It cannot be stressed enough how the approach to aromatherapy is all important. Whether there is a leaning toward the healing applications of the art or to the magickal aspects, or to both, the approach may well determine the ultimate success or failure of the endeavor.
Many practicing aromatherapists work by instinct alone. For many, with a background of extensive study, research, and experimentation, the instincts can take over and do an admirable job of guiding the practice of the art. In watching the seasoned experts work, it is fascinating to see the overwhelming light of creativity and inspiration that go into the final production of an essential oil blend. It becomes clearly understandable why this ancient practice, while full of the trappings of the scientific pursuits, remains very much an art form, as well.
Those, however, who are new to the ways of fragrance blending may want to do things more by the book. It is conceivable that, somewhere beneath the layers of learned, conditioned behavior, we all have the capacity to set free our instinctive knowledge and let it guide our steps to effective and practical applications of aromatherapy. For the beginning student of fragrance working, however, it is far more advisable to base the decisions as to what ingredients belong in a particular oil blend on sound knowledge gleaned from sincere study. Let instincts develop as they may in accordance with natural individual growth. After generations of ignoring instinctual knowledge as a matter of social conditioning, one could hardly expect to become an expert overnight. Don’t rush the process!
The formulae included in this volume include many of the more traditional blends as well as some of the newer designs. The old traditional combinations may be considered tried and true. They have been utilized for many years throughout their host cultures and any other societies that may have adapted them into their own systems of healing and magick. Also included are many of the newer developments. These have been designed and produced for optimum effectiveness for use in their given purpose.
Even armed with these most powerful proven blends, however, the approach to the art of aromatherapy must be rational. While we share a universal existence as a people, we are also endowed—especially with the advent of higher communication and travel—with our own set of experiences and response stimuli. As we deal with individuals in aromatherapy (or any art) we must always safeguard against losing the integrity of the lone client in the shared experiences of the masses.
We live our lives as individuals, perhaps coming together in many different kinds of bonds but still as individuals in our own right. As individuals it is possible, and even likely, that one client may not respond a textbook manner to a certain fragrance or fragrant blend. Rather, one person’s response may be colored by personal experience.
Though many may think of aromatherapy as a science, it should never be characterized by the strict disciplines of the more orthodox scientific processes but should be left flexible. After all, we utilize the virtues of the art of aromatherapy for the betterment of the individual. We can hardly hope to accomplish this lofty undertaking by giving credence to the universal truths of the art and ignoring the client. We must remain flexible and sensitive if our resulting journey into aromatherapy is to be effective.
This is the essence of what we might call “aromatic sense.” Because aromatherapy is steeped in both science and art, and because we must adhere to principles of both universal and individual response to scent, the practice demands a special kind of discipline of its own. It is a balancing of virtues that make it work. The knowledge, study, and experimentation facilities are there, just as might be found in a chemistry lab. Amounts of individual components of an oil blend are exacting, often measured in drops.
Yet an open mind and sensitive nature are also essential for the optimal practice of aromatherapy. Because we deal with individuals and create effects on people’s physical, mental, and spiritual conditions, we cannot approach the design of a blend with a purely black and white, action and reaction, stimulus and response, dry, scientific attitude. Our working must be tempered with a sensitivity to the needs and responses of the individual and, above all, laced with compassion.
In offering a complete presentation of the workings of aromatherapy, perhaps we should expand our understanding of “psychological” to include all that is non-physical. It is important to note that scent can have a significant effect on the emotional and the spiritual as well as the strictly mental facilities of humankind.