As our selection of ritual oils expands, we’ve had some questions about how to connect with them and use them for spiritual, ritual, and ceremonial practice. We’re happy to give some ideas and techniques here, and we invite you to comment below if there is more information you’d like to see covered.
First, the practical aspects. Our Ritual Oils come in glass bottles with a rollerball top, so they are easy to apply- just roll the top around where you want some of the oil until a thin shine of it is visible.
Be sure you’re not applying it to broken or damaged skin, or to sensitive mucous membranes. Our oils are infused, with no concentrated essential oils, so they are much gentler and less irritating than other products out there, but they still need to be used with care.
Now that you know how to use them, what about where? The classic place for scents are the so-called “pulse points” on the wrists, backs of the knees, and behind the ears. These are areas where the skin is thinner and the blood vessels are close to the surface, so anything applied in these spots will absorb easily and dissipate through the body well.
Since our oils are oil-based, what is extracted from the plants we use is their oil-soluble, or lipophilic, constituents. These types of subtances are especially good at affecting the mind, since the brain is a fatty tissue and naturally draws in the fats that circulate in the bloodstream, to use as its fuel. This is an important part of how, on a chemical level, scent molecules alter our moods, thinking, awareness, and cognition.
I find the pulse points to be good application spots for our Oils when I am working with them as a companion to my day, allowing them to suffuse my awareness as part of my routine, rather than in a specific ritual or practice. So if I am feeling scattered and need to focus on a task, I might work with our Frankincense+Myrrh combination to sharpen and collect my thoughts, but if I’m having a tired or lackluster day, our White Copal is a great ally to lift my spirits.
The wrist points are also a good starting place for any application, since it is easy to sniff the oil from there throughout whatever working you are doing. After that, you can think about more targeted application spots.
If you’re working with a specific planetary energy, applying Ritual Oils to the corresponding Chakra can be a powerful way to direct their effects as they enter your system. And, even if your ritual is not specifically dedicated to a planet’s archetype, you may be working on something that is ruled by one planet and in that way, also connected to a Chakra. For example, even if you’re not invoking the Moon, if you’re working with dreaming or astral travel, applying our Black Copal to your Third Eye connects to the Lunar energy that rules those influences. In the same way, our Frankincense applied to the Solar Plexus Chakra can intensify the energies of confidence, charisma, and radiance.
For practices with an active energy circulation component, such as Qi Gong or the Microcosmic Orbit, oiling the palms of the hands can help with the transmission of Qi through them and into the circuit of the body. This application is also great for energy healing such as Reiki, where the hands are passed over the person being healed, directing energy towards them.
Another way to integrate our Ritual Oils into your other practices through the hands is to incorporate them into charging of talismans, sigils, prayers, or any other physical object you are directing towards a spiritual goal. After the object is created and ready for energizing, apply some of the oil to the palm of your active hand. Then, ideally with planetary timings, lay that hand on the object with whatever focusing practice you normally use for your work. Some of the oil will transfer to your object, warmed by your hand and directed by your Will, creating a bridge between your intent and its manifestation.
This technique makes use of two aspects of the skin, whether on the hands, or elsewhere. Firstly, the skin is our largest organ, and our most flexible, and anything applied there is taken in to our entire system by the lipid-friendly membranes of the skin’s structure.
Secondly, on a more esoteric level, the skin is a liminal space between inside and outside, connected to and connecting both spheres. Ritual tools like incense are primarily outside influences, while Spagyrics affect the interior of the self, but the skin mediates between these two worlds, and anything applied to it overlaps into both influences. When anointed ritually with this awareness, the skin becomes the temple where evocation and invocation come together- where energies are called in as external forces and intelligences, but also embodied into the being of the practitioner to integrate with them.
With that in mind, almost any application site can work in this way, and when directed with care and connection to the larger context of the Archetypes, along with focus and reflection on the intent of the working, a powerful sphere of influence can be created for your practice.
