AFFINITY FOR: muscles, central nervous system, skin, central vessel meridian, bladder meridian, throat chakra
RESONANCE: emotional, physical
PLANT FAMILY:Lauraceae
PART UTILIZED: wood
EXTRACTION METHOD: steam distilled
AROMATIC CONSIDERATIONS: The gentle aroma of rosewood creates a peaceful atmosphere.
APPLICATION: Rosewood can be worn as perfume, diffused, or applied to the feet or anywhere on the body.
EMOTIONAL / SPIRITUAL / MENTAL ASPECTS: Rosewood’s action on the central nervous system can help us balance our emotions, maintaining evenness of mood instead of wide fluctuations from moment to moment. Rosewood is an excellent choice for grief of all kinds. It helps us notice and respond to the loving strength of those around us until we are able to respond again with love of our own. Rosewood helps us move past the grief, and sometimes the anger, of our losses and find the good memories and the love that we once felt.
Because rosewood’s action lies in the realm of the throat chakra, it can have an effect on our ability to speak up and speak about things close to our hearts. Sometimes communication is about the things that we don’t say. Rosewood can help us find a balance between speaking up and holding our tongue.
PHYSICAL ASPECTS: The actions of rosewood are predominantly on the skin and the nerves, but like all essential oils, rosewood is antiseptic. Rosewood is useful for skin rashes, irritations, dermatitis, scars, and skin that has become dry and inflamed. It brings balance to the secretions of the sebaceous glands, improves elasticity, and enhances the skin’s ability to act as a barrier to infectious invasion. Rosewood, or essential oil blends containing it, are often used as massage oils for the prevention of stretch marks.
Rosewood is a very good oil for headaches that cause nausea, especially when the headaches are linked to nervousness and tension in the muscles of the neck and back.
GENERAL INFORMATION: Rosewood will probably become increasingly more difficult to find and more expensive as over-harvesting has caused changes in the laws of some countries. Howood is being tried throughout the world as a substitute for rosewood.
CAUTIONS: I do not recommend the internal consumption of essential oils, but a special warning needs to be issued about rosewood. Even among authorities that do recommend internal consumption, rosewood is contra-indicated. In fact, it is considered extremely dangerous. DO NOT take rosewood essential oil internally.
There are no other known cautions for rosewood essential oil.