Tuesday 9 July 2013

Creating a Sacred Space

I don’t honestly know how it came about. All I remember was it started with a graduation present. 


Perfect Potion was a little shop in the Elizabeth Arcade in Brisbane. Mum and I went there and she bought me essential oils as a year 12 graduation present. Ylang Ylang was one of of those oils. I had a candle oil burner. A few years later I upgraded to an electric oil vaporizer. It was ugly yellow; there wasn’t much choice back then!

No matter where I lived I always had my oils. Slowly as my interest grew so did my extensive library and my desire to try all the oils and all the combinations. I enjoyed infusing my home with the scents I created. I loved it when friends visited and they’d say ‘your house always smells so good’. When I lived in an apartment the girls upstairs used to tell me how much they enjoyed walking past my door as there was always beautiful scents wafting out.

Lucky for me as my interest grew Perfect Potion flourished. More and more stores opened, more oils were released, more blends were available, more products. Quench my scent thirst, no, it only fueled it. 

There was nothing more I enjoyed than spending an afternoon in a Perfect Potion Store.

All the while it never entered my head to pursue it any more than a hobby. 

One day the opportunity arose to stock Perfect Potion at Trevallan Lifestyle Centre. We have never looked back. It has been an amazing journey being a part of a company that seems to only take huge steps forward.

Then something strange happened - Perfect Potion ran a competition, a competition unlike any other. A competition open to all Australian and Japanese residents. The competition was to create your own essential oil blend to be sold under the Perfect Potion banner. They had never offered this before; all the blends sold by Perfect Potion are Perfect Potion’s creations. 

Wow.

But I couldn’t create a blend. What do I know? Perfect Potion even ran some classes on the art of blending to help. I couldn’t attend them. I even convinced myself it would be pointless entering. Then I got excited and started playing around with some of my oils. I then got completely disheartened as time and time again my combinations made me gag!

See the competition wasn’t just about choosing some essential oils. You had to work out the perfect combination of oils and then how much of each oil. Plus the scent you were trying to create was to embody your scared space.

Hang on I live in a small house with kids, animals – what scared space? 

My books! It always comes back to books. Books are my scared space. Books are my escape. At the time of the competition my little library was being built. So now I had a sacred space but no scent. I gave up. 

Then a few days before close of competition inspiration struck. I got it. The oils just worked, the combination, the amounts. It worked. But I still hesitated. It was late that night I finally got enough guts to enter. And swoosh like that the email was sent, the competition closed and I promptly forgot all about it.

You see I had a baby on the way. Number three to be exact. The day the winners of Perfect Potion’s competition was announced I was a little busy. I was in labour.

When I finally got my head out of the clouds I read an email “Firstly, a massive CONGRATULATIONS for being the winner of the Create Your Own Sacred Space Blend Competition”.

I thought “what’s going on. Who won the competition? They aren’t telling me the names”. I thought it was a generic email sent to everyone who entered informing them of the winner. 

Silly me. 

Tears may have flowed when it set in.

Something I loved, something that is so important and a part of me just became real. 

The day that I received that little bottle adeptly named ‘Wisdom’, my heart skipped a beat. Just thinking about it now makes me well up with tears. 

It wasn’t just that I won it was the recognition I also got from the creator of Perfect Potion Sal Battaglia. A man who I admire for all that he and his team have achieved over the years. 

Sal wrote ‘Choosing the sacred space blend has been so difficult for me as there were so many wonderful ideas and beautiful blends…. I was so impressed with the depth and complexity of the blend. It is such a simple formula…..I absolutely loved the blend …’ 

I was and still am on top of the world about this.

Sometimes when I’m having a bad day I just go to the Perfect Potion website and read the Wisdom Blend synopsis ‘Created by Chelsea Van Rijn from Australia, this blend represents her library which is a sacred place of learning, a place to gather thoughts, to be inspired and become wise.’

I read it and think I did that. 

When we have it in the vaporiser at Trevallan and customers comment on how beautiful it smells I love seeing their faces when I tell them it’s a blend I created. I’m sure some of them don’t believe me and think I’m a looney!

I will be eternally grateful to Sal and the Perfect Potion Team for giving me this opportunity. 

I am so lucky to have one of my secret dreams realised and to be able to share it with others.

But what’s in my lucky potion?

Check out Lucky Potion

Lucky Potion

My winning essential oil blend ‘Wisdom’ is a combination of my four favourite essential oils – Ylang Ylang, vetiver, fragonia and patchouli.


Perfect Potion describes the blend as ‘The deep musty and exotic aromas of vetiver and patchouli together with the intoxicating and arousing aroma of ylang ylang and fresh, vibrant scent of fragonia create a truly mystical and sacred space.’

But why these oils? What do they mean?

Ylang Ylang is my all-time favourite oil. It has a sweet floral scent. To me it embodies all that is passionate, sensuous and uplifting. Whenever I wear it I feel confident and almost bewitching. It is believed to be useful in creating feelings of peace and dispelling anger. It is a scent that embodies all that is good about femininity.

Fragonia was an oil that was very new to me but I instantly fell in love with it. It’s an Australian native essential oil obtained from Agonis fragrans. I feel Fragonia has an ability to work at a deep level, releasing both physical and emotional blockages. It’s very soothing and calming oil. I have found it sometimes referred to as the magic oil as it seems to work on whatever level that is needed to help the body, mind, or spirit find balance.

Vetiver, it smells like the earth. Most people are put off by it. I love it. I guess that’s why I love my job. I feel just like the earth there are layers to it. Coincidently vetiver is very useful for grounding and centering a person and opening them up to their core wisdom.

Patchouli is described as soothing, calming and somewhat hypnotizing scent. It always makes me feel like I’ve escaped to the orient when I smell it. Patchouli oil has a grounding and balancing effect on the emotions and banishes lethargy, while sharpening the wits, fighting depression and anxiety.

This is all my own interpretations of the oils and their meanings I am no way a qualified aromatherapist.

With these four oils I was trying to create a scared space for everyone. A place we could escape to to find ourselves. A place where we are free to be us.

When I vaporise ‘Wisdom’ at home it fills my house with such a warm comforting scent. I feel at peace and safe in my own surrounds. I love it when I put it on in the mornings and then I go out. I can smell it as I get to the front door and know I’m home. My shoulders drop and I feel relaxed.

Just recently ‘Optimum Health’, a natural therapies clinic in Ipswich has asked to use it for their meditation classes they are starting soon.

I truly feel this blend will ‘create a truly mystical and sacred space’ for you.




 
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