The Ultimate Autumn Essential Oil Collection

As we settle into the cooler season, it's increasingly important to take care of ourselves, inside and out. We've shared plenty of tips here for updating your holistic spaces for the new season, and we've also spoken with many health experts on how to ease your body and mind into autumn. In addition to watching your diet and taking care to listen to your body, these essential oils can work wonders in making the switch from warm summer to cool fall. 

Eucalyptus - This essential oil is an amazing tool in treating a variety of respiratory symptoms, including coughs, runny noses, sore throats and more. It's also shown to be highly effective in reducing stress (holiday season, anyone?), and is a generally warming, calming scent.

Nutmeg - Speaking of pleasant smells, nutmeg essential oil is another option with great results in treating cold and cough symptoms. It can also help to alleviate some depression and act as a sleep aid, both helpful in the change to cooler weather! Maybe the best perk of this essential oil is the token autumn scent that acts as a mood setter as well!

Rosemary - This powerhouse essential oil has a wide range of uses for heading into the fall season, including helping to improve respiratory function, reduce stress, support a healthy immune system and prevent dry skin. Talk about a must-have!

Lavender - One of the most popular essential oils, lavender is excellent at healing skin irritations (think dry skin from all that wind and cool weather) and is also a wonderful way to reduce stress. Final perk? It helps boost your immune system! 

Frankincense - Another essential oil with many healing properties perfect for fall, frankincense is known to help tighten and tone skin in addition to fighting coughs and colds and soothing anxiety. 

Lemongrass - Lemongrass can help to give your skin that glow that cooler weather often steals from summer's bright days. It's great as a skin toner and can also help to fight depression that comes with colder months!

Sandalwood - Sandalwood is yet another all-around perfect essential oil for fall, as it helps heal dry skin and keep skin smooth, while also working to fight colds and coughs and boost the immune system. 

Rose - Rose oil is touted as one of the most effective for reducing depression, stress and anxiety, all of which can unfortunately accompany the change in weather. Not only can this oil uplift your mood, it's great for dry skin as well!

Vetiver - This is a grounding essential oil, perfect for the new fall season, when we look toward rooting ourselves to gear up for the cold, yin winter. 

Chamomile - Another essential oil worth having any time of year, chamomile offers a calming scent that helps us return to inner harmony, much needed as we head into the often stressful holiday season!

Of course, this list isn't all inclusive, but if you're looking for a great fall lineup, these oils fit the bill. You could also add fall-scented oils, like orange, cinnamon, clove and wood oils like pine, cedarwood and many more. Be sure to also try your hand at oil blends too! Check out this post from Fresh Mommy Blog for some great ideas for fall!

by Anjie Cho

Celebrate the Autumnal Equinox with Feng Shui

featured this month on Over the Moon

The Autumnal Equinox is on September 23rd and marks the end of summer. If you’re familiar with the feng shui “bagua” map, there is an area called “Completion” that’s related to the color white, the season of autumn, the element of yin metal, the number seven and the element of joy.

In the feng shui and five-element philosophy, this time of year is related to the after-harvest. In agricultural times, the harvest was the culmination of the hard work of tending to your crops. The harvest was also a difficult task, but afterward, the farmers could finally rest and relax. It’s a time of celebration and joy.

As we're moving into the Autumn, I wanted to share three ways to bring joy into your home using feng shui.

Bring in Fresh Flowers

Fragrant, fresh flowers attract joy and transformation into the home. My feng shui teachers taught me that the scent of fresh flowers can lift the energy in a home and alleviate depression. The vibrant colors bring beauty into the home and the harmonic, fractal patterns in nature, particularly flowers, soothe and comfort. Place fresh flowers in the entry, living room and bedroom areas of your home for joy. Be sure to change the water frequently and toss any dead material.

Clear Space with the Sound of Metal

In five element theory, metal is related to joy. I love using brass bells or tingsha (Tibetans metal cymbals) to activate clarity and joy into a space. You can also use a metal wind chime. Be sure the sound produced is pleasing to you. The easiest way to use the metal sound is to circumambulate the space, meaning walk around the perimeter. I start at the front door and walk clockwise through the entire space. That metal sound can cut through confusion and darkness and invite joy.

Nine Fresh Oranges

Oranges are used in many feng shui adjustments to bring happiness and joy into an environment. The color orange is related to the earth element which feeds and creates metal, and metal is related to joy. The scent of oranges also invokes feelings of wellbeing and joy. The life-affirming bright scent just makes you happy! The shape of oranges are round, which is also related to the metal element and symbolize completeness. The circle has no end and no beginning but is continuous and complete. Even the number nine is the auspicious number of completion in feng shui. Placing nine fresh oranges in a bowl in the center of a room in your home can inspire joy.

I hope these three feng shui adjustments will help bring more joy into your home and life. 

by Anjie Cho

Your Holistic Guide to the Autumn Equinox, with Jill Hoffman

I'm so excited to speak with Jill Hoffman, a Brooklyn-based Health and Lifestyle Coach, about the autumn equinox and how it affects each of us. Check out our chat below, where Jill and I talk shifting from summer to fall and three easy ways to handle the change with grace and holistic style! 

AC: As today is the fall equinox, how does the shift from summer to fall affect our bodies?

JH: During the summer months, most of us experience an accumulation of heat in the body that will turn into dryness in the fall. If we don’t work to balance out this dryness, during winter our sinuses will become irritated and can become a breeding ground for a viral or bacterial infection. Autumn is also the season to retreat. It's your time to savor the abundance of what you've harvested in the spring and summer months and to focus on the health of two of your major organs of elimination ~ the skin and the colon. Just as the leaves start to shed from the trees and reveal their inner core, the fall season beckons us to turn inward and let go of waste. It is a cleansing period and a time of transition for the earth and our bodies.

What are three lifestyle tips to help support this shift from summer to fall?

1. Transition to eating foods that are in season. Fall offers a bounty of grounding and nourishing fruits and vegetables that are important to balance out the dryness that naturally occurs in our body. These might include root vegetables such as sweet potatoes, beets and turnips. Eating 2-4 apples a day provides good fiber for colon health and malic acid to support your skin. Trade up your raw salads for more cooked, warming foods to help you prepare for the winter months.

2. Increase sleep. It is natural for our bodies to slow down this time of year. As our rhythm starts to bring us more inward, our need for sleep increases. Unfortunately, as our schedules tend to get busier as we move towards the winter holidays, we often ignore this craving. Now, more than ever, it’s important to be sleeping by 10pm. This is so we can stay in tune with our circadian rhythm and support detoxification. If you have a hard time winding down, dim the lights in your home after sunset and avoid using any devices after 8pm. Create a “wind-down” routine that starts at 9pm which might include yoga, meditation, warm bath or anything that makes you feel warm, cozy and nourished.

3. Dry brush your skin. Your skin is your largest organ of detoxification and is also our “face” to the world - we want it to look good! Right underneath your skin is your lymphatic system, which is essentially the garbage disposal system of your body. Waste and toxins are transported through this system so that they can be expelled through the detox organs. However, it is common for the system to get sluggish this time of year. By using a dry brush every morning, you are essentially giving your skin a “workout." It stimulates your lymphatic system and ushers the waste out of your body, thus improving the appearance and complexion of your skin. Also, using a dry skin brush will naturally boost your energy - just like regular exercise!

How have you created your own holistic space?

I love learning about energy and so the concept of Feng Shui has really resonated with me. I am currently in the process of fixing up my home office space. I have been studying the Bagua Map and am trying to apply the concepts to this space as well as my entire home. The first step was to make sure that my desk, stove and bed are in the command position. It makes so much sense how not being in command of your space can create chronic stress in the body. Reducing stress is something I am really passionate about in my work with clients, and I’m so grateful have this new tool to experiment with and to share with my community. 

by Anjie Cho

Jill A. Hoffman is a Health + Lifestyle Coach and has been working with clients since 2013. She specializes in teaching busy women how to be fully nourished so that they can experience radiant joy. Jill received her training from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition’s cutting edge health coaching program. She is a board certified Holistic Health Coach and a member of the AADP (American Association of Drugless Practioners). Jill is currently working on certifications in transformational coaching and thyroid health coaching and is the founder of the Healthy Thyroid Movement. Jill lives in Brooklyn, New York with her husband, Chris, and 7-year old rescue pup, Toby. You can learn more about Jill and her work by visiting cravehealthwithjill.com.