Best Essential Oils for Sleep
Are you finding a good night’s sleep more and more elusive? Many factors in our lives can cause us to struggle drifting off into restful slumber. Maybe the stress of … Read More
Interested in Essential Oils?
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Practical ways to incorporate essential oils into daily life. Plenty of tips and DIY suggestions for using EOs for health, wellness, and first aid purposes. As with everything preparedness related, start slow and learn as you go.
Welcome to our guide for essential oils! I’ve been using essential oils for X years and am thrilled to share with you what I know. Once you start using these powerful tools, your life will never be the same. And for that, I’m forever grateful.
An Introduction to Essential Oils
Essential oils are a great tool for anyone hoping to use more natural remedies in their life. Each oil is a liquid made from natural extracts (like flowers, grasses, and fruits). The active chemicals in the oil enter our bodies and get to work, helping us fall asleep better, reduce blood pressure, and a host of other things.
Tackling Common Issues with Essential Oils
Many problems can be solved naturally with essential oils. With so many oil options out there, however, it can be hard picking the right one for your situation. Our guides below suggest the best essential oils for a given issue.
- Get a good night’s sleep
- Pump up your energy levels
- Manage asthma symptoms
- Fight back against allergies
- Tackle a sore throat
- Relieve sinus congestion
- Soothe sunburns
- Relieve arthritis, muscle, and joint pain
- Treat Psoriasis
- Manage blood pressure
- 20 all purpose remedies using essential oils
Using Essential Oils 101
Getting started with essential oils is easy! But there are a few key things to keep in mind:
- Why use natural remedies
- How to apply essential oils
- Why you should avoid ingesting essential oils
- Safety considerations when using essential oils
- When to use carrier oils
- When to use diffusers
Building Your Set
It can be daunting looking through the many essential oil brands and product options, but it doesn’t need to be!
Check out our beginner’s guide to buying essential oils. It’ll help you know what you should look for from a company, as well as suggest our top 3 brands.
Once you find your favorite company, you can start creating your collection. Before you buy an oil, it helps to know what it can do for you. Here’s a roundup of the most commonly used oils and their benefits:
- Peppermint
- Lavander
- Lemon
- Tea Tree
- Oregano
- Clove
- Melaleuca
- Frankincense
- Lemongrass
- Rosemary
- For others, check out this big list of essential oils
Some people enjoy creating kits around a certain theme, like the ones below:
- Essential oils for a first aid kit
- Essential oils for health and wellness
- Essential oils for a survival kit
- A small essential oil starter pack (use code “BACKDOORSURVIVAL” for a 10% discount)
- A larger essential oil starter pack (use code “BACKDOORSURVIVAL” for a 10% discount)
DIY Projects with Essential Oils
Create a number of useful household products with essential oils, great for even the most novice of DIY-ers.
- Hand sanitizer
- Healing body butter
- Toilet cleaner
- Foaming hand soap
- Facial wipes
- Antiviral sanitizing spray
- Vapor rub for cough and congestion
- Peppermint scrub
- Cold and flu bomb
- Healing lotion bar
- First aid stick
- Facial toner, beard oil, face serum, and makeup wipes
- Simple salve
Helpful Resources
Ready to learn more about essential oils? Check out these resources:
- Interview with author of The Complete Book of Essential Oils and Aromatherapy
- Interview with author of Smart Mom’s Guide to Essential Oils
- Our Pinterest board with a collection of tips and tools
- The essential oil part of our website where we frequently post new articles
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The Best Carrier Oils to Use with Essential Oils
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Top 7 Best Essential Oils for Energy
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Top 5 Best Essential Oils for Asthma
Getting diagnosed with asthma was a complete shock to me. I wasn’t the picture perfect image of asthma Hollywood portrays: a little kid with glasses wheezing to keep up with … Read More
Top 5 Best Essential Oils for Allergies
The sun is shining, the flowers are blooming, and with it comes the dreaded allergies. A few minutes spent outside stirs up uncomfortable symptoms like watery eyes and sneezing. No … Read More
Best Essential Oils for Sore Throat – Soothe Your Throat with Essential Oils
Suffering from a sore throat is a terrible experience. Each swallow feels like a golf ball pushing down your throat. Just laying on the coach is exhausting because of the … Read More
Prepper Book Festival: Complete Book of Essential Oils & Aromatherapy
Linking survival and preparedness with essential oils may seem odd but the more you use them, the more you recognize their value in preparing for times when traditional first aid and wellness solutions may be difficult to come by.
For years, the Complete Book of Essential Oils & Aromatherapy has been the definitive source of information about essential oils. Recently updated, read an exclusive interview with the author, Valerie Worwood, and learn what she recommends as a budget-friend “Basic Care Kit”. Plus, enter the giveaway to win a copy of her newly updated book for free!
Diffusers and You: What You Need to Know
Using a diffuser to dispense the healing qualities of essential oils is one of the easiest ways to become accustomed to their use. Say, for example, someone in your home is sick with a cold or flu. Adding 5 or 6 drops of an anti-microbial essential oil to a diffuser will allow the healing qualities of the oil to disperse and circulate around the room, benefiting all if its occupants.
Likewise, if you are having problems breathing, a few drops of an essential oil running in a diffuser can clear the nasal passages and allow you to breathe more easily, especially at night. If this sounds familiar to the old fashioned vaporizer our mother’s put in our rooms as kids, you are correct. The concept is the same but instead of breathing in a chemical cocktail invented by the OTC drug industry, you are breathing something plant based that is actually good for you.
In this article, I share with you some of the benefits of using an essential oil diffuser along with alternatives for those times when a diffuser is not available. I also suggest specific oils and blends to get you started. (Part 1 of a 2 part series).
How to Use Essential Oils to Relieve Sinus Congestion
A sinus infection is miserable. Technically called sinusitis, this is a common ailment that first appears to be symptomatic of a common cold but in reality, is the result of swollen and inflamed nasal cavities. It is often caused by a virus which means treating with antibiotics is useless. That is just one reason why it makes sense to know how to treat the symptoms of a sinus infection without running to the drugstore for an armload of drugs that either will not work or will make you drowsy and incidentally raise your blood pressure.
Over the past couple of months, a number of people around me have suffered from sinus congestion. Like a mad scientist on a mission, I started experimenting with essential oils and with the help of Valerie Worwood’s fantastic book on essential oils, came up with a formula that works. If you have sinus problems, here is a DIY remedy using budget-friendly essential oils along with three different ways to use the blend: topically, in a diffuser, and by simple inhalation.
How to Make DIY Hand Sanitizer With Essential Oils
Hand sanitizers have their place in our lives, especially in the sick room where alcohol-based sanitizers rule. On the other hand, many hand sanitizers currently on the market deliver a chemical brew that results in a sticky, nasty mess along with ingredients such as triclosan and other anti-bacterial ingredients that are now suspected to contribute to the creation of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
Given that plant-based essential oils are some of the strongest antibacterial and anti-microbial substances around, I have chosen to make my own day-to-day hand sanitizer. I use this hand sanitizer to supplement good old fashioned hand washing with plenty of soap and water. This recipe uses 100% organic, cold-pressed Aloe Vera gel, organic coconut oil, and a mix and match blend of essential oils.
8 Essential Oils For Your First Aid Kit
As much as I like to try new things when it comes essential oils, I tend to go back to the same oils, day in and day out. This is surprising since my EO drawer is overflowing with over fifty different oils. I consider this good news since, as a prepper, there is only so much I can afford to put away for long term emergency purposes. It is much easier to stockpile and learn the effective use of a handful of oils than the dozens that are out there, just waiting to be put through our personal trial and error cycle. Today I share eight oils for your first aid kit that are tried and true.