Peppermint essential oil is one of the most versatile and favorite oil for many people. It has a very sweet, fresh, minty, candy-like aroma. And of course it can benefit us in many ways, not only physically but also mentally.
- Energy boost. Diffusing it in the morning to wake up can be equal to a cup of coffee for our brain. Also diffusing peppermint during workouts, or using it with carrier oil on upper body, is very helpful to boost the physical performance and to have a nice cooling effect when you’re sweating.
- Muscle tension relief. If you have tensed muscles, or especially if you experience tension in your upper back, neck and shoulders, apply peppermint with carrier oil and massage slightly, it works also very good in a combination with lavender essential oil.
- Headache. Peppermint is great to help dealing with headache tension, mix one drop of peppermint with carrier oil and apply on your temples and back side of your neck with circular movements to sooth the headache tension.
- Nausea. If you experience travel sickness inhaling peppermint directly or from your palms can be very helpful to relieve such discomfort and let you enjoy your trip.
- Sun burn relief. Here peppermint can also serve us good. To sooth the burning sensation of your skin add 5 or less drops of peppermint essential oils to 30 ml of distilled or drinking water in a spray bottle, shake it well and spray on your skin to cool the burning sensation. Avoid eyes area.
- Allergy itchiness. Peppermint is great oil to add to allergy relief blends. If you experience an allergic reaction on your skin which creates a lot of itchiness and discomfort you can mix peppermint essential oils with other soothing oils like lavender, helichrysum, chamomile, marjoram to sooth the skin. Check out my recipe for sun allergy relief.
- Digestive support. For digestive support you can rub peppermint with carrier oil around your tummy, or sometimes can be taken internally (here make sure it’s a high quality oil suitable for ingestion and I encourage you to do your own research on this topic as we are all different and may or may not have contraindication).
- For mental or emotional overwhelm, which we may experience sometimes, and when we need the time to process and to digest the information or even our emotions, the best way is to use peppermint aromatically, either diffuse it or inhale directly from the bottle or your palms, as well as to use it in a roller ball bottle.
- Boost focus. Feeling like you can’t concentrate, or your brain just don’t want to work properly today, you can diffuse peppermint essential oil in a combination with lemon oil to naturally boost mental performance (sometimes diffuser is not an option, then using USB diffuser is the best).
- Cooking. Peppermint can add a very unique and refreshing taste and aroma to your home-made sweets. It combines really well with chocolate. I love adding a drop or less to my brownie mixture, the taste becomes very unique. Again, here make sure you’re using a high quality essential oils suitable for ingestion (purity matters).
- Tired feet. When we spend to much time on your feet, or wearing high hills or tight shoes for long time, but the end of a day our feet tend to burn. The best way is to have a foot bath to cool down our feet, adding peppermint essential oils to a cooling foot bath I find to work miracles.
As you can see peppermint essential oil is so versatile and so handy, definitely the right oil to have near by. Just one more thing, peppermint essential oil is quit strong oil and is better not to be used with little kids under the age of 5. Unless it’s included in a specially formulated blend for kids in a small amount.
Have a beautiful days,
Anna