subject: Protect Your Skin From Oxidation And Inflammation With This Great Home Made Formula [print this page] Essential oils are found as ingredients in many of the world's top skin care preparations. You'll see them listed on labels as "botanical extracts" -- somehow that's a little fancier -- but essential oils are in there. Why? because their therapeutic activities are just what your skin needs, and the oils are readily absorbed by the skin cells themselves. Yet these high end formulas can be costly. So why not make your own anti-aging skin care blend? It's truly easy to do, and you can choose the finest ingredients and still have an amazing product at a fraction of the cost.
We all know that overexposure to UV radiation may be the number one factor in causing premature aging of the skin. Then there's exposure to environmental pollutants, smoking, and perhaps lesser known is the overindulgence in sugary foods. Interestingly, all these factors -- except perhaps the eating of too many Twinkies -- result in cellular aging from two effects: damage due to inflammation and damage due to production of, and exposure to, oxidative radicals. Without going to far into the biology, both these processes lead to the skin being slowly torn apart on a molecular level.
What happens when UV radiation strikes our skin is that oxidative radicals are formed, which begin to damage our skin until they're "quenched". Essential oils are known to be some of the strongest natural antioxidants on the planet. Sea buckthorn oil was examined as a potential agent for Russian astronauts to protect their skin from UV exposure. Myrrh essential oil has one of the highest ORAC values known of any natural substance, and has long been a component of blends for mature skin.
At the same time oxidative radicals are formed, inflammatory processes are set underway. Inflammation is our body's way of dealing with injury, and can be temporarily healthy. But in the long run, chronic inflammation has been indicated as one of the major contributors to aging. Thankfully, there are some essential oils that are highly potent anti-inflammatory agents. Sea buckthorn, again, is among the best, along with German chamomile, lavender, frankincense and myrrh.
And it's not just the essential oils that have anti-aging therapeutic effects. The carrier oils in which the essential oils will be based contain antioxidants (argon oil is rich in vitamin E, for example) -- and omega-3 essential fatty acids in hempseed and evening primrose are highly regarded for their anti-inflammatory properties. Because the essential oils and carrier oils offer these actions while having completely different molecular structures, the actions will synergize -- work together with multiplied effects.
Now that we've got a little background, how do we go about creating our blends? First, gather all your tools and containers. The blends are best mixed and stored in cobalt blue or amber glass bottles, and if the bottles have a dropper top or pump top, it'll make it easier to dispense the blend when your done. Also, you'll want to know the volume of your bottle(s) in ounces, as you'll use them for measuring.
The recipe will be for one single fluid ounce of final blend -- if you'd like to make more, simply multiply the number of drops of essential oil by the number of ounces you'll be making. Blending itself is easy: just fill your bottles up with the indicated amount of carrier oils, filling them about nine-tenths of the way full. Then measure the essential oils in by counting the drops.
Your carrier oil base will be made of one-third each virgin coconut (you'll need to warm this for it to become liquid -- it will stay liquid once blended with other oils), evening primrose OR hempseed, and argan OR rosehip seed. We've included a couple choices here: both evening primrose and hempseed are high in essential fatty acids that are very nutritive to your skin. Both argan and rosehip seed have been documented to actually reverse the signs of aging in the skin. Whichever you choose, fill your bottle up about 9/10ths of the way with your combination of carrier oils.
Then add the following essential oils: Seven drops each of lavender, myrrh, German chamomile and twenty-four drops of sea buckthorn (be sure to find the essential oil or "CO2", not the cold-pressed oil). Gently mix the oils so that the color appears uniform (it's better not to shake or mix vigorously, as the oils don't do so well being oxygenated this way). And there you have it -- what seems like a simple blend is actually a truly fine, therapeutic quality creation. Use it regularly and you'll probably notice a healthy difference in your skin fairly quickly, and with long term use, you'll be doing your skin a wonderful favor by protecting it from the most troublesome factors of aging.
