Have you ever bought or been given an essential oil, and then not really known much about how it can be used? Or had a sudden injury/illness and wondered what oil you could use, but had trouble wading through the masses of information online to find out? Often if you do search online for remedies you’ll find a LOT of contradicting advice. One site says to swallow a drop or two of oil (therapeutic grade) in water, while another says you’re probably risking your life if you ingest oils! So how do you know what’s safe and what’s most likely to help you?
Enter ‘Modern Essentials.’ This is a reference book produced by Aromatools, a sister company to doTerra I guess you could call it. Its designed to be simple enough for newbies to make sense of, but to have enough detail that you can dive into topics like the chemical makeup of essential oils if you desire also.
It’s pretty much an essential oils bible. It’s full colour, hardcover and details every oil doTerra sells, which oils to use for just about any illness you can think of, what oils blend well for DIY perfume, the safety data for each oil, reflexology charts, references to hundreds of studies conducted on the effectiveness of the oils and a bit of the history of essential oils. And more…but the point is, this book gives you a wealth of knowledge with studies to back it up so that you can both make the most of the oils you have, and find safe and effective remedies for any ailments you’re trying to heal up.
One suitable example we had was when Micah was bitten by a spider and was swelling up fast and in a lot of pain. I didn’t have time to negotiate the flood of information online to try and find an oil that would help, but I had our copy of Modern Essentials, so within about 30 seconds was able to find out that Basil oil helps with spider bites. And it did. The pain went almost instantly, and the swelling left very soon after applying 2 drops of that oil. It’s times like that having a real book with reliable information is a huge blessing.
The 8th edition of Modern Essentials was released late last year, and is up to date with all the new oils doTerra are producing. If you use another top quality brand like Young Living, this book would work for their oils, with exception to some blends they produce that are slightly different.
You get a page per oil describing all the common and less common uses for the oil, it’s properties (antiviral, antibacterial etc), safety data of that oil and what it blends with. It also has a full colour botanical photo of the plant the oil is distilled/extracted from.
They have a page like this for each blend also.
And there’s some info on using your oils in cleaning recipes, culinary recipes and beauty recipes.
Then the back end of the book is an alphabetical listing of most ailments or needs you can imagine, with lists in order of effectiveness, of which oils you would use for that issue, and how to use them.
There’s also some explanation of how the olfactory (smell) system functions. All up the book is 480 pages.
We use this book almost daily, and if you’ve ever bought an oil from me, I’d have given you a photocopied page from this book about the oils/s you bought so you could use it properly and to it’s full potential. It’s sad to be in a place where you have solutions like the oils, but aren’t sure how to use them, so leave them stored away! I found an almost full bottle of a fairly decent grade of Ylang Ylang in an op shop a few months back, and thought it a bit sad the donor hadn’t been able to use it up!
Modern Essentials isn’t available directly from doTerra. Aromatools sell it, as do several other essential oil supply stores, but it’s usually coming from the USA and very expensive (if you live in Australia!). I have some in stock, (down to the last 5 actually!), and they are $55 each. Or free if you’re signing up with me with an enrollment kit.
I’m sorry I can’t do them any more economically (though a decent reference book is worth that anyway) but postage from the USA this time literally cost me several hundred dollars, so it’s pushed the price up a bit.
If you live in the USA, you can order from Aromatools at a much nicer cost! And often get free postage too, unlike us in Oz!
And lastly, if you are ever giving therapeutic oils as a gift, please consider telling the recipient about this book, or giving them info about the oils your giving so they to can get the most out of those oils.
If Modern Essentials is something you’d like to purchase to have on hand, let me know 🙂
