Maggie Tisserand - Essential Oils for Lovers: How to use aromatherapy to revitalize your sex life

This book is dedicated to the lover within.

My grateful thanks go to the following people:

Sue Robinson for her support and assistance.

Jane Graham-Maw, my editor, for her patience.

Marek Urbanowitz for his advice on Oriental medicine.

Thanks, too, to the researchers into the wonders of olfaction, whose findings have been quoted in

The love of two pure lovers consists of desire and in mutual pleasing. In it nothing can be worthwhile unless their will be equal.

JAUFR RUDEL

Sex is beautiful, fulfilling and good exercise. No revelations here; the benefits of good sex have been known and written about for a long time. But what of the theory that sex can improve your health, strengthen your immune system and prevent the onset of disease? When sex is enhanced by aromatherapy, all this is also true.

This is not a book on how to get a man or how to score with women. It is a book for lovers. You can be as hedonistic as the ancient Greeks and Romans, as worshipful as the Taoist Chinese or Tantric Hindu. The recipes and descriptions in this book will help you use aromatic oils to scent and massage your body and that of your partner. You can indulge all your senses, in the privacy of the bedroom.

While writing this book I had to stop and ask myself the question, Why am I writing a book about sex in this age of AIDS? Am I exploring an issue 30 years out of date? Am I being irresponsible? A bit of reflection, however, gave me my answer. There is no reason for sex to stop being fun just because it needs to be safe. And isnt the safest sex that which takes place within a loving monogamous relationship? Monogamy need never be boring. Sex need never be boring: each of us has an innate need of pleasure and fulfilment, as well as a need to give pleasure to another. What greater or keener pleasure is there than that of sex?

Sex and aromatherapy marry together perfectly. Imagine how, hundreds and even thousands of years ago, lovers rubbed scented oils onto each others body, experiencing the fulfilment of all their senses. Their sense of smell delighted in the wonderful perfume of natural essences intermingling with the bodys own perfume; their sense of touch revelled in the feel of massaging their loved one or in being massaged by him or her; their eyes beheld the erotic sight of oil glistening on naked skin; their ears took in spoken words of pleasure and when they kissed, the fifth sense was fulfilled, for what finer taste is there than that of the lips of your lover?

I believe that good sex is life-enhancing, as is aromatherapy. Even when sexual intercourse is not involved, the physical pleasure of touching, of intimate body contact in the form of massage all this equals happiness, and happiness is a potent medicine. Joy and pleasure send the right stimuli to the body cells to keep them healthy. By using essential oils on a daily basis we create within ourselves a state of health and harmony.

You may already be a keen advocate of aromatherapy and appreciate its benefits but if this book is your introduction to essential oils, you have a treat in store. Enjoy the sensual pleasures that lie ahead. Fragrant essences not only excite the senses and lift the emotions but also work on a deeper level, to nourish and protect the cells of the body.

Aromatherapy can be used to address many health problems, enabling us, for example, to break with the antibiotic habit. In recent years the researcher Clive Wood has looked at the connection between mind, brain and the immune system. He calls this study psycho-neuro-immunology. We know, for instance, that people can truly die of a broken heart such is the power of our emotions on our physical being. Surely we must also be able to use this power to maintain a strong and healthy body.

Aromatherapy can also bring about a peaceful state of mind, which in itself can bring harmony to a relationship. Many Eastern texts, when referring to meditation, stress the importance of deep breathing. They say that the mind follows the breath. Within our polluted environment we tend to be shallow breathers. When experiencing a delightful aromatherapy massage or when soaking in a deliciously fragrant bath, we automatically take deeper breaths to savour the beauty of the scents around us.

In this book I have tried to present practical tips and recipes and alternative methods of treating sexual problems as well as offering a brief history of the erotic use of aromatics since ancient times. I have also discussed the theory that inside every woman there exist attributes of several goddesses. Aphrodite, being the goddess of love and sensuality, is the one this book is most interested in revealing. By letting go of fears and preconditioning, and using essential oils with imagination and confidence, every woman can allow this part of herself to emerge and flourish.

Sex puts a sparkle in the eye, a glow to the cheeks and makes the world seem like a better place.

MANTAK CHIA, Taoist Secrets of Love

Few of us would argue with this sentiment, yet its easy to let the pressures and problems of modern living dampen our desire, making us not in the mood, preferring the television to a night of love-making.

We have become too used to obtaining objects of desire cars, holidays, fitted kitchens merely by signing an easy credit contract. This habit of instant gratification can influence the way we view our sexual needs. We may believe what we see in films and read in the press, magazines and books: that sex any kind of sex is the answer. One-night stands, extra-marital affairs, or simply choosing partners for their sexy image are all seen as ways of fulfilling our need for intimacy. But are they really?

HOLISTIC SEX

Many of us recognize holistic medicine as a safe and effective system that takes an overview of the whole person his or her lifestyle, diet and mental outlook as well as medical and hereditary history and total symptom picture. In the same way, holistic sex brings together every aspect of sexual union: the physical, mental and emotional. The sex therapist and author Barbara de Angelis writes, The sexual act is so powerful because it is the closest we ever come to uniting with another human being. If that physical union is not balanced and matched by emotional closeness, the same act that can be so full of joy becomes one that leaves [us] feeling isolated, lonely and unfulfilled. The psychologist Erich Fromm puts it this way:

Sex [without love] becomes a desperate attempt to escape the anxiety engendered by separateness, and it results in an ever-increasing sense of separateness, since the sexual act without love never bridges the gap between two human beings, except momentarily.

Figure 1: Triangle of love.

Holistic sex is the mix of all three types of loving, so that we love and want our partners on a physical, mental and emotional level. Or, to put it another way, we lust after their body, thinking about them turns us on, and we bond with them emotionally. We love their mind, body and spirit with our mind, body and spirit:

When their bodies merge into each other, desire can turn into joy, and physical lust and its gratification can become an expression of unconditional devotion which pervades mind, body and spirit.