Aroma therapy

The word aromatherapy means "treatment using scents'. It is the art and science of healing and therapy through the use of plant extracts, known as essential oil, to promote balance in the mind and body. Essential oil like aromatherapy essential oil are aromatic essences extracted from plants, flowers, trees, fruit, bark, grasses and seeds.

Aroma can incite your sensory organs

Your sensory organ for smelling something is most powerful. A single whiff of an aroma can evoke feelings and memories long forgotten. When you inhale a fragrance, the smell itself bypasses your "thinking brain" and goes directly to the limbic system, the part of the brain that controls certain impulses. For instance, smelling lavender increases alpha wave frequency in the back of the head and this state is associated with relaxation. Due to these reasons, aroma are valuable for the purpose of mood alteration.

Historical evidences of Aromatherapy
Aromatherapy has been around for a very long time. It is one of the oldest forms of health and beauty care. 

The oldest use of aromatic oils is known to be as old as 6,000 years back when Egyptian physician, Imhotep, the then God of medicine and healing, recommended fragrant oils for bathing and massaging.

• In 4,500 B.C. Egyptians used Myrrh and Cedar wood oils for embalming their dead and 6,500 years later they preserved mummies.
• Romans utilized essential oils for pleasure and to cure pain and also for their popular perfumed baths and massages.
• Emperor Nero being indulgent in orgies, feasts and fragrances employed rose frequently to cure his headaches, indigestion and to maintain his high spirits while enjoying amusements.
• During the great plague in London in 1665, people burnt bundles of Lavender, Cedar wood and Cypress in the streets. This was their only defence to combat infectious diseases.
• Aromatherapy received a wider acceptance in the early twentieth century. In 1930s Rene- Maurice-Gatte Fosse, a french Chemist, dipped his burnt hand in Lavender oil. To his surprise the wound healed very quickly without any infection or scarring. He did considerable research on various oils and their therapeutic and psycho-therapeutic properties.
• Dr. Jean Volnet, French army surgeon extensively used essential oils in World War II. It was Madame Morquerite Murry who gave the holistic approach to aromatic oils by experimenting with them for individual problems.

Essential oils, like spiritual healing (Reiki, Pranic, Magnified), homeopathic, herbal and flower remedies, have a life force that vibrates within the body and the benefit exerted is too subtle to evaluate.