Nature’s Natural Immune Booster: 5 Best Essential Oils for Diffusing Forest Bathing Health Effects
Take a walk in the woods. How does it feel? The scent, energy, and spiritual aura of the forest is profoundly healing to the body and emotions.
Laying in a field of grass and wildflowers, a stroll by a rose bush or gathering a deep breath through a eucalyptus grove, all can produce a positive shift in attitudes and vitality. Nature heals. When the opportunity to be in nature is missing, bring nature home by diffusing the essential oils from the forest, from the fields or from the garden. The 5 best essential oils for diffusing nature in your home are cedarwood, rose, rosemary, spruce, and vetiver. Well, all oils are the best, these 5 are a good representation of the variety of scents that permeate the landscape, though it doesn’t even begin to express all the world’s scent environments.
PHYTONCIDES
A logic that supports the health benefits of essential oils comes from the understanding that humans evolved in an atmosphere saturated in volatile compounds from plants. The scientific name for these volatile compounds that permeate the atmosphere is phytoncides. Once distilled and bottled, these same compounds are called essential oils. When passing by a fragrant garden, flowering fields, or dense forest woods, the aroma of the plants that fill these areas become part of the sensory experience. The animal kingdom evolved surrounded and submerged in this fragrant saturated atmosphere. This would reasonably assume a genetic connection generating an instinctive and physiological communication between the animal, including humans, and the phytoncide-rich atmosphere. Viewed with some knowledge of the plants’ purpose for generating these aromatic molecules, and from a perspective of interconnection, there appears to be cooperation within nature to assist in mutual evolution and survival (Sharifi-Rad, Javad et al., 2017).
THE HUMAN DESIGN
Putting this in perspective, it would make sense that humans are designed to respond to and communicate with the volatile evaporated lipid (oil) compounds in its environment. The most obvious communicating apparatus would be the sense of smell. The body is also layered with skin surface receptors and neurotransmitters, which include the endocannabinoid system (Kendall, Alexandra, et al., 2015) and olfactory receptors (Denda, Mitsuhiro, et al., 2014). The volatile molecules in the air interact with these skin receptors signaling response in the area of the neurotransmitter as well as throughout the entire physical and emotional system. Think about this. We are wired to communicate and respond to an environment of lipid-based volatile compounds from nature.
The human body evoloved in a phytoncide saturated environment
INHALATION OF ESSENTIAL OILS
The superiority for use of essential oils through inhalation can get lost in a drug-like mindset that the new oil distributors have been promoting. This oil for that condition or even the phrase “there’s an oil for that” diminishes the logic of how essential oils are best used or understood as therapeutic agents. There’s a holistic rational that is incorporated when awareness is given to essential oils as phytoncides and used with an understanding of how humans are apparently designed to respond to the evaporated compounds. The aromatherapy culture already acknowledges a synergistic physical and emotional response when engaged with an essential oil diffused atmosphere (Peng, Shu-Ming, et al., 2009). Even so, this can often have limitations to the true potential of diffused oils.
Inhalation does not dismiss the ability of essential oil compounds to penetrate into the bloodstream or that there may really be “an oil for that.” Neither does it relegate the physical essential oil compound absorption to lesser importance than the pharmaceutical drug-culture process would expect. The logic of evolutionary design of the human body developed in a phytoncide saturated environment suggests a more encompassing complex interaction, and healing, from the inhalation of essential oils. All the interacting systems of the body; molecular penetration, olfactory and limbic system, surface receptors, and energetic-type characteristics; respond to the inhalation of essential oils with physiologic and neurotransmitter activity.
There really isn’t an application of essential oils that evades inhalation. If there is olfactory detection, then the molecules are interacting with all the systems mentioned. Though the amount of receptor binding, dosage requirement, or penetration may not be at a desired therapeutic amount for specific conditions. Even so, it can be assumed any amount of airborne communication would have some shift in the body’s physical environment.
SHINRIN-YOKU
In Japan, the practice of shinrin-yoku (translated to English as forest bathing) was developed to relieve stress, anxiety, and tension resulting from an urban and industrial lifestyle. The trip to the forest involves naturally breathing in volatile phytoncides. The concept is based on the idea that human “genes are adapted to nature, and they have not changed over the two or three centuries since the industrial revolution. Because we have bodies that are adapted to nature, living in modern society places us in a condition of stress” says Miyazaki Yoshifumi, a researcher and author specializing in shinrin-yoku (Miyazaki Yoshifumi, 2018).
Hinoki (Chamaecyparis obtuse) are beautifully fragrant Japanese forest trees
with spiritual association.
Immune efficiency is among the many healing effects of forest bathing. In a 2010 study of forest bathing, results showed an increase in Natural Killer (NK) cell activity, which was mediated by increases in the number of NK cells and the levels of intracellular anti-cancer proteins. The increased NK activity may also be due to a reduction of stress hormones when in an atmosphere of phytoncides and forest bathing (Li, Qing, 2010). A study with 12 urban children brought to the forest environment showed a reduction in asthma and atopic dermatitis, concluding that “short-term exposure to forest environment may have clinical and immunological effects” (Seo, Sung, et al. 2015).
BRINGING THE FOREST, OR NATURE, HOME
The phytoncides, as mentioned, are the compounds found in essential oils. The volatile mixture in a forest atmosphere would include α-humulene, β- caryophyllene, α-pinene, β-pinene, 1,8-cineole, and d-limonene, which are emitted by the variety of trees typical to the forest. These compounds are very common in a large assortment of essential oils, especially those derived from the forest trees and plants.
When a forest trip isn’t available, bring the forest home by diffusing one, or a blend, of essential oils. Japanese cedar (Cryptomeria japonica), hiba wood (Thujopsis dolabrata), and hinoki (Chamaecyparis obtuse) are beautifully fragrant Japanese forest trees with a spiritual association. Diffusing these essential oils would mimic the atmosphere, and the physical and emotional benefits, of forest bathing in Japan.
The emotional impact of aromatics used in environmental fragrancing has been well researched. Essential oils in context with forest bathing diffused in an office environment were shown to relieve stress, elevate work performance, and support immunity (Matsubara, Eri, et al. 2017). Another study with results similar to the emotional benefits of a trip to the forest was shown when the essential oils of Japanese cedar and hinoki wood were inhaled in a controlled environment (Ikei, Harumi, et al. 2015).
Bringing nature home may be fine-tuned to include tropical with ylang ylang and jasmine.
CREATE YOUR DESIRED NATURAL ENVIRONMENT
Inhalation of essential oils is already recommended for emotional harmony, immunity, and specific health conditions. The suggestion here is to enhance the healing objective by combining the oils to specifically recall, or imitate, a natural environment. If a forest environment is an enjoyable escape or provides meditative relief, then this would be an at-home environment to create. It could also be a method of bringing one back to their childhood home environment. Along with, or as an alternative to, the mentioned Japanese forest oils, a selection of forest oils could include pine (Pinus sylvestris), black spruce (Picea mariana), Atlas or Virginia cedarwood, western red cedar (Thuja plicata), cypress (Cupressus sempervirens), juniper (Juniperus communis) or larch (Larix europaea).
There’s more to nature than the forest. Your specific memory or desired location may be one of the many geographic settings throughout the world. Bringing nature home may be fine-tuned to include tropical with ylang ylang and jasmine, a rose garden, or wild herbs of rosemary, oregano, and thyme. Though not all of these oils have been studied as immunomodulant, the impact of a naturally fragrant home environment would likely have comparable results.
REFERENCES
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“Miyazaki Yoshifumi Explores the Healing Power of the Forest.” www.nippon.com, April 20, 2018
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