What is Ayurveda?

The ancient healing science of Ayurveda is one which dates back 5,000 years. Whilst Ayurveda originated in India, this widely accepted practice has now been adopted by many individuals worldwide and influenced other practices such as Homeopathy and Polarity Therapy. 

The goal of incorporating Ayurveda into your life is to achieve all round well-being, physically, mentally emotionally and spiritually. To achieve this, the practice of Ayurveda embraces all natural remedies that promote inner balance of your chakras, improves one’s physical health and emotional well-being. When answering ‘what is Ayurveda?’ there is no simple answer as this ancient healing practice has many pillars, from consuming and purposefully excluding certain foods, natural skincare that reflects your Ayurvedic body type, self care through meditation and self massage with essential oils and herbs… even spanning to something as simple incorporating an all natural haircare regimen. 

How Does Ayurveda Work?

Ayurveda works by harnessing the power of nature and utilising Earth’s natural remedies to bring about internal balance, a sense of calm and provide mental, emotional and physical well-being to our everyday lives. Whilst Ayurveda doesn’t seek to replace prescribed treatments, it can run alongside seamlessly to provide subtle yet active psychological support. 

Ayurvedic products such as shampoo do not simply seek to wash your hair, Ayurvedic body wash will not just cleanse your skin and massage oils will not just moisturise your skin. The all natural ingredients of Ayurvedic products, specifically formulated with essential oils, natural scents, herbs and botanicals will provide a complete sensory experience of calm, a moment of peace and mental reset. As you use these products, close your eyes, inhale deeply and allow the natural botanicals to be absorbed into your bloodstream, washing over you with a sense of inner peace. Adding these products to your daily rituals will give you a gentle reminder to look after your mental and physical well-being as well as harnessing Earth's most powerful natural substances. 

What are Essential Oils? 

Essential oils are natural substances that are extracted from plants and fruits through a careful distillation process to capture that plants ‘essence’. Once these potent oils are extracted they are then combined with a natural carrier oil to create an essential oil.

How do Essential Oils Work?

Essential oils work in two ways to bring about positive physical and mental change. Firstly essential oils can form a positive scent association. Have you ever had a certain perfume remind you of an amazing trip? Or perhaps the smell of a certain cake reminds you of your mum's home baking? When you get a whiff of these gorgeous smells and inhale the familiar scent molecules you are often transported to that time and the emotions you felt in that moment. This powerful scent association that our brains form can be manipulated for our own benefit. Here at Scentered we have created easy to use Aromatherapy Balms that are packed with gorgeously scented essential oils so you can use them as positive triggers to help you transition to your desired mind state throughout the day.

If you would like to learn more about scent association, you can read our blog post answering the question ‘Is it Good to Breathe in Essential Oils?’

As well as positive scent association, essential oils do actually create a physical response in the body. When we inhale essential oils through the nose or they are absorbed via the skin into the bloodstream. Your body will then respond by releasing chemicals into the body such as serotonin which calms you and endorphins which will bring about peace, happiness and tension release.

More research is now being conducted into the effect of inhaling essential oils on our limbic system and how the human brain becomes stimulated when different scents are present. This may affect the thinking process, emotional behaviours and moods.