SCENTING THE SCENE

Enter the Aromatic World

(Taken from Scents of Wonder- Aromatic Solutions for Health, Beauty, and Pleasure – Laurie Szott-Rogers)

 

Welcome to Introductory Aromatherapy with Robert Rogers and Laurie Szott-Rogers.
We hope your olfactory journey will be deep, satisfying and full of learning.

Overview–

Welcome back to the Free Cruise portion of the tour. To help you get oriented on this journey, first, listen to your animated helper give an overview. She’s on the right side of the page. Click on her to start her talk.

Then, make your way to the Ship’s Library. Bring your laptop, notebook and a beverage.
To find the Library – From the main stairwell, go to Deck 4. Turn left, and the Library is the second door on your right.

Oh good, you found it! Thousands of books are on the rounded wooden shelves, collected by generations of herbalists and aromatherapists. Today, get comfy at a table, sit down, read an Introduction to Aromatherapy Below, and listen to the videos.

Free Cruise Passengers, Welcome Video

Introduction to Aromatherapy-

What has brought you here? Do you love the scent or habitually follow your nose into new adventures like this one?

Have you ever sniffed a scent so enticing that it lured you onto its path until you traced it back to its origin? When your nose has its way, you search for that evocative fragrance which drives emotion, reaction, and desire. Is there a scent from the past that haunts you, a memory you wish to recreate?

Possibly, you have entered the field of fragrant possibilities because a friend’s passion for scent enticed you. Maybe you heard in the media that a particular oil could be beneficial. Possibly, you have always loved plants, which was the natural evolution of your botanical studies. Or are you someone who suspects factory-produced chemicals and wants to avoid such products? In whatever way you begin, once you have experienced the ease, practicality, and diversity of essential oils, it feels enticing to explore more.

Essential oils are not for everyone. Occasionally, people do not gravitate toward natural scents or like to create their concoctions for beauty, cleaning, or healing. In this case, many commercial products satisfy their needs. However, for those who do, aromatherapy opens the door to creativity and self-sustainability. You can blend almost infinite combinations with the hundreds of natural oils available.

Essential oils can help you avoid chemical ingredients found in commercial products. With an arsenal of essential oils, you become empowered to stock your household with personally made, effective products, ranging from kitchen and bathroom cleaners to facial toners, cleansers, and masks. Creating gifts for others takes on a new dimension when you can individualize presents, such as bath salts, moisturizing oils, and facial creams. It is fun and exhilarating to make your products.

This enthusiasm for crafting personalized items with essential oils may evolve into a deeper exploration of aromatherapy. As your curiosity blooms, you embark on a personal journey that melds the joy of creation with the pursuit of knowledge.

If you decide to pursue learning, an online course will allow you to set your own pace. You may start with only one oil, but be aware the oils may slowly grow on you until you incorporate essential oils throughout the day for many tasks.

You have been smelling your whole life. Your sense of smell is a natural gift that awaits refinement. Aromatherapy offers a path to fine-tune this ability, turning it into a source of pleasure and practicality.

 

Smell- Our Oldest Sense

Smell is our most ancient sense, connecting us to reptiles and other animals whose sense of smell is far more acute than ours. This sense is closely tied to survival. Among the senses, scent is the first to develop in the human fetus, marking its significance in our early stages of development. This primitive aspect of humans is almost inseparable from our instincts. Our vocabulary proves this. Phrases like- “that situation just doesn’t smell right” or “that idea stinks” are concepts that link our sense of smell to our sense of survival.

Interestingly, everyone perceives odour differently, so you may not like the same scent as your best friend. The receptors in our noses are all the same, but we do not experience fragrance like others.

Through socialization, we also learn what smells excellent or disgusting. For instance, some cultures enjoy garlic or curries, while others are less enamoured with pungent spices. There is individual conditioning with scents. We associate pleasant experiences and fragrances that co-occur as favourable. Bad experiences can make one scent unappealing for life. So, there is a lot of subjectivity in interpreting what scent we enjoy.

Delving into aromatherapy broadens our exposure to different smells. Like wine connoisseurs, we can develop an appreciation of odours that are unusual for us. Trying new essential oils will allow us to enjoy scents that initially seemed foreign or undesirable. So, if your nose says yes, join us on this aromatic adventure.

Here are a few more definitions to expand your aromatic vocabulary.

Essential Oils and Absolutes

Essential oils are potent extractions of plants obtained from all over the world. Many plants are wild-crafted, while some are grown in orchards or plantations. By steam distillation, growers extract the potent oils from specific plant parts—bark, leaf, root, berry, or sometimes flowers.

Fruit peels like lemon, orange, lime, and grapefruit are often cold-pressed and accurately called expressed oils. Although the preparation of fruit peel oils differs from steam-distilled oils, they are often referred to as essential oils.

 

Certain flowers, such as jasmine, gardenia, and narcissus, release their scent through an alcohol or solvent preparation. The resulting extracts are called absolutes and are used mainly for perfumery.

Hydrosols (or floral waters) have slightly different properties than essential oils. They contain the water-soluble components of the plant, comprising a milder concentration of natural chemicals than essential oils. Hydrosols are usually softly scented and can be applied directly to the skin. Many of them are perfect for facial steams, as toners and refreshers.