Anointed with Oil (eBook)

Description

Learn to immerse yourself in the bountiful aromas of life, and also discover one of man’s oldest healing techniques. This 81 page book is packed with easily readable and enjoyable information about the history, nature, and miraculous power of scent to transform our daily life and our moments of inspiration. If you have ever wondered why you are transformed by a walk in the woods or a fragrant garden, if you are curious about the powerful connection between emotion and scent, then you will find many of your answers in this book.

To anoint with oil is one of man’s oldest healing techniques, and one of the most beautiful gestures of blessing and gifting. Discover a Therapy of Wholeness that engages your most primal sense with your highest guidance for optimal happiness and well-being.

Learn to immerse yourself in the bountiful aromas of life, and also discover both ancient and modern blends of Sacred Oil that inspire and lift you up to higher levels of consciousness and energy where unhappiness and disease cannot easily enter. This is the perfect companion and information guide for those of you who already know and use our essential oils. It is the perfect gift for introducing another person to the experience of scent as a path to wholeness.

The following is an excerpt from the book ~

Scent defies the ordinary mind. Though it is one of our five major senses, supplying our brains with a steady stream of environmental information. Scent is not a feature of the intellect. It is a powerful experiential force, created to be that way for our very survival. We have good reason also to believe that it may facilitate our survival on more than the physical level.

Fragrance and our sense of smell hold a unique place within our consciousness. Smell is our oldest, most primitive sense, in that it is directly received into the primal part of our brain, which directly triggers the autonomic nervous system. This is so that smell can stimulate an immediate survival response without first engaging our cognitive faculty, which might be too slow or incorrect. Of all our senses, smell is the most intimately associated with our emotions and feelings, and therefore is indelibly part of our five major senses, supplying our brains with a steady stream of environmental information. Scent is not a feature of the intellect. It is a powerful experiential force, created to be that way for our very survival. We have good reason also to believe that it may facilitate our survival on more than the physical entwined with our entire emotional response system and history. In many therapeutic healing sessions, practitioners have reported the patient to remember a smell associated with the trauma being addressed, and upon full recognition of the scent, the injury was gone. At the same time, smell is the one sense most reported and associated with miracles or the attainment of higher consciousness. Many who have experienced a miraculous healing have reported a beautiful fragrance, even though no external cause was present.

Through aroma, we may have a valuable key that unlocks the door to all levels of consciousness, even the hidden ones that hold our forgotten trauma and the higher ones that remind us of the sunlit palaces of Paradise. Aroma presents a golden thread that weaves its way through our physical body, while engaging a larger emotional matrix that connects, supports, and directs our physical behavior even beyond that into a larger metaphysical body which serves as a direct link between body and soul. Scent has revealed to me that our body is gradiently linked to our soul, much as material objects represent gradient degrees of compressed or condensed light, ever progressing from the infinite into form…and back again to the infinite. In this, I am assured that our body is just the visible portion of our soul and not a separate entity seeking (or avoiding) a spiritual life.

It was within such a state of connection between the infinite and the finite, that I first realized the powerful connection that aroma can provide for uniting the higher dimensions of our being with the physical one on which we all too often fix our attention. There is a holistic nature to scent, whether it is the fragrance of a country garden or the most complex blend of essential oil. Because scent is not refracted by the lens of mental structure, it leads us to an immersed union with experiential moments, and invites us to be anointed by the very essence of our moment in time. Perhaps there is an even greater wholeness to which our sense of smell is attuned…the wholeness of life itself.

Surely, we all have strolled into the woods, meadows, or a back yard garden at some time to become awash with nature’s perfume. It could have been the captivating fragrance of Jasmine or honeysuckle that lured us to follow its path, the fresh smell of grass that gladdened our hearts, or the refreshing aroma of pine, spruce, or juniper that caused us to relax and linger. We are anointed by spirit and life whenever we immerse ourselves in the natural world. In such moments, we are included in nature’s vital network of communication, and we are made more whole and more united with all of life. These marvelous refreshing experiences are facilitated by plants as they broadcast their living essential oils. It is their way of communicating among themselves and all the other species of life.

The environment in which man emerged was not only lush but also richly aromatic. Many ancient records give account of man’s love of scent. Since the dawn of recorded history, fragrant smoke and other scents have been used in daily rituals and religious ceremonies as a devotion to the all-pervasive Power of life and creation. Fragrance has been referred to as the presence of God on earth, a delicate and precious emanation revealing the connection between spirit and matter. The Bible, from its earliest chapters to the end, is full of references to herbs, fruits, plants, and seeds provided for our sustenance. “And on the banks, on both sides of the river, there will grow all kinds of trees for food. Their leaves will not wither nor their fruit fail, but they will bear fresh fruit every month, because the water for them flows from the sanctuary. Their fruit will be for food, and their leaves for healing.” (Eze 47:12) Then in conclusion, we find in Revelations 22:2, the following vision. “…through the middle of the street of the city; also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.”

Plants are critically important to life on earth. They are the foundation on which all life stands. The botanical kingdom is a vast chemical factory, which interfaces between light and dark, sun and earth, drawing energy from each and synthesizing it into molecules of carbohydrates, proteins, and fats necessary to all other forms of organic life. Plants provide the “crude fuels” which all animals and humans break down to produce ATP (adenosine triphosphate), our high-grade fuel. More than that, these ‘factories’ of life shape and sustain an environment capable of sustaining all organic life on earth.

Within plants there are essential oils, which are the high-grade fuel making this miracle possible. When we bring their pure essence into our lives, we too acquire the ultimate goodness plants have to offer…which, in many ways, is the fountain of life. I believe this was the understanding that the ancient High Priests and perfumers celebrated as they took great care to extract and prepare oils worthy of anointing in the name of Spirit. They called their art ‘alchemy’, and what alchemists had to say about themselves and their beliefs reveals much about the results to which they were so devoted. For an alchemist, every particle of creation had three parts—a body, soul, and spirit. Their chemical art involved dissolving the physical essence with which they were working and then allow the soul and spirit to purify itself and re-condense into quintessence of the rarest form. With regard to essential oils, they would distill over and over again until the final products were highly potent medicines.

The value of essential oil to the constitution of plants (and by extension to us) is not merely for the aroma it provides. There is a vital force encoded within these ‘essences’, which insures the plant will be protected, healed, restored when damaged, and propagated when conditions allow. One of their main functions in the plant is to heal all wounds and defeat invasion. They are also the world’s most powerful anti-oxidants. From the beginning, at the very foundation of life, was the means to safeguard life and assure its continuance and expansion. This protection, which is extended to all the rest of life, is perhaps the most extraordinary contribution of plants. So amazing is it that it touches every level of our existence.

There is a circle of life that is ever widening. This applies not to a species, but also within a single member of a species, and even within a single cell. Every life entity has a beginning. It grows, protects itself, and replicates itself. When this circle is unbroken there is a state of integrity we call ‘wholeness’. In a state of wholeness, life can continue, grow, and evolve. Ultimately, wholeness is the secret to health, and interestingly, smell is the signatory quality that informs all of nature instinctively about the health of its members and the wholeness that supports them.

A joyful, knowledgeable, and skillful use of aroma can provide one of the most important of all healing tools. This is partly because of the constituents in plant essences, and also partly because we are hard-wired to respond through our sense of smell to seek the essences that will assist us in our needs for wholeness. This is true, whether it happens to be nutrition, healing, or emotional reparation. The right smell can effectively lead us to what we need, or stimulate a state of wholeness where disease and unhappiness cannot easily enter.

Aromas can have a powerful effect on all levels of your being: body, mind, emotions, and spirit. A vital, living fragrance can directly affect everything about you, from how you feel, to your motivation for living, to your actual lifespan.

Of all five senses, our sense of smell is the only one directly linked to the limbic lobe of the brain, the emotional control center. Anxiety, depression, fear, anger, and joy all emanate from this region. The scent of a special fragrance can evoke memories and emotions before we are even consciously aware of it. Where smells are concerned, we react first and think later. All other senses (touch, taste, hearing, and sight) are routed through the thalamus, which acts as the switchboard for the brain, passing stimuli onto the cerebral cortex (the conscious thought center) and other parts of the brain. Therefore, all our other senses are to some degree ‘filtered’ by the various conditions of ‘conscious allowance’.

In considering the wholeness of scent, I am reminded of St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians (4:18), in which he remarks, “I am amply supplied, having received of Epaphroditus the gifts you sent. They were a fragrant offering, well pleasing to God.” Most likely the use of the word ‘fragrant’ was a metaphor referring to the endearment they contained rather than some aromatic oil. His statement is a potent reminder that spiritually we are just as attuned to our senses as we are physically.

In my experience, there are a number of vital similarities between the way we are nurtured, guided, and protected by our basic physical needs and our highest spiritual nature. Both are instinctive and empathic. Both serve without reservation or condition. This is quite unlike our normal cognitive functions and behavioral patterns, which are conditioned, encumbered, often focused on fragmented parts of our life (especially the parts under challenge), and frequently resistive to change.

By creating positive associations between our favorite scents, which directly affect us physically, and a corresponding spiritual (or higher mental) state, we can create a bridge that passes over the troubled water of many life challenges. While there are challenges that must be met immediately and head-on, most of our troubling situations are just murky waters created by causes beyond our control or by others with whom we have confused our feelings. In those cases, we can turn our attention toward self nurturing. We can re-establish our wholeness while the outer situations are working out their tangles and revealing a clearer picture of what further can be done.

This is a type of wholeness therapy in which we are eliciting the soul’s greater knowing and sensitivity. Then we engage it with the innocent, base-level knowing of the body, which is hard-wired to seek protection and healing in the most effective way. In our ancient history, smell was the body’s highest survival sense. It was so vital that it is the only one of our five ordinary senses having a direct connection to the autonomic nervous system, without any conscious filters or permissions. By connecting our highest faculty (the heart and soul) with smell, our most primal initiatory sense for well being, we are by-passing all the sludge and confusion in between, which could misdirect us or pin us down. The principle is that by moving us up to the soul’s radiance, under the authority of love, we will reconstruct our wholeness in the gentlest, most beautiful and effortless way through our body’s inner knowledge.

To do this, we first attend to the physical and emotional needs of our bodies, whether that would be to provide rest, therapy, play, or more desirable work. Use good sense to move conflicts aside. Then use good scents to fully engage your body in what you are doing! That would include everything from a summer peach exploding with aroma while the sweet nectar cools your throat, to more frequent enjoyment of natural fresh air, to the selection of essential oils that uplift and enrich your spirit, to anointing with a special oil blend in a moment of greater reverence. All of these wonderful aromas wake up the autonomic nervous system and create signals of well-being on a deep cellular level that cannot be screened out by the cognitive mind or overwhelmed by environmental turbulence. While doing this, turn your attention to the aspirations of your soul. These could be plentiful and unique for each person. Wonderful changes can occur (and remain) as to seem miraculous.

Our soul’s aspirations are always guiding us toward fulfillment or moving us around the roadblocks to it. Usually, though, we are so focused on the affairs of the world that we do not see this higher work, or utilize its great benefits. By acknowledging our spiritual aspirations, and specifically putting our attention on them, we bring them into all levels of conscious living and even our unconsciousness patterns. The process of awakening is an ever-widening circle, and wherever you are in the circle is a wonderful place to be. Sometimes it can be temporarily challenging as you move through a bit of resistance or old limiting beliefs, but it is always relieved by the brighter view on the summit of that experience.

It is very healing to create a direct association between an aspiration of the soul and an aroma you are moved by emotionally. In doing this you have performed your first practical application of anointing. There may be different occasions or anointing, but there is only one universal reason for it. That is to establish an unimpeachable connection between body and soul that your senses can recognize. This is true, whether one is using a blend of oil steeped in sacred tradition or one that is the fruit of modern inspiration. When this vital connection happens it is always sacred, even if the application was a casual one. The sacred connection is more important than which fragrance or oil blend are used. The Scents of Life formulas were designed to coordinate profoundly and universally with the aspirations of the soul.