whatever you’ve been putting on her, keep it up,” he ordered. I’d been slathering my daughter with tea tree oilfor a week. She healed quickly and bears only the slightest scars today.

More recently, a pre-teen foster daughter we hosted for six months routinely suffered emotional meltdowns because of a traumatic childhood. When I blended lavender with other essential oils for her to inhale during an “outbreak,” her mood calmed quickly.

Head lice plagued our friends with six children. Fearing the carcinogenic properties of over-the-counter head lice medicines, they treated everyone’s hair with tea tree oil. The family was quickly, and safely, lice-free.

Testimonies like these offer just a few reasons why I’ve kept essential oils in our medicine cabinet for more than ten years. Produced by the distilling of selected plants, pure essential oils offer potent healing assistance to the body and mind. Essential oils go a step further than regular herbs because they absorb directly into the bloodstream and trigger systems in the brain for emotional well-being.

When in Aroma, Enjoy What the Aromas Do

Perhaps you’ve heard of aromatherapy. While it’s become something of a buzzword, not everything that claims to have aromatherapy qualities actually does what only essential oils can. “Aromatherapy” lotions and candles sold next to pickled eggs and caffeine pills at gas station convenience stores seriously misuse the term just to make a sale. So do many air fresheners, cleaning products, and facial tissues. Most, if not all, of these products use chemical-based, synthetic oils which do not provide health benefits-they can actually be harmful.

True aromatherapy is provided only by pure essential oils. Although your nose may not readily detect the difference, when exposed to the real thing, your brain’s limbic system gears up to help you concentrate better, relax, or perk up your mood, depending on the particular oils you use. In the 14th century, during the Black Death plague, workers in the perfume industry showed a remarkable tendency not to get sick. They were in constant contact with essential oils, the primary source for scents at the time. Essential oils still do the job today.

Here are a few easy ways to capture the healing character of essential oils:

Rather than dosing your child with cough and cold medicines, fill a medium-size bowl with boiling water and add a couple of drops of tea tree or eucalyptus oil. Let him/her breathe the healing vapors deep into the lungs.
Dilute the oils with a carrier like olive or sweet almond oil. Then rub a sick person’s chest, neck, and soles of their feet for an antibiotic effect against germs and viruses.
Add a drop of peppermint oil to a glass of water, and drink it to soothe indigestion and nausea.
A drop of oregano oil in water swished in the mouth and swallowed helps heal mouth ulcers and sore throats.

Many times, essential oils can be incorporated into things you do anyway, like bathing and washing your hair. Oils make your home smell fresh the healthy way instead of with chemicals. And you can massage sore muscles and tired backs with health-giving oils rather than cheap lotions. Or add essential oils to your natural cleaning and laundry products to give not only a nice smell, but also antibacterial and anti-fungal (mold!) protection.

Oils Take to the Air

One of the easiest and most effective ways to get the full advantage of aromatherapy is to use a diffuser. While you can always put a drop of essential oil on a tissue, cotton ball or even your pillowcase, a diffuser distributes oils through the air so the whole room is purified and every breath brings healing. Beeyoutiful now carries one of the best diffusers available. It works by nebulizing (breaking the oils into separate molecules) before dispersing them into the room. These smaller molecules are more readily absorbed by the lungs, making this the most therapeutic of the diffuser-styles.

Essential oils can be combined to create appealing and complex aromas for specific therapeutic uses. Blending with a targeted purpose is called essential oil synergy. Working together, oils heal more effectively than on their own. Tea tree and lavender oil are often paired, and there are many specific blend recipes available on the internet.

A Great Start with Oils

Since there are more than a hundred different essential oils, sorting through the nearly countless possibilities for using them can be overwhelming. To help with the selection, Beeyoutiful carries several champions of the essential oil line-up. Eucalyptus, known for opening up bronchial tubes and clearing stuffy noses, has been part of the Beeyoutiful product line almost since the company began. And this fall, four splendid, highly versatile oils have joined the team: lavender, oregano, peppermint, and tea tree oil. To help you maximize your aromatherapy experience, I’ve noted below a quick rundown of what to expect from each.

Lavender-think “fresh.” The purple, gently scented flowers grown in most herb gardens have been used throughout history as a natural antiseptic, antibiotic, anti-depressant, sedative, and de-toxifier. The name comes from the Latin word “lavare”, which means “to wash.” The fresh, clean fragrance is a reminder of lavender’s internal and emotional cleansing attributes. Lavender promotes healing and scar prevention after injury or burns. You’ll want to avoid the fake lavender fragrance now added to many baby skin care products. Use the real thing, and you’ll see your colicky, stressed-out baby relax. While you’re at it, try some on yourself after a rough day of mommy-ing. A lavender massage not only relieves sore muscles and arthritis pain but also menstrual cramps and discomfort from bladder infections. Skin problems like acne, eczema, wrinkles, and sunburn are soothed by lavender.

Oregano-the strong man. Used by folks as far back as the ancient Greeks, oregano is a potent antiviral, antibacterial, anti-fungal, and anti-parasitic oil, a warrior against germs, Candida, and parasites which contribute to skin infections and digestive problems. Oregano strengthens the immune system. It’s safe for internal use and can zap a sore throat (including strep) in short order. Just gargle and swallow a few times a day for three days. Even the antibiotic-resistant staph. infection MRSA can be treated with oregano oil.

Peppermint-think “perky.” Besides the anti-nausea benefit noted earlier, cool, refreshing peppermint stimulates the mind, increasing mental agility and improving focus. Try peppermint aromatherapy when you’re working on taxes or some other tough project requiring concentration. If you’re feeling down and overwhelmed, a dab of this oil perks up your limbic system to keep you plugging away. Peppermint oil cools the skin, reducing redness and calming irritation and itchiness. Inside, it eases spastic colon and boosts the digestive system. Peppermint breaks up congestion pain from migraines, headaches, sinus, and chest congestion, too.

Tea tree oil-the jack-of-all-trades. This one works for most every sick bug and cleaning need you have. Just don’t swallow it. Made from a tree that grows only on the east coast of Australia, tea tree oil is antiviral, antibacterial, and anti-fungal. Use it for first-aid on cuts, scrapes, and burns-and as a wart remover. Tea tree oil helps control problems as diverse as dandruff, head lice, vaginal yeast infections, jock itch, athlete’s foot, cold sores, and ringworm. And did I mention shingles-and its cousin, chicken pox? Inhaling tea tree oil vapors helps colds and bronchial distress. What’s more, bugs hate tea tree oil, so it makes a great repellent and treatment for insect bites. It even relieves itching caused by poison ivy. Add tea tree oil to your laundry to kill dust mites and for disinfection after sickness. For a great way to avoid toxic cleaners, use tea tree oil mixed with vinegar, borax, and water to get the same cleansing results, and add it straight in your dishwasher or garbage disposal.

The bottom line? For more healing, cleansing, and mind-soothing results than you can count, these oils are essential.

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