Do essential oils really work on our emotions? The answer here is YES and NO. Sounds confusing, isn’t it? Let me explain.
Whenever we experience certain emotions which are kinda on a surface, the ones that come and go, for example, feeling stressed our or burned out, having emotional tension, emotional overwhelm, experiencing irritability or mood swings, feeling tired, feeling sad, feeling anxious at some situations, feeling randomly anger, or in general we feel like we need to be more calm, more grounding, diffusing essential oils around the house or inhaling them directly is very helpful and the results can be pretty fast.
But what about deeper emotions? What about feeling really depressed, or still can’t overcome the grief process, feel a lot of deeper inner unsatisfaction in our life, what if we experience self hate, self-doubt, self-worth, self-love, self-acceptance, low self-esteem issues, we hold deep inside of us anger, resentment, that’s when simply using aromatherapy may not be as effective, may not bring expected results and may get us questioning if it really works.
That is the time when we need to make this extra step to really address the whole issue, to go deeper, maybe into our subconscious mind, to find the main issue that’s causing us to feel certain way on a first place. That’s when we really may need to dig deeper and release these negative emotions, replace them with positive ones like forgiveness, gratitude, love.
There are many different techniques and modalities to work on releasing negative emotions and working on our belief system (a lot of the time certain emotions can be a product of our deeply rooted beliefs). These are EFT tapping, affirmations, journaling, practicing gratitude, practicing forgiveness, inner child work, different types of inner works, belief work, hypnotherapy, regression therapy, sound therapy, you can also combine it with color or crystal therapy. All of them are beautiful and can provide incredible results.
Now you may be wondering, do you really need using essential oils if these modalities are already very promising and effective? Again the answer is YES and NO. Technically you don’t need to use oils because these techniques are already powerful.
But why I personally love using aromatherapy here is because on a first place to diffuse specific essential oils in a room helps to prepare our conscious and subconscious mind, as well as prepare us emotionally for the practice. They create the sense of calmness and relaxation which is very helpful to start any kind of inner work.
In order to release these deep negative emotions we start diving deep into the root cause of it, into our subconscious mind. And when we reach the main issue that’s when things become very uncomfortable and often emotional. The whole process of releasing negative emotions is quite painful, not physically but emotionally painful. And that’s another point why I love using aromatherapy along the way.
Essential oils here become like a bridge, they smooth the whole transition, they are helpful in releasing these emotions, making the process easier and less emotionally painful for us. They create sense of comfort as well, and help us to really open up.
Also whenever we work with our belief system, and let’s say you choose using affirmations, you can’t just say it once and the shift is done. That’s when you repeatedly saying these affirmation daily for some period of time. And infusing it with essential oils makes a whole difference. Here is why.
Coming to the science. When we inhale aromatic molecules, they travel through our olfactory system until they reach our limbic system, which is the storage of our memories. When we keep saying certain affirmations over and over, we can use same essential oil alone the way. And later on if you feel like you start doubting yourself, or stem aside from what you’re trying to affirm yourself, inhaling that same essential oils would bring back the memory and emotions you have during the affirmations. And that’s why I find aromatherapy to be such a powerful tool when working with beliefs.
I hope this gives you an understanding on what to expect and what not to expect from essential oils when it comes to our emotions, and what other actions can be taken in order to address the main issue, to release negative emotions or change our beliefs, as well as how to infuse any of the modalities with aromatherapy to get even better and faster results and benefits.
Have a beautiful day,
Anna