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Title: The Blossoming Heart: Aromatherapy for Healing and Transforming (Aroma Tours, 2003)

Author: Robbi Zeck, ND

Book Details: 191 pages including bibliography, appendices, glossary and index. Soft cover.

Book Review & Ritual Test by Donna Maria:

As you can probably tell from the title and the excerpt, this not your typical aromatherapy book. Robbi is a naturopath, kinesiologist, counselor and trainer who regularly leads workshops and retreats. While her book does of course contain descriptions for dozens of essential oils, it also contains Robbi's suggestions for how to use these oils to help blossom your heart. Each oil is associated with a "blossoming heart affirmation," and Robbi's questions to help you ponder your life and where you would like it to take you. The exercises are so simple that anyone can utilize them, yet they call for deep thought. For example, the blossoming heart affirmation for one of my favorite oils, grapefruit, is, "I appreciate all that I have." This affirmation coincides with grapefruit oil as one that is generally uplifting and cheerful and which Robbi says directs your thinking "toward the positive aspects of your life and the golden opportunities that are waiting in the wings."  The questions require you to contemplate the aspects of your life that are draining you, as well as the about the things you most appreciate about your life. Anyone with a drop or two of grapefruit oil can benefit from a few minutes with the oil and contemplation of the questions posed and the affirmation.

Chapters on emotional well-being (Chapter 8) and meridians and their acupuncture points suggest use of the oils to aid in emotional healing and transformation. There are suggestions to use oils to do everything from balance emotional expression to balancing the physical body. Far from a "cure-all," the book is easy to use and the application suggestions are simple so long as you read Chapter 8 and 9 (particularly the first part of Chapter 9) so you have an understanding of how to use the suggested oils to balance your heart blossom points.

My personal favorite chapter is also the shortest: Rose Meditation for a Blossoming Heart. In this chapter, Robbi provides a step-by-step journey through a meditation using rose essential oil, another of my favorites. As you might imagine, the effect is supposed to be calming and balancing. As you might also imagine (if you know me at all), I had to do it several times before I slowed down enough to actually enjoy any positive effects. For me, this is a reminder that while books and the suggestions they provide can be helpful, you still have to put forth effort to obtain the envisioned results. After trying the exercise a few times and becoming frustrated because my mind kept wondering, I told myself to stick with it and see if habitual ritual would help. Sure enough, it did, and I found myself looking forward to the ritual more and more. For the past several months, I have enjoyed the Rose Meditation several times and I have added lemon essential oil because I find rose to be rather intense and distracting on its own.

Robbi brings more than impressive credentials to this book. She also brings a heart that is committed to the power of essential oils to penetrate and change a life from the inside out. She provides examples of how she has used the oils herself and on clients. The book left me longing to spend a few hours alone with Robbi and whatever oils she would suggest for me. And if you find you are wishing for the same thing, you can register for an Aroma Tour with Robbi and her husband through their company, Aroma Tours.

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