With our RED theme at Footsteps In Eden Reflexology this month, we invited our essential oils writer, Connie Scheel, to an adventure with Ylang Ylang essential oil. After all, this Young Living oil comes with a RED label and some of its aromatic use is consider quite romantic. Join Connie on her discovery. She has some amazing things to share. Like her on her Facebook page: Catalysts to Connie’s Wellness. Also, visit her Young Living Website to learn more about essential oils and Young Living.
by Connie Scheel
Discovering and experiencing a new essential oil (EO) can bring fascinated joy to your life. Getting to know a new EO is an invitation to slow down and open your senses. This has been my experience with Ylang Ylang EO the past several days.
It’s been a lovely change of pace for me. Usually I’m using a new EO to help with a physical issue and put my focus on how much and how quickly an EO is working on my issue. It’s all to easy to get caught up in that hurried results driven mindset. Although I am amazed and grateful for the physical relief I’ve found in EOs, when I focus on only that I’m cheating myself from the wonder and beauty EOs also offer.
I’ve gotten to know Ylang Ylang with a flirty dance. My first experience was a soft inhale directly from the bottle. Ahhhhh… it’s like a mildly spicy flower. I immediately associated it with the color of warm pink… a dogwood rose. This fits quite well with Footsteps in Eden’s RED theme this February. This is my new favorite cologne.
This is only my interpretation, of course, as Ylang Ylang is it’s own flower that originated in Madagascar and Ecuador. You may know it’s meaning as ‘flower of flowers’. It’s been used to cover the bed of newlyweds on their wedding night in Indonesia. That sweet spicy fragrance does indeed have a sense of romance to it.
My flirty dance continued with 1 diluted drop (1:1 ratio) on my wrist before meditating. I found the sweet fragrance very relaxing and felt as if God’s arm wrapped around me in the most gentle and loving way. This was around Valentine’s Day… so a romantic moment with God felt extra sweet.
Speaking of romance, Ylang Ylang EO may be helpful to your physical heart, particularly regulating your heartbeat and balancing hypertension. It offers a calming effect on the physical heart and blood pressure.
In the 2012 study Essential oil inhalation on blood pressure and salivary cortisol levels in prehypertensive and hypertensive subjects published in Evidence Based Complementary Alternative Medicine “the inhalation of an essential oil had immediate and continuous effects on the home SBP, daytime BP, and the stress reduction. Essential oils {a blend of lavender, ylang ylang, marjoram and neroli) may have relaxation effects for controlling hypertension.”
In another study published in Planta Med in July of 2004, Evaluation of the harmonizing effect of ylang-ylang oil on humans after inhalation showed “that ylang-ylang oil may be characterized by the concept of “harmonization” rather than relaxation/sedation. Compared to an odorless placebo, ylang-ylang oil caused significant decreases in blood pressure and pulse rate as well as significant increases of subjective attentiveness and alertness.”
I don’t believe in coincidences, and as such when I first received ylang-ylang I had a cold of sorts and my blood pressure was elevated due to OTC meds. This EO came to me in beautiful time and I have been applying 1 drop (without dilution) over my heart and my wrists. Over a few days of being off those OTC meds and applying ylang-ylang EO my blood pressure returned to normal, and I’m well again.
My dance with ylang-ylang EO continued… and I discovered relief from anxiety and a boost in self-confidence. I researched further, my curiosity peaked. I found that ylang-ylang EO can be used for depression, anxiety, hair loss and intestinal problems. I came across a study on PubMed from September of 2006 titled Relaxing effect of ylang ylang oil on humans after transdermal absorption and was fascinated and grateful that this study showed that “At the behavioral level, subjects in the ylang ylang oil group rated themselves more calm and more relaxed than subjects in the control group. These findings are likely to represent a relaxing effect of the ylang ylang oil and provide some evidence for the usage of the ylang ylang oil in aromatherapy such as causing a relief of depression and stress in humans.” I feel grateful joy when I read scientific EO research results like this one!
Who doesn’t need more calmness and relaxation in their life nowadays? Pause for a few moments and ponder the amazing links between our physical hearts, stress and depression to the calming, harmonizing, anti-inflammatory, antispasmodic, anti-diabetic, and peace restoring properties of ylang-ylang essential oil. Perhaps you’d like a get-to-know-you slow dance with this EO too?
Dogwood Rose image from canstockphoto.com
Ylang Ylang image from CanStockPhoto
