A Beginner's Guide to Essential Oils - Everything You Need to Know to Start

A Beginner's Guide to Essential Oils – Everything You Need to Know to Start – Angie Cruise Blog

A Beginner’s Guide to Essential Oils – Everything You Need to Know to Start

New to essential oils and want to get started? Enjoy this beginner’s guide to essential oils (from someone who’s spent more than a decade learning)!

I’m just going to go ahead and say it. If you haven’t at least

of essential oils by now, you must be living under a rock. Maybe you haven’t tried them, or know much about them, but all it takes is 5 minutes on the internet these days to know they exist.

But, what exactly are they? How do you use them? Where should you buy them? It’s hard to get to the bottom of this online with all the conflicting info available. I thought I’d share what I know, as someone who’s been using and learning about essential oils for the better part of a decade.

I’ve shared a lot about essential oils on the blog in the past, but I thought it would be helpful to have it all in one place. Want to know how to get started? Read on for all of my top advice and resources.

What Are Essential Oils?

Essential oils are the aromatic, volatile liquids distilled from plants. Depending on the oil, it can come from the root, leaves, sap, or flowers, and bring with it whatever properties the plant offers.

Essential oils are

concentrated and take a

of plant material to make one bottle. This makes them incredibly powerful, which is why it’s so important to only use a little bit at a time, and dilute it appropriately.

The science behind essential oils is pretty extensive, and way more than I can include in one post. If you’d like to get more in depth, I recommend checking out my post called

You can also check out some further reading

Why Use Essential Oils?

Essential oils have so many uses. They might seem like the latest fad, but they’ve been used for thousands of years. It’s just that they’ve become more popular in recent years!

We use essential oils pretty regularly here. I put them in my favorite skincare DIYs, use them for immune support or respiratory support, and diffuse them to boost our mood or help my family relax in the evenings.

Once you know the basics of the oils you want to use, a whole world opens up to help you support your body naturally.

What’s my recommendation for anyone just getting started? Figure out what it is you want to use essential oils for the most, and then research the best oils for that purpose.

Where to Buy Essential Oils

I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but the world of essential oils is

polarized. Everyone thinks “their” essential oil company is the best, so it can be hard to weed through the noise and figure out where to shop.

As someone who’s spent

learning about essential oils, let me just say this.

There’s no industry regulating essential oils

. Terms like “therapeutic grade,” “certified pure therapeutic grade,” and other terms along those lines are nothing but marketing terms.

It’s true that not all essential oils are created equal.

They’ll vary a lot based on how they’re grown and harvested, whether they’re tested, and whether the company allows additives in their oils.

Over the years, I’ve tried a lot of companies. In the beginning, before I knew anything about them, I bought whatever oils were cheapest from the health food stores. Then, I learned about Young Living and was a pretty exclusive customer (and even rep) for years. Eventually, I left the company (

you can read about why I did that right here

), and now make it my mission to learn about and share many of the top brands available today.

My personal go-to brand of essential oils for most of our needs are Plant Therapy. You really can’t go wrong. They offer a quality product, with testing results available right on their product page, ship really fast, and have a great price. We really like their big line of oils that are safe for kids, too!

You can check them out here

You can also read more about other brands and check them out with these posts:

How to Buy Essential Oils

My Review of Simply Earth Essential Oils

Beginner’s Guide to Essential Oils – What Oils Do I Need??

This is probably the second most common question I get from people. (The first being, “

which brand of essential oils do you recommend?”)

So, naturally, I had to include it in my beginner’s guide to essential oils.

Of course, you can ask around on Facebook, but it never fails. You ask this question in any group and the answer is always the same.

A starter kit full of oils you don’t know how to use and an expensive diffuser you don’t know what to do with.

And truly, that works for a lot of people. But, if the idea of spending hundreds of dollars on essential oils right off the bat turns you off, just know that’s not your only option.

Personally, I always recommend figuring out what you’d actually

(like I explained above), and going from there. If you want some help coming up with ideas, here are some posts I’ve written on the topic!

6 Must-Have Essential Oils for Beginners

10 Best Essential Oils Under $10

How do I Use Essential Oils?

There are two main ways to use essential oils in your daily life.

This is the most common, especially for those newer to the practice.

When you use a diffuser,

put drops of oil on jewelry

essential oil inhalers

, you’re enjoying your oils aromatically.