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Who doesn't love a well crafted clever marketing spiel? I'm guilty of chortling with delight when I encounter well crafted persuasions. I especially admire well crafted persuasions that stick to truthfull inuendos. I get disturbed by tactics which veer into the realm of the phantasmical, and I hope to not do that when attempting a sell of my own creations. The first thing that I like to do when analysing shtick is dig for more and hopefully accurate information. One particular assertion that I have repeatedly encountered in my endless knowledge surfing is the assertion that tearless cleansing products are made so through the use of numbing agents. Oh, this is a good one! So, I then go to the alleged offender product and peruse the ingredients, looking for any chemical that might have numbing properties. Alas, so far I have repeatedly struck out on that one! It did lead me to delve into some great chemistry textbooks though. If such products contained numbing agents, they would no longer be cleansing products, but mysterious drug compilations. The FDA wouldn't like that! I'm appalled that there are large and popular manufacturers of otherwise great cleansing products with natural ingredients that are pitching selling points based on this false allegation. When you are searching for that great organic all natural product, look at the FAQs and then dig for facts. I'm the sort that gets turned off when the FAQs and facts suffer discrepancies. Often, a first resource I go to for a rumour check is snopes. This site gives me a quick summary of an allegation, and from there I can either pursue more information, or be satisfied and give it a rest. The next question then is, how reliable is this snopes? The trick to uncovering truth about most anything is the finding of non biased information. Find information that isn't presented by a source with a vested interest in the outcome of actions taken with the information. Preferably, find sources that have no vested interests in any similar or conflicting things! If you are really dedicated to your mission, this can take a significant amount of your time. The quest for truth can even take years! I rather like snopes because they can cut down on my personal work load, and I suspect them to be relatively unbiased. I can't imagine what they might gain from the outcome of misinformation. However, this is my own opinion, based on my own personal ideals and information gathering. If you too would like to snope around, here is an article about snopes:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/05/technology/05snopes.html?_r=0 For more entertaining debunkment, visit www.snopes.com. The next time that you are enticed by that body care product claiming to be organic, consider whether or not the FDA recognises it as having the potential for being organic. Here is a delicious link to what may actually be FDA certified: (hint: if it isn't food, feed, or fiber...) https://www.ams.usda.gov/publications/content/what-organic-certification
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I have a serious problem with laundry detergent. No matter what kind, I really can't stand the stench it produces. Funny, even the ones labeled as free of this and that still produce negative effects on my sinuses and itching with clothes to body contact. I have certainly used my own soap, but I get down right lazy about keeping the liquid soap stores stocked or grating old soap bars for laundry purposes. I have read plenty of articles about soap nuts (which are actually berries) and I finally could resist the urge to buy and try no longer. I love them! I must assert that I am not picky when it comes to laundry. All I care about is that it be clean, non stinky with artificial perfumes and especially non itchy due to unpleasant residues. I tend to avoid wearing whites because I hate having to do any extra work to keep them white. My whites tend to dinge with time and go unregarded. I can't tolerate bleaches at all. If I really really want something to be white, I will go completely old school and give it a boiling. So far, the dried soap berry hulls are doing the job that satisfies me and I really love it that I'm not putting any extra work into it. I did 5 loads with the first 5 berries and they turned out clean smelling without a hideous residual perfume stench or itch factor. My daughter had gotten a smidge of hair dye on one of her shirts and I did treat that one immediately after it happened while the dye was still damp with a rub in of some of my own soap followed by a wash with the berries and amazingly, the dye came right out! I think the key was in getting to it before it had dried. Another nice thing about the berries is that I can just pitch them into the garden when they have been exhausted of their saponins. This is great for the lazy woman with the bad back and really awful soil! I went all out and bought from one of the best name brand suppliers due to less stellar descriptions of berries purchased from other suppliers. Here is a link to the Naturoli website: https://store.naturoli.com/soap-nuts-berries/
I really like the idea of using a completely natural cleaning plant! Well, it certainly sounds great, doesn't it? Let's throw in a 'certified' too! Now that seems even more creditable, doesn't it? A great amount of my time is devoted to research and learning, and one thing I learned is that 'certified therapeutic' really means bunk. I do so love the sounds of the words together though, and I have found that most essential oils which I purchase that have that delightful wording are in fact of satisfyingly high aromatic quality. Truly, it is hard to find an essential oil container lacking that wording! I too have been guilty of employing those words in descriptions of products containing some wonderful aromatics, and I figured now was a great time to share the knowledge that I have discovered that there is no such thing as an independant certification agency that stamps the aromatherapeutic seal of approval on myriad essential oils sold by myriad companies. If I use those words in a description, it means that the essential oils used bore that suggestion on their labels and I had a moment of over enjoyment and indulgence in marketing artifice. I have a very sensitive sniffer, and I tend to rely more on it than on any collective description or wording from a potential seller. I can usually smell adulterants instantly in a great many scents. This is a blessing and a curse sometimes! Don't picture me with my nose over numerous bottles either. A straight shot of undiluted essential oil can cause some serious harm. Imagine rather a careful dispensation of minute amounts on a dispersal agent. Some big name companies that sell essential oils have marketing ploys that incense my conscience, and I refuse to buy from them. No, I most certainly DOnt Terra! When I see ingestion suggestions for essential oils, I get disturbed. Are they trying to make repeat customers, or are they serious misanthropes? When I see recommendations for external application without dilution I feel a reflexive psychosomatic rash coming on. Sometimes, if an oil is put full strength directly on the skin, horrid and much worse things than a rash can happen! When I work with essential oils here, I have to employ measures ensuring much ventilation and skin protection until they are properly dispersed and diluted. I have mentioned before that I use up to two ounces in a pound of soap. This may seem like an alarmingly high concentration, but the nice thing about essential oils in soap is that the concentration reduces as the soap ages. Also, a warm temperature increases the evaporation of the oils. By the time the soap is ready for sale, the essential oils used for a scent have dispersed to a safe level while still imparting pleasant aroma. I consider essential oils to be the super concentrated precoursers to perfume blends. Rather than combining them with a bunch of other artificial ingredients to make a scent, I strive to make satisfying scents with as few pure ingredients as possible. I have discovered that I can tolerate scents made in this way much much better than fragrances containing all kinds of who knows what. Fakey air fresheners make me totally ill, but diluted essential oil does not. I do not believe in using essential oils on toddlers and babies. I know many say that this can be perfectly safe, but I prefer to err on the side of caution. So, what about that lavender baby night night wash in your local grocery? Chances are, it contains an extremely minute amount of real lavender essential oil, or none at all. It's probably full of who knows what, but it has also been thoroughly tested by the huge corporation that manufactures it. I can't stand a fakey lavender scent, but it might be alright for plenty of babies. Sometimes synthetics can be safer than the real deal. Sometimes even allegedly safe levels of essential oils can produce alarming effects. I once liked soap with peppermint essential oil and then, over time it disagreed with me-even at a safe concentration. I now use the less irritating spearmint essential oil in my soap. I do not believe that ingesting essential oils is safe under any circumstance, no matter what brand or method of delivery is employed. If you want to gain the benefits of essential oils through ingestion, make a cup of tea with a tablespoon or so of the nice fresh plant. This way, you get the full benefit of the complete plant without over doing things to the point of organ failure as can be the case if a single drop of an essential oil is ingested.
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