One very simple, convenient, and health supportive way to bring ourselves into balance amid the challenges of the holiday season and descent into winter is to incorporate essential oils— and in particular, diffusing essential oils, into your home.

Essential oils are composed of some of the finest medicinal molecules you could get your hands on. Distilled, extracted, or cold pressed from plants, flowers, herbs, and trees, these powerhouse oils can be diffused and inhaled aromatically, used topically on the skin, or in some cases ingested for mental, emotional, and immune support.

For starters, let’s just explore why diffusing is often a much more health promoting choice than burning those department store candles. As a former candle junkie, I get it; they are exotic, expensive, and can be hard to resist, but if we are trying to maintain a conscious relationship with the environment and our bodies, we know better! Candles can be full of harmful chemicals and artificial ingredients that have no place in the home. Why? The chemicals included in the composition of the synthetic fragrance in scented candles don’t have to be revealed. Fragrance secrecy is legal due to a convenient loophole in the Federal Fair Packaging and Labeling Act of 1973, which exempts companies from listing their proprietary fragrance ingredients and, functioning to keep the public in the dark. When you turn over a label and see fragrance, what you can almost guarantee that includes is: neurotoxins, carcinogens, endocrine disruptors, DNA mutagens, allergens, hepatoxins and reproductive toxins all hidden under the simple ingredient label “fragrance.”