Juniper Berry Essential Oil
As Autumn is approaching, I like to use more of my earthy and grounding essential oils.
One that comes to mind is Juniper Berry.
The Juniper tree is an Evergreen tree found in many different parts of the world, including North America, Europe and Asia; it has prickly, pine-like leaves and seed cones (known as berries) which are a bright blue colour once they have fully developed.
Juniper Berry was used as a medicinal applicator by the Native Americans. They would also burn the berries to help cleanse and purify the air. This is still a common choice today when being used for prayer and meditation to help purify the air in the room. I like to use this when practising my own meditation.
Like Tea Tree, Juniper is a natural anti-septic so is great when used topically. It can be used for skin care application as a treatment for acne or as a home-made air freshener to help kill airborne germs or cold/flu like symptoms. It can also help to reduce swelling in tired, aching muscles.
Emotionally, Juniper Berry essential oil helps to drive out negative influences and self-doubt. As many of us know, worrying and lack of confidence can result in stiff and painful joints but Juniper helps to purge us away from that fear of failure and restore determination and confidence in ourselves.
Juniper is also known for imparting the traditional pine note of gin. In fact, Juniper is such an important aspect of gin that by law, it needs to be the predominant flavour in anything seeking to be classified as gin and is the primary botanical- perhaps you can see now why Juniper gives us that confidence boost!
