Yoga practitioners, specifically those practicing physical asana, tend to be interested in natural medicines, and in all the ways nature can offer healing to their bodies. Essential oils are truly potent natural therapeutic agents, and can support one's yoga practice in many ways. Here we'll look specifically at healing physical injuries; in future parts of this article we'll look at using essential oils for supporting various organ systems, and even oils to enhance meditation. Whether one has just started a practice of yoga asana, or has been practicing for twenty years, injuries can occur. Of course, the longer one has been practicing, the less likely this injury will occur "on the mat". Either way, we'd really like to get back into the swing of our practice, and our lives, as quickly as possible. Essential oils actually have proven therapeutic effects (see, for example, pubmed.gov and search for "essential oil inflammation") for the healing of muscles, tendons and ligaments. Effective blends will combine inflammation reduction, pain relief, and regenerative actions all in one formula. When healing physical injuries, be they chronic or acute, the process must begin with reducing inflammation. This allows the exchange of damaged material out, and healing nutrients in, to the injured area. Reducing inflammation also reduces the potential for further inflammation, as well as reducing pain. Proven anti-inflammatory agents are found in the oils of ginger, German "blue" chamomile, frankincense and plai -- a root oil from Thailand, similar to ginger. (Note that the "CO2 extract" oils are likely the more potent oils for this action, and are available from specialty online retailers). Next we'll include an oil or two to stimulate tissue regeneration. Lavender is a very well known oil, which actually began the modern aroma-medicine movement because of its inflammation-reducing, regeneration-stimulating actions. (A quick digression: a chemist burned his hand and submersed it in the first liquid he could find, which was a container of lavender essential oil. His hand healed so fast that he wrote a book about it, in French, called "Aromatherapie"). Helichrysum essential oil is even more potent than lavender, yet some may find its high cost prohibitive (it's distilled from tiny yellow flowers from plants growing only in certain climates in Europe). An ideal blend for healing soft-tissue injuries could be made using the following recipe: For each ounce of total formula, blend 3 to 6 milliliters of helichrysum (the more the merrier -- but also note that this is not true with most oils), and 1ml each of ginger and German chamomile CO2 extracts, in a base of sesame (considered warming in Ayurvedic practice -- otherwise really any carrier oils are acceptable). If you like, the essential oils can also be simply added to an unscented cream base and shaken well. If helichrysum should prove too costly, don't despair! Other oils have been proven effective for our needs. Plai oil was the subject of research where the participants had undergone knee surgery. It was shown that plai used undiluted, or in a 10% concentration in a carrier significantly reduced both pain and inflammation. Wintergreen and birch bark essential oils are chemically equivalent to "liquid aspirin". The should be used with awareness for this reason, using only as much and as frequently as necessary to achieve your desired result. With this in mind, you may have excellent success with a blend of 3ml plai (that's 3ml's in each ounce of total formula, there being 30 milliliters in an ounce -- and approximately 25 drops of essential oil in one milliliter from a standard glass eyedropper), 3ml sweet birch (or wintergreen) and 1ml each ginger carbon dioxide extract oil and lavender essential oil in 22ml of sesame oil. To simplify blending, you can add all the essential oils to an empty bottle and top it off with your base oil when the essential oils have been measured in. You may find that one of these formulas works better for you than the other; it's fun to experiment in this way. Creating your own blend tends to give you more insight into the medicine that essential oils really are, and will pique your interest to delve further into their healing potential. In the next parts of this article, we'll look at other ways essential oils can support the health of the yogi. These include immune system function, and both physical and energetic cleansing, and even more esoteric applications. So crack open your first bottle of oil and enjoy!
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Essential oils offer an incredible array of therapeutic possibilities for the Yoga practitioner, from the healing of injuries to the support of meditation. Here's a look at how today's yogi might use essential oils to support their practice AND their health in general.
For more on the therapeutic value of organic essential oil, and one of many important oils individually such as Patchouli oil, visit The Ananda Apothecary online.
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