What are essential oils?

"Nature's own perfumery"

According to scientific notions, "essential oils can be described as pure and highly concentrated chemical substances, extracted from plants, flowers, roots, barks, peel, leaves, resins and seeds".

In a more poetic sense, essential oils are "nature's life force and pure earth energy".

Therefore, as powerful earth energy, essential oils need to be blended carefully with carrier oils for an optimal use and results. And this applies not only to "scientific or poetic" minds, but also to "holistic minds".

The importance of understanding the oils inner working

Before blending any oils, one needs to understand their power and inner working, by means of receiving proper training and by reading as much information as possible about aromatherapy.
Only then, one fully understands both their application methods, working of the different oils in the body, their side effects and oils toxicity levels.

Finally, essential oils are extracted directly from nature, by recurring to different  laboratorial methods.

Next, we will briefly explain one of the methods most commonly used by essential oil producers.

Steam distillation

What happens during steam distillation?

Through steam distillation, the plant parts and its components (terpenes, alcohols, esters, aldehydes, ketones and phenols) are heated up, releasing in the process small molecules of oil.
When the steam cools down, the oil is then separated from the water. This apparent versatile process of producing oils, often requires high pressure pipes and condensers, not being easy to master or learn.

Hence, less experienced and confident people may encounter huge difficulties when experimenting steam distillation, often resulting in authentic lab disasters e.g. by letting the oils dry, burning the compound, over heating it, or simply letting it evaporate.

Besides steam distillation, there are other methods of extracting essential oils from plants and herbs e.g. carbon dioxide extraction, solvent extraction ( mainly used for difficult capturing oils e.g. linden blossom and jasmine), hydro-distillation, cold pressing etc.
These complex, expensive and time consuming processes, often require expertise, large amounts of plant parts, and are normally carried out by professional distilleries.

Finally, each oil has its own properties, colouration, aroma and depends  from the plant or herb parts being used in distillation!

Low quality doubtful oils

As we mentioned before, essential oils are pure, concentrated and highly effective liquids.
And nowadays there are several companies and individuals worldwide, producing and selling essential oils.

However, its important to keep in mind, that not all essential oils for sale in the open market, have high quality standards or are for the effect highly concentrated.
Due to the inherent difficulties of steam distillation, some companies and individuals prefer to adulterate bottles with vegetable oils, making the process more profitable and quicker for them and less healthier for the consumer.

Thus, before buying essential oils one needs to pay close attention to several factors e.g. the origin of the product, percentage of pure oil contained in the bottle and price.
And buying essential oils is not a simple task, requiring some level of knowledge about different market players and oil brands for sale.

Additionally, good quality oils are often expensive (but always accompanied by detailed information both in the bottles and labels).
Therefore, one should also pay close attention to the amount of information in a bottle of essential oil.
And if there's no information at all, or if the oil is too cheap, then be suspicious and don't slip into buying it (most probably the oil is adulterated with synthetic substances, or mixed up with a normal carrier oil to make it more affordable).

Finally remember, that if an essential oil is not pure or concentrated enough, we as consumers have less chances of treating specific health problems, and making the most out of what nature offer us.
Reason why, we commonly believe that an oil quality is normally synonym of wonderful, unique therapeutic properties, and not simply a promise of wellbeing.

Reasons that may impact the quality, availability and price of essential oils worldwide

Some of the most common reasons affecting the quality, availability and price of essential oils worldwide, are directly related to:

• The country of origin of the production;

• Quality of the ground;

• Weather conditions;

• Drought and limited access to water;

• Internal policies regarding import and export of plants;

• Seeds and plants availability for production;

• Lack of technological know-how on the respective countries of production;

• Lack of production or inexistence of crops.

Harmful fertilizers, fumigations and pesticides

Another reason affecting the quality of essential oils worldwide, is the use or "abuse" by farmers of harmful fertilizers, fumigations and pesticides.
It is commonly known, that the action of chemicals and fertilizers in nature, can significantly impact the quality of the soil, essential and carrier oils, reducing their standard of applications and therapeutically uses.
Therefore, oils extracted from "chemical" based crops can never be comparable to oils cultivated in the wilderness, unpolluted and away from human intervention.

Manipulative lab practices

Another important issue affecting the quality of essential oils worldwide, are the so-called manipulative lab practices.
Some synthetic fragrances are being presently produced in labs worldwide, aiming to duplicate essential oils and plant natural aromas.

These mixes often mislead many inexperienced or first time aromatherapy buyers, thinking that they are buying the "real thing".
Therefore, its important to be aware about these practices (often more harmful than helpful), and they can both impact our health and "purse".

Rare oils

Finally, essential oils differ in terms of prices and rarity. If some oils are reasonably cheap and easy to purchase, others can be "exceedingly expensive" and very difficult to find.
This last category, normally regards oils known to be expensive by nature and even rare.

And when an oil is rare, people often go through great lengths to find it.
Thus, it's understandable that their prices vary significantly from other "more common" essential oils.

Some rare oils:

• Rose;

• Neroli;

• Linden blossom;

• Melissa;

• Jasmine oil;

• etc.

Essential oils are volatile

Essential oils are volatile by nature. This means that they evaporate easier and faster than normal vegetable oils.

Therefore, when buying essential oils one should always give preference to dark brown and air-tight bottles.

Additionally, the bottles need to be stored in cold and dark places. As we all know, sunlight often deteriorates the quality of oils, causing them to change properties, or to evaporate easily.
And the fact remains, that evaporation also ends up by interfering with the quality of essential and carrier oils, changing both their chemical composition, properties and nutrients. 

Finally, the volatility or evaporation of essential oils falls often into 3 core major categories:

• Top note (light oils, strong scented with easy evaporation levels);
• Middle note (warm oils with average evaporation levels);
• Base note (intense oils, expensive, with slow evaporation levels and often rich, sweet with wooden aromas).

Some examples of oil notes:

Natural oils vs. synthetic fragrances

Essential oils and natural aromas are not the same as synthetic fragrances. Essential oils and natural aromas have important and reputed therapeutically properties, and when used properly help the body getting healthier, younger and fitter.
These wonderful properties, often act in the body as stimulants, diuretics, antidepressants, antiseptics, expectorants, anti-virals, anti-inflammatories and pain-relievers.

Besides affecting positively the nervous system, natural scents and essential oils also affect people on a physical level, relieving pain, treating different types of skin problems, alleviating stress, reducing fear, increasing relaxation, energizing body and mind.

Thus, whilst essential oils are directly extracted from plants, roots, flowers, barks, fruits, seeds and grasses, synthetic fragrances are a direct result of complex pharmaceutical mixes, aiming to copy natural oil aromas and properties.

Therefore, the natural intrinsic value and importance of essential oils can not be easily  replaced by synthetic fragrances, that so often are harmful and dangerous for human beings.
They may be succeeding in doing so, but the fundamental flaw from synthetic fragrances, is the long-standing desire to copy the impossible - nature!

Read more Aromatherapy articles 

© copyright Sharehealing 2005