Psychoactive Sleep Edibles, Essential Oil Wizardry, Cosmic Orgasms & More With Dr. Nick Berry

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Hey, folks, it's Ben Greenfield here. And it is absolutely no secret that I'm kind of a fan, almost to a fault, of essential oils. I've got rosemary diffusing in my office right now. I've got this special pain relief ice stuff on my knee after a tough workout that this morning, I've got something called Trinity diffusing out in my living room where I just had some new carpet installed. I've got lavender up in the bedroom. I freaking wear essential oils instead of cologne. I am a huge fan. Heck, I've even been vaporizing essential oils like frankincense and cinnamon for some of the vaporizing effects of essential oils, which we'll delve into on today's show. I have on the show with me today one of the guys who's really on, I would say, the bleeding edge of essential oils and not only how they work, but how to almost, I guess I would say biohack essential oils. His name is Dr. Nick Berry and he. He is a wizard, Literally a wizard when it comes to essential oils. His company is called Essential Oil Wizardry. He himself is a licensed pharmacist. I've spoken with him multiple times, and you guys may have heard me interview back in the day, Dr. Sarah Labis, who's a naturopathic physician, well versed in essential oils, who's one of my other go to resources. And Dr. Nick is right up there with her. He has kind of like a different approach than she does and a whole bunch of things we haven't talked about when it comes to essential oils. So before we dive in, everything that we talk about, you can access over@BenGreenfieldFitness.com OilWizard that's BenGreenfieldFitness.com Oilwizard and anything that Dr. Nick and I bring up, as well as the comments section where you can leave us questions and feedback, et cetera, you can access over there. And just one more quick thing before we dive into this interview with Dr. Nick. I heard about him when I was training, doing therapy at a place you may have heard me talk about before called the Human Garage. And when you walk into the Human Garage, this place in Venice beach that deals with high end celebrities and pro athletes and all manner of folks who really, truly need a holistic approach to healing their fascia and their bodies, the very first thing that you smell is this whole lineup of Dr. Nick's essential oils. And they use it for everything from biomechanical retraining to aromatherapy while you're getting your fascial therapy done. And so that's where I first discovered Dr. Nick. And since then, I've had a chance to try a bunch of his oils, and I've had my, my, my mind blown by what he's doing. So, doctor, or I believe you call yourself Dr. Dr. Nick. How you doing, man?

I'm doing amazing, Ben. It's such a privilege to be here on the show with you.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's a privilege to have you, man. And I have this burning question that I wanted to ask you just like, right off the bat, because like I mentioned, I've got all these ways that I use essential oils, but can you walk me through and take your time if you need to? Like a typical day in your life, specifically around, like, how you'd use essential oils, like, what are you doing when you get up? What are you smearing on your body? What are you diffusing? What are you vaping? How are you using essential oils as a part of your. Your daily routine?

Mm, that's a wonderful question, Ben. So every day I love to take a shower. You know, I have some essential oil infused soaps that I rub on my body and get all clean. I have an amazing product called Shower in a Bottle. It's a natural spray deodorant that really works. It's an antiperspirant that actually kills the bacteria responsible for the bad fragrance. And it helps to keep me dry throughout the day. So I'll spray a little bit of Shower in a Bottle on my armpits to get super then. I like that one's called what?

Shower in a Bottle.

Shower in a Bottle.

What's in it?

It's a combination of CO2, extracted usnia and different essential oil blends for the fragrance. Himalayan salt, colloidal silver, with some vitalized spring water. We actually take our spring water and we play it in a set of 432Hz crystal balls. And so we activate the water through vibration and mix everything up to the perfect. And there we go.

All right, man. Well, this is going to be a rabbit hole. We'll get back to what you do after you make yourself smell pretty here in a second. But you just. You just kind of brought up something I think a lot of people are going to scratch their heads about.

You're.

You're exposing the oils to a frequency. Is that what you said?

So what we do is we use the crystal bowls to actually vibrate the water.

You mean like a singing bowl?

Exactly.

Okay.

And so that's the water that we use for the shower in the bottle as the base. And then we add in the different essential oils into the formulation and add some Himalayan salt, colloidal silver, and we got ourselves a wonderful deodorant product.

Tell me what's going on from a biochemical or physics standpoint, when you expose the essential oils or the water, that the essential oils is mixed into that frequency.

Yeah. So what we've noticed is it seems to the solubility of the oil into the water. So the molecular structure of the molecules are able to get activated through the vibration. And so when it's connecting with the oil phase in the solution, it slightly increases the solubility is what we seem to notice while we're blending and mixing.

And do you have a reasoning behind the. What frequency did you say that you use? What hertz frequency?

It's 432 hertz.

432 hertz. And is that. I know that different hertz frequencies in Eastern medicine are associated with different chakras or different energies. What would that one be?

Mm. So we have a set of 432Hz that spans the scale. And typically, we use the F note from that scale, and that is correlated with the heart chakra is what it's said to be.

Okay, so heart chakra. So. So if someone has, like, a singing bowl, because I know you can buy sets of singing bowls on, say, like, Amazon, that. That create certain frequencies. Like, I was at my friend Drew Canole's house down in San Diego, and he's. He's got, like, a bowl for every chakra. And we were standing around his living room. He started playing these bowls, and you feel amazing as they kind of strike you with these frequencies. And I also play. There's a composer named Michael Tyrell who makes music. They're called whole tones and they also are tuned to specific frequencies. And so you're just doing the same thing, except you're doing it to the actual oil so that when you place the oil on your body, you're achieving a similar effect.

That is pretty much correct. So for this particular product, we're actually tuning the water that goes into the product. And we do use our sets of 432 heart crystal bowls. So we have seven and it's said to correlate with each chakra. And we do use this set of crystal bowls for all of our wizard alchemy blends, which we'll dive into deeper.

So different blends will get exposed to different frequencies.

You're so on it, Ben.

Okay, cool. I like it. All right, so you've got this, this one that you put the shower in a bottle. Stuff that you put on when you wake up in the morning to make you smell all huggable and lovable. And that's exposed to 432 hertz. How's the rest of your day look?

Yeah, so right after the shower, I also love my sacred toner formulation. What I notice is that it really softens the skin and tightens the pores and it actually leaves the skin feeling looking a little bit glossy to the light. And it really just softens the skin and it's great for acne. That formulation is a combination of helichrysum and geranium hydrosols infused with CO2 extracts of frankincense and myrrh with a little bit of Moroccan cedar.

Interesting. So what is a CO2 extract?

Yeah, so CO2 is carbon dioxide. And what CO2 extracts are, is utilizing carbon dioxide as solvent. With these expensive machines, you're able to actually drop the temperatures and play with pressures and turn the gaseous CO2 into a liquid and then run the liquid CO2 through the plant material. And what that does is that really grabs out lots of the non polar and heavier molecules that are oftentimes missing from steam distilled essential oils. So CO2 extracts are typically known to be more full spectrum than a steam distilled essential oil. I've even read that therapeutically speaking, they can be two to three times more potent therapeutically. And it's a really clean extraction process because once the liquid runs through the plant material and you collect all the different aromatic constituents, once the pressure and temperatures normalize, the liquid CO2 is going to return back to its gaseous state and leave the solution. So you're left with a really pure, clean, finalized product that's super potent.

So how would you normally extract the oils from a plant extract or whatever you're using to make the essential oil if you weren't going to use CO2?

Yeah. So typically on the essential oil market things are steam distilled. And so what you're doing is you're utilizing water and you're heating up the water and you're running the steam through the plant material where it's going to collect the different aromatic molecules and run through the apparatus to the other side in the condensing flask where it's going to be collected into the tank and you're going to be left with a hydrosol and a steam distilled essential oil. So the hydrosol is the water soluble terpenes that are carried through the steam infused with the water and the essential oil is going to be the portion that separates out from the water.

Now do you see a difference in the actual smell of the oil with something like a steam distillation versus CO2? And the reason I ask that is when I open the cap on your oils that you've sent up to me to try, it seems to be a much stronger smell.

Yeah. So I guess I can speak to that twofold. So steam distilled essential oils are typically a little bit lighter and almost, I don't want to say cleaner, I want to say they're lighter and maybe clearer. Where the CO2 extract I would describe as more of a full body bouquet of the aromatic plant material. So, you know, one thought comes into mind. I have a steam distilled and a CO2 extract of cardamom. And the steam distilled cardamom, it's really light, aromatic, pungent, and it comes through as a, as a really nice soft cardamom fragrance. When I open up the bottle of the CO2 extracted cardamom, it has, I almost want to say three distinct levels of the aromatic profile where it's got the, the deeper bass notes. It kind of has this, it's, it's like a piney, it's got a nice top note that's really rich and kind of hits the nose and it's really full on the center as well. And so it's a very full spectrum type of aromatic experience.

Okay, got it. So does that mean that you would be getting more of the, more of like the phenols or more of the active constituents of the oil when you're, when you're whether you're vaporizing it or you're using like a, like a diffuser or something like that, or are you simply trying to avoid damaging some of the constituents of the oil?

So steam distilled essential oils can damage some of the aromatics ingredients. So one example of that is there's a constituent known as chamazulene found inside German chamomile and blue tansy. And chamazulene isn't actually found in the plant. What happens is through the, through the high heat of a steam distilled essential oil process, the chamazolene is formed by a reaction of some of the molecules found inside of those plants. And chamazulene actually has anti inflammatory properties and a really rich blue color. And so that is something that isn't found in the plant material and it's formed through a steam distilled essential oil. So typically a CO2 extracts are using much lower temperatures and so you're not going to have the same type of heating problem destroying some of the delicate aromatic molecules.

Okay, got it. Very interesting. Okay, so you use a CO2 extraction on your oils and you start off your day using it almost as a deodorant, which is really funny because that's what I do too. I put it in my armpits, I put it on my chest. I've got a bunch of different blends that I use. But lately, and my kids absolutely love this one, I've been using your heart opener essential oil related to that heart chakra that we talked about earlier. And then the next thing that you do is you actually, after you've done the shower in a bottle, remind me what you're doing with this, with this next blend.

So sacred toner I like to spray on my face.

That's right.

Really softens and purifies the skin, tightens it and makes me feel younger on my face.

Okay, cool. So what do you do after that?

So another great formula that I like to play with is our Invigor formula. And it's a wonderful way to start the day. So Invigor is a combination of caraway, cardamom, sweet basil, two types of rosemary, peppermint, silver fir and frankincense. So I'll apply it into my hands, rub my hands together, take three deep inhalations and then massage it into the scalp and into the back of my neck. This one is really good for increasing memory, focus and concentration. It's really, really good for bringing a person into the present moment and just kind of activating the mind. But not in an overly stimulatory type of sense, similar to caffeine. It doesn't have a comedown or a crash. And it's a really good, great way to get focused.

Okay, have any, when you say these type of things, because I know we're getting asked this question. Have any studies been done on this? I mean, like, have they looked on like brainwave stimulation or production of BDNF or anything like that? You know, when you, when you say it helps you think or are you just speaking from personal experience?

Yeah, that's a great question. So one of the, one of the components found inside Invigor the rosemary, they've actually looked at the 1,8 cineole content inside rosemary and there was a small clinical study, I think it was about 20 to 30 people. And what they did was they gave this patient set a type of mathematical related questions. And what they found was that the people that were receiving the diffused rosemary actually had increased memory, focus, concentration associated with the mathematical types of tasks that they were assigned compared to the control group. And what they did was they also looked at the 1, 8, 6 content inside of their blood and they found a correlation associated with the active constituents of the rosemary.

I think I saw this same study and that was one of the reasons that I diffused it in my office. And I don't know if you saw this other. It was an article in the New York Times. I talked about it on a podcast a while ago about this little city in Italy. I believe it's pronounced Acciaroli. And they have this particularly pungent variety of a locally grown rosemary. And supposedly it smells like 10 times stronger than normal rosemary. That's a part of their diet, meaning that they use it in everything from like, you know, coffee to meats and beyond. And they have an enormous number of centenarians in this area. And what was kind of interesting was that they also, all the people in this specific region, especially the older men, have what they describe in the article as a very robust sexual appetite. So it sounds like rosemary has a variety of different functions. But yeah, that's interesting that there actually is some studies behind rosemary and that's one of the reasons I diffuse it here in my office. I'll diffuse rosemary cinnamon, this new Invigor formula you send up to me. And I've got that going in the living room right now. And then peppermint is another one that I'll diffuse for cognition and alertness.

Wonderful.

So after you've been diffusing the invigor for just kind of like your day to day mental acuity. What's another strategy that you'll use during the day with an essential oil?

So it really depends on the flow and the intention of the day. My relationship with our essential oils are really to tune me into any type of state of action or presence. I really like to use them as allies. And so, you know, one example is getting ready for this podcast. I have this formula that I call Prosperity. So prosperity is a combination of royal Hawaiian sandalwood, cistis, vetiver, spikenard, sweet marjoram and red mandarin. And here's where some of our products start to take a multifunctional, holistic kind of approach where it's not only physical but also tuning into the mental and emotional sense. And so our Prosperity formula is really good for opening up the throat and helping to speak the truth. So prosperity, I like to apply over and in front of my throat and over and in front of my stomach. And I've actually had sore throats develop when I wasn't completely communicating my truth. And this has happened a few times for me. And this oil, I would actually apply it in front of and on my throat. And on numerous occasions I've actually had the sore throat dissolve within minutes.

How's that working exactly? And what do you mean? I know a two part question, but first of all, what do you mean when you say you're not communicating your truth? And then also I'm curious if there's an actual bacterial effect on the throat or if this is simply working on like meridians or chakras or something that's more of an eastern medical approach.

So maybe I wasn't able to completely articulate my complete truth. Like I wasn't very clear about how I was feeling in a situation. And then my throat starts tightening up and my body starts contracting. So this is what I'm talking about, not completely speaking my truth. And I've had situations where. So I'm perceiving that this type of sore throat is not from a bacterial origin, but more a tightness and an energetic blockage. And so this one really seems to help support removing the static from my throat and has helped to release some of the energy so that the throat blockage is removing itself.

Interesting. When you say throat blockage, what do you mean?

So a tightness in my throat is what I was experiencing by that.

And what is that blend called?

This one is called Prosperity.

Prosperity. Okay, cool. Very interesting. I had no clue about that. What's the next strategy that you might use during the day.

Yeah. So we have our Oil of Elevation. And Oil of Elevation is really perfect for getting into the zone. So Oil of Elevation is a combination of Moroccan cedar, CO2 extracts of frankincense and myrrh. So this one is both really grounding and expansive. And so essential oils really work in a unique way where you can have two purported opposite effects appearing and taking action at the same time. So oil of Elevation I love to apply to the bottom of the feet. One reason that the essential oils are so effective when massaged into the bottom of the feet is that the pores are large enough that these small aromatic molecules can pass through the feet and enter the bloodstream in about five to 15 minutes. And so what I like to do is I like to apply some Oil of Elevation to the bottom of my feet and typically within about 10 minutes, I feel this soft groundedness in my physical body. And I feel an increased amount of clarity coming from my head. And so it's a really perfect blend for meditation and increased levels of focus.

What's that one called again?

Oil of Elevation.

Oil of Elevation. Okay, cool. So you could put that on if you were, say, like doing yoga or meditation or something along those lines.

Yeah, it's perfect.

Okay, cool. Before we keep going with the rest of your day, one of the questions that I wanted to ask you is you have this talk on your website about how your essential oils are wild crafted, and I'm curious what that means for something to be wild crafted.

So a wild crafted essential oil is it comes from plant material which is wild harvested through kind of an untamed growing area. So it's literally capturing some of the plant material in the wild. So I could give you guys an example. One of our friends, Gray out here in San Luis Obispo, he'll actually wild harvest from the mountains of the San Luis Obispo region. So what he does is he. He goes and he finds white sage plants in the area and he'll remove some of the plant material. It's really important to consciously harvest because you don't want to over harvest when you're going out into the wild. So what he does is he basically trims the white sage plants and then he moves on to a different environment and he peruses the the mountain space in the general area. And then what he does is he takes home the plant material and does a steam distillation on that. So wild crafting is not a commercial type of grow where you're growing the medicinal herbs or plants, but rather going out into Nature and harvesting.

How scalable is that? I mean, because I know a lot of these essential oil companies will. You know, I've interviewed the folks who, from. From Young Living, for example, which is another brand that I use. And I know they have like these enormous lavender fields. I mean, is that, is that scalable from a business standpoint to have somebody out there with like a. I don't know, I guess I imagine some dude walking around with like a knapsack, picking, picking little plants off the ground.

Right. That's lots of fun. Right. You know, agriculture is going to be much more scalable. And having been a small essential oil company, we really are very fortunate to have worked with smaller distillers and wholesalers to bring more rare and exotic type of botanical extracts to the market. And we're excited about continuing to grow and to tap into new markets and start growing our own medicinal herbs and plants and really putting conscious efforts into creating kind of a permaculture type of agriculture operation where we're doing our own steam distillation and CO2 extractions to bring more of these botanical extracts to the world.

That's very cool. I know. I was actually talking with our mutual friend Paul Check about this. And because he had some of your essential oils at his place, and apparently you're going to be bringing some of your potential facilities up to Ashland, Oregon. Is that where you'll be. You'll be doing more of this permaculture setup for essential oils?

Exactly. Yeah. I'm really excited. We're actually driving up to Ashland, Oregon to check out another location this week. Weekend. We have our eyes on a wonderful 5 acre property about 20 minutes outside of town. And we haven't been able to line up with all the financial aspects of purchasing this property. And so we're going to dive into a friend's property. He's got a quarter acre and we're gonna get our operations set up there and see how. See how things want to unfold.

Cool. I like it. All right, walk me through a little bit more of your day. What would be another use of the essential oil as you move into the rest of your day?

Mm. So, you know, purity is a really wonderful formula that I like to. To use to purify the energies of a space. So this is another one that works more on an energetic level. This is a combination of CO2 extracted myrrh, palo santo and white sage. And it's one of our ceremonial blends and purity. What I like to do with it is I'll put a Few drops into my fingertips and then snap it around a room or an environment. And it's kind of like burning incense or sage in a space because the aromatic molecules would just travel everywhere.

Yeah, I actually. Sorry. Sorry to interrupt. I usually will burn. I've got palo santo incense sticks in Ayahuasca, this great place called the Alchemist in New York City at the time that we're recording this. I'm actually speaking there in a couple of weeks. And they have these incense stick bundles that they sell, and I have the palo santo one that I absolutely love, and I burn that stick. But I also have some of this purity, and I'll just sprinkle it inside the sauna and then turn the sauna on and let it kind of ferment in the sauna for about 30 minutes before I get in. And you're right. It totally transforms the space in a very similar way as, like, an incense stick would, where you walk in and you feel as though you're walking into some kind of, like, a ceremony.

Thanks for sharing your experience. I love that. I've never tried purity, particularly in a sauna.

Yeah, well, it works well, man. You have to give it a go. Okay, so you got this purity. And then I'm curious about moving into the evening. How would you use essential oils for relaxation or for sleep, and in what specific ways?

I have two formulas that I really like topically that I make. One is called Violet Chill. So Violet Chill is a combination of lavender, cedar, frankincense, myrrh, and helichrysum. And Violet Chill is wonderful massaged into the bottom of the feet. I like to put a little bit right below the nose as well and on the wrist points. And what I find is that it relaxes my nervous system and it slows down my mind. So that one's a really good for calming down. I find that it's less effective for sleep through my own subjective experience, but it's great for relaxing into the body, which can translate into an easier time transitioning into sleep. Then there's another topical formula called moon cycle. And moon cycle is one that we've had previously, plenty of really wonderful reports from women for helping to balance women's hormones. And it's also phenomenal for men. It's a combination of lavender, sweet, marjoram, clary, sage, rose, geranium, bergamot, blue yarrow, and fennel. And moon Cycle is one that I personally keep by my bedside. What I find is that it not only relaxes the nervous system, but. But it also does a Very great job at slowing down the thoughts. And so sometimes if I have a lot of excitement from the day, it's a really good way to wind down and transition into a deeper quality of sleep. And what I'll do is I'll massage that into the bottom of my feet right before I go to bed.

That's interesting. Do you ever do any tests of like your heart rate variability or your nervous system or are you just kind of going by feel?

So I, you know, it's been a few years. I have looked at how the brain waves function through vaporizing certain essential oils. I can't remember the exact test results, but there, there was some pretty interesting finds that we were able to discover. Yeah, I remember vaporizing Tulsi and coming into there was a really pronounced increase and I'm trying to remember may have been alpha and theta brainwave states. Been about two to three years since I've looked at the results.

Well, I found with lavender, I haven't used this moon cycle stuff that you talked about, but with lavender I see an increase in my deep sleep. I just have a diffuser next to my bed stand that I use. But you mentioned vaporizing and I'm kind of curious about that. I noticed on your website you've got this thing for sale called the Firefly Vaporizer. And what I've been doing lately, and I've mentioned this on a couple of podcast episodes, so it's no secret to people is I've been actually putting essential oils just like a drop or two into a vaporizer. Like I have one vaporizer called the Buddha. I have another one called the Magic Flight Box and I put a couple drops in there. I know these weren't specifically designed for essential oils, but I'll put like some loose leaf tea, some organic tobacco sometimes if it's during the day, and I want a little bit of a pick me up, I'll put some sativa or some indica in there occasionally as like a little bit of a marijuana pick me up or settle me down and then some essential oils like for a pick me up. Sometimes cinnamon or occasional use, like, you know, like a lavender, like a peppermint, different oils. And you have a vaporizer device that from what I understand is actually designed to vaporize essential oils. Can you tell me how you'd use that and how it's designed differently than other vaporizers when it comes to essential oil?

Yeah. So the Firefly, it's effective both for burning plant material and they also have a metal mesh screen which you can infuse with some essential oil, and it does a nice job of gently and quickly heating up the essential oil. And I find with a firefly, I'm able to get a really pronounced flavor for about, I want to say about five inhalations for a single drop of the essential oil. And what's really wonderful about vaporizing essential oils is, you know, if you're using a pure essential oil, you don't have any carrier oil that you're going to be burning. There's no vegetable glycerin or propylene glycol, which to me, my intuition says if we can do without it, get rid of it. So, you know, there's this whole market out in the world, and it's the smoking and the vaporizing market. And so from my perspective, it's at least a harm reduction that also has some therapeutic benefits depending upon what essential oils you're vaporizing. So if a person is smoking or vaporizing, then it's likely that vaporizing some of these essential oils not only is going to have a rich, pronounced flavor, but it also comes with some. Some really beautiful physiological shifts from the perspective of the user. So an example of that would be like vaporizing lavender is really calming and relaxes and slows down the mind. The flavor profile tastes very similar to how you're smelling the lavender. And so you get this rich lavender experience that's really good for reducing stress for people. And from a cost perspective, once you have the essential oil vaporizer, like the firefly, it's really inexpensive because a single drop can be used for several days and you can experience both the flavor and the therapeutic effects. There's an older device that I've used, also called the essential vape, and that one is good for about 10 to 20 inhalations from a single drop of essential oil. And that one is a lot more manual. You, you take a vial and you, you put a single drop in and then rotate the vial in and you heat it with a lighter. And it. That device requires a little bit more skill, but it's really easy to use once you get the hang of it. So vaporizing essential oils is another effective way of therapeutically essential oils. And also I perceive it as a harm reduction technique for people who are smoking or vaporizing other herbs plants.

What do you mean by that? Harm reduction technique?

Right, so meaning that it's likely less damaging than smoking plant material to the lungs.

Okay, gotcha. Could you make the argument that it could actually have a healing effect on the lungs if you were to Because I know a lot of these things you've talked about, like helichrysium, for example. If you use that topically or externally, it seems to have a really good effect on scars and soft tissue and cuts, wounds, things like that. Do you think that vaporizing would have a similar effect internally?

Yeah, I really appreciate that question. My thoughts is that everything in life comes with a balance. And so I know that I've had personal experience of overusing vaporizers where it caused slight to moderate upon how much I'm using it. And I'm probably talking about using it daily 10 to 20 times a day versus something like using it two to three times in a day just for a specific purpose or an intention. And I usually notice benefits from that. So I think that it can be beneficial or it can can be harmful. And I think it depends on the amounts and the frequency that's that it's being used.

Okay, interesting. Got it. I just think it's fascinating, this concept of vaporizing essential oils. It's something I recently discovered and now it's kind of fun figuring out which different blends produce which kind of flavors and what kind of mental highs or therapeutical effects. I think it's fascinating. So that one for those of you listening in and I'll put a link to all this stuff over@Ben greenfieldfitness.com Oil wizard the one on Nick's website is called the Firefly. It looks really interesting. It's a cool looking vaporizer too. And can you vape tobaccos or marijuana or things like that in there as well?

You can.

Interesting. Okay, cool. So you have a very, as we talked about earlier, kind of like a very ceremonial process in terms of making your oils. You expose these frequencies and these singing bowls and it's wild crafted and hand picked. And I know you ship it in the these, you know, these glass bottles that are, you know, that keep it from getting, you know, rancidity or exposed to excessive sunlight, et cetera. But one of the things that I noticed that you say that you do is you imprint your oils using frequency and you use something called organite. O R G O N I T E What is that and how is that a part of the process of your oil formulations?

So over the past five years I've really been diving into everything essential oils and just keep an open mind about different ways that I can bring the highest quality products to the world. And so one thing that I've discovered is a friend out in Arizona turned me on to some frequency chips and so There's a device which imprints these holograms with different codes of information, which are the frequency vibrations of different things found inside nature. And so I have no experience in working with the device itself, but rather these hologram cards which have been imprinted with different frequencies. And so the interesting thing is letting my essential oil bottles sit on these frequency cards, typically within about five to 15 minutes, I can notice a different type of aromatic shift. So I might perceive the smell differently before and after letting it sit on these plates. What I've also seen is by integrating organite, organite is it's a combination of different organic and inorganic materials. And so it's typically an epoxy resin composite that holds different copper wires and shavings and materials that are conductive with these ground up crystals and stones. And so crystals carry something called a piezoelectric charge. And when these crystals are compressed, it gives off an electrical current. And so what happens is this electrical current is being transmitted through the organite, through the pressure of the resin, squeezing it. And then the copper is said to work as a conductor. And what I've noticed is that the organite really helps to amplify the signal of these frequencies to put into the oils. And so that's another way that we like to really activate and bring our essential oil products to the next level.

Now what happens, just playing devil's advocate here. Like, you know, if these essential oils get placed next to a WI FI router or, you know, cell phone or something else that produces a frequency, doesn't that change the frequency that this piezoelectric crystal vibrates at, or doesn't it change the frequency that the oil has been imprinted with? And if so, is there a special protocol to kind of like, should you not put your oils near cell phones and WI FI routers and things like that?

Thanks for asking that question. Well, I have a rule inside of the lab, and that is no computers and no phones. So that is something that I take into account personally. The type of effect, I think I don't know how well it's been studied. I know that there's been studies about how cell phones can really interfere with the human body. And so my perception is that these oils are really living material as well. And so I feel if there's a choice, don't keep the essential oil right next to your cell phone or your computer. You know, give it some space.

Okay, got it. So you should basically care for your essential oils the same way you'd care for, like, youryour brain or the rest of your body when it comes to not exposing yourself to specific frequencies too much. What we call non native emf. And part of that is because you actually go out of your way to expose these oils toto good frequencies.

That sounds correct to me.

Okay, got it. Starting to wrap my head around it. I know this is kinda like woo woo for some people, but I actually am very much under the effects of specific frequencies on the human body. So now you also say that you enhance your oils using some kind of like a salt. How does that work?

Yeah. So in many of our essential oil products that we blend, our wizard alchemy blends, what we do is we infuse them into a carrier oil. We use fractionated coconut oil because it's liquid at room temperature, it has a long sleeve stable shelf life, it doesn't have its own smell, and it absorbs into the skin really effectively. And so we love our essential oil products to be ready to rock and roll for the end user. And a pure drop of essential oil is a lot of information for the body to take on. An example of that is if you were to take 19 cups of peppermint tea and steep it, steep the water for 15 minutes. The amount of chemical constituents of peppermint found inside those 19 cups of peppermint tea is the same as one drop of peppermint essential oil. Oh, wow. So while you're letting that sink in, we know how powerful essential oils are. And so what we've noticed is that less can be more. You know, your body, if you give it a little bit less, then it doesn't shock the system in the same way initially. And so it can send the therapeutic molecules more effectively to where it wants to go in the body. Or at least that's my theory and belief. And so lots of our blends are infused into a carrier oil so that they're ready to be applied topically to the skin. And in that process, we, there's a process called live oil. And what that live oil is, is it's a mechanical process where you steep the carrier oil into Dead Sea salt and Celtic sea salt and we shake the product regularly. And what happens after several weeks to several months is it starts collecting some of the fuel finer mineral content into the oil. And that mineral content really seems to potentiate the fragrance. So if you were to take a bottle without the mineral salt and a bottle with the mineral salt and use the exact same proportions, the aromatics with the mineral salt tend to pop more effervescently, I would say and it also seems to absorb into the skin both longer and more potently. So an example of where this is practical is some people say essential oils as perfumes, well, that doesn't last that long. Well, what we've noticed is with our formulas that are activated by these minerals is that they can really sit on the skin for a longer period of time. And yeah, we have our line of botanical perfumes.

I was at a conference recently and I was putting some of this essential oil on, and this guy who studies essential oils came up to me and told me I had to be really careful because a lot of oils are caustic to the skin. And I should use a carrier like coconut oil or almond oil or something like that. What do you think about that? Are you concerned about using essential oil as a deodorant or as a clone without having it mixed with a carrier oil? Especially with that increased potency that you're talking about via your addition of the salts and the CO2 extract process and things along those lines?

I mean, we do our best to keep a nice balance between potency, effectiveness and safety. And so while some of our products are more for the experimental of heart, what we do is we really do our best to create products that are ready for the mainstream to receive and to utilize. And so, you know, my reflection on that comment is that's one of the reasons why I infuse our pure essential oil blends into a carrier and then offer that as a product that can be used, you know, to the world.

Okay, got it. Another thing that I wanted to ask you about in terms of your oils before I ask you about some of these other things that you have, because I know you've got a different form of. For example, you sent me some kava. I wanted to ask you about that too. Floral absolute. You have the term floral absolute on your site. What does that mean? What's floral absolute?

So floral absolute, an example of that is going to be a jasmine or a rose. Absolutely. And you know, we have a really beautiful blue lotus absolutes. So absolutes are not intended for therapeutic purposes. They're more intended for botanical perfumery. And so there are some delicate aromatic flowers and plants that the steam, when you're heating, when you're heating through a steam distillation process will destroy some of the sensitive, delicate aromatic molecules. And so a floral absolute uses a solvent. And so typically it's pharmaceutical grade hexane that's used inside like a blue lotus. And then you wash the, you wash the blue lotus material with the Hexane. And what you do is you evaporate the hexane out and you're left with a concrete. And the concrete is this rich plant material that's heavy in waxes and aromatics material. And then you wash the concrete with a, with ethanol. So then you, you pull out the aromatic material using alcohol and you evaporate the alcohol away. And that final product is called an absolute. And so we do carry some absolutes that are very rich and complete in their aromatic profile. And they're not suggested for therapeutic purposes.

When you say they're not suggested for therapeutic purposes, you mean you would use these for diffusing or something like that, or making a room smell better, but not on your body.

So what I mean by that is you could use it for botanical perfumery. You know, in very small concentrations you can put it into a diffuser, but you wouldn't want to put it into a tincture or take it internally.

Okay, got it. Interesting. Yeah, you've got a lot of different blends on, on your site. And I mean, it's kind of, honestly, I kind of chuckle when I go to your site because it's, it's, I love it. But it's totally, it's totally one of those things that you'll, you'll hear a lot of people joke about how, you know, they're getting special supplements that were, that were bottled by a one armed monk with, with unicorn tears sprinkled in. And it's kind of funny because like your, your website is. You talk about how it's bottled by joyous humans and you know, you don't have your cell phones near the bottling area and you're exposing it to these frequencies of love. And I mean, it's a very cool approach. And honestly, like as woo as it sounds, you know, a lot of people know that, that I value the spiritual aspect of things just as much as I do the, the hard physiology and science. And you actually do notice a big difference. You know, I try a lot of essential oils. People send me a lot of essential oils and it, it's pretty cool what you guys do. I understand why the folks at the Human Garage liked you so much because they're the same way. This cool blend of ancestor wisdom and modern science, it's good stuff. I wanted to ask you. I used to go race Ironman down in Kona every year in Hawaii and I'd drink these kava bowls at night to relax. You have a lot of kava on your side and you even sent me a bottle I think it was your kava Euphoria bottle. Why is it that you're selling to kava? What do you do with kava?

Yeah, so that's really one of our more popular products. We have this super potent CO2 kava that comes from vani watu root. And the kava kava is really helpful for relaxing the nervous system. It actually binds to the same receptor sites as alcohol, the GABA receptors inside of the body. And so it's good for calming the nervous system. And some people notice an increased mood and can be helpful for sleep. Can also be quite stimulatory. I find that different people have different effects. And so our CO2 extracted kava kava is ridiculously potent. It's got 60% kava lactones. And so one little tooth pick dab can be the same as two or three cups of drinking kava.

Do you have to be careful with that with your, with your liver? From what I understand, kava has some alkaloids where you need to be kind of careful with, like hepatotoxicity.

Yeah. So, you know, the suggestion is kava should not be used every day. We have some of our formulations that are infused with some other products and in a carrier oil. And so it's a smaller concentration of the kava. And so that's one way to really synergize the effects of kava and also minimize the amount of kava inside of the system. And I usually suggest people, you know, use it once or twice a week or as needed. Some people really enjoy the using the kava in social settings as a replacement for alcohol. It's likely that kava is broken down by the liver, and there's some reports that parts of certain strains of kava can be toxic to the liver. When I looked at the GC analysis of this particular kava, there's some constituents found in sakava which have more reports of liver toxicity, and those weren't found to be present. I don't remember what the constituents are that have been noted with hepatotoxicity off the top of my head. And, you know, my thought is, don't use it every day. Drink a lot of fluid, you know, allow, allow the kava to work with the, with the body and use it as a support for the system. And, you know, listen to your body's own homeostasis.

I hear you. Yeah, because you've got this one thing called Golden Sleep nectar, which is that CO2 extract of kava, raw honey, and then your essential oil sleep Blend in fractionated coconut oil, which obviously would just knock you out. I make these things called sleep cakes that I take sometimes, and it's. I basically decarboxylate a really strong indica, and then I mix that with kratom, a little bit of kava, some reishi mushroom extract, and then some black pepper and copaiba oil to increase the potency. And then I'll blend that in this thing called a. What's it called? It's a blender. It's a special countertop blender. A magical butter machine is what it's called. And you just let that blend for like eight hours. I pour this into these little molds. I'll put a link. I wrote an article for Men's Health about this. I call it a sleep cake or Men's Health titled it an extremely potent psychoactive edible for sleep. But I'll put that in the show notes for those of you who want to mess around with that recipe. But again, very similar to the kava kava. Not something you'd want to take every day, per se, just because you want to care for your liver, too. So you've got a lot of essential oil packages, like these different kind of packages that you have. You have one for ecstatic dance. I assume you'd use that before a rave. Similar, like MDMA or something like that. You have. What are some of your other favorites? I mean, you have so many that I'm just curious, like, what are some of the more popular ones that you have?

Yeah, well, one of my favorite essential oil tinctures, and I'll talk about what an essential oil tincture is, is our cosmic orgasms. So Cosmic orgasm is a combination of royal Hawaiian sandalwood, Moroccan cedar, and Israeli blood orange infused in organic sugar cane alcohol. So this is really wonderful way to share essential oils with people. It's got a small concentration of the essential oil infused into alcohol, and you just use a single drop on the tongue. So I'm not a big proponent of ingesting pure essential oils, and I think that the tincture should be used consciously. So I have some therapeutic ones and some ones that are great to share in social settings. And so this one, it's a lot of fun to share with people because it's this rich, aromatic flavor experience that continues to change over about 30 minutes. You know, you start off with, wow, there's a blood orange. Oh, my God, there's the Moroccan cedar. Oh, there's the sandalwood. And you. You just have this really rich palette of flavor that Just changes in the mouth. Very similar to oil of elevation. It relaxes the body, but it's also mentally focusing and it calms and slows the thoughts. And so it's a great formula for meditation. And that's one I like to share when I'm out and about. Just, you know, would you love a cosmic orgasm in your mouth? Perfect. So there you go.

That's funny. So, so it's not designed for sex, it's just designed for like almost like a feel good effect.

Exactly.

Okay, cool. Cosmic orgasm. What about this ecstatic dance one? What does that do?

Yeah, so that one was the first essential oil tincture that I developed when I was living at my mentor's house on the Big Island, Hawaii, I believe that was 2014. And the formula came to me right before I went to my first ecstatic dance on the island. And so ecstatic dance drops a combination of 11 different essential oils infused in the organic sugar cane alcohol. And that one, the flavor profile is pronounced and beautiful, kind of sweet, kind of spicy, uplifting. It's really helpful for opening up the heart, increased awareness into the present moment, elevating the mood and it's great to share on the dance floor. So that's ecstatic dance drops.

That's funny. So an ecstatic dance, you mean very similar, like a rave.

Ecstatic dance is a free flow form of dancing where there's silence on the dance floor and everyone's able to just.

Yeah, I've done that before. Yeah, I did that in Thailand. We did like this whole, what's it called? The OSHA Blank. You know what I'm talking about, man, I'm, I'm blanking on the name. I want to say it's like OSHA dance or something like that. I, it's on the tip of my tongue. I, I, it was something like an OSHA dance party. But anyways, yeah, it was like that, like silent ecstatic dance. Really, really interesting. Almost like meditation. You mentioned you were going to explain what a tincture is.

Yeah, thanks for bringing it back. So, you know, there's a big topic in the world of essential oils about ingesting essential oils. And I think that there's some schools and some schools of thought in between or on, on opposite polar ends. And what I've really done is, you know, I've sat with the awareness that there's going to be people that are ingesting essential oils and there may be a time and a place to ingest essential oils. I know I really benefited from ingesting essential oils when I had really nasty infections and. Or, yeah, respiratory infections like pneumonia. And so for the people that are going to choose to put essential oils in their body after doing their own personal research, I've created these essential oil tinctures. And what that does is they're essential oils that are infused in organic sugar cane alcohol. And we use a very low percentage of essential oil. And so typically drops out of the essential oil bottle are, you know, depending upon the size and the opening, but usually it drops somewhere about 25 to 40 milligrams of essential oil oil. And then, you know, if you're talking about the end user, you know, they might say, okay, I want to ingest some essential oils. So they might say, I'm going to use one drop. And as they start pouring the drop of essential oil into their water cup, two or three drops come out. So that could be somewhere between 75 and 140 milligrams per se. Right. So what I've done is I've created these essential oil tinctures that are using a much lower concentration, so you're able to drop one drop onto the tongue, and you're typically going to be using somewhere about 3 to 5 milligrams of essential oil that's also mixed into a medium of alcohol. So it's lighter on the system. It doesn't have that pure essential oil pop. And I feel as though it's a solution for putting less pure essential oil into the body, so it's minimizing the continued stress on the liver. And it's put into alcohol, which can be more bioavailable for the system to absorb and to break down than just a pure essential oil. And they're also really great to use. You can share them with friends. You can put them in your pocket and use them throughout your day. So that is one solution that we've made for people that are interested.

Is this the teeny tiny bottle that you sent me? This one that says Raven on it? Is that a tincture?

That one was an abundance vial, and we love sending our friends abundance vials with our orders. So that's like a little wonderful gift to you of Ravansara.

How would I use that?

Ravansara is said to have antiviral properties. Kurt Schneibel actually recommends a 5050 dilution of Taminu and Ravensara aromatica, and he found that it greatly shortens the duration of herpes outbreaks.

All right, if I ever get herpes, I'm going to tuck this one away. Nice. Thank You, I think, yeah, you got a lot of tinctures. You've got, like that cosmic orgasm one that you talked about and your medical field kit. And what else do you have? Like, there was one I saw that looked really interesting. I can't find it now. It was something for teeth. It was like a tooth blend. Yeah, like a tooth ease formula for toothaches. That prosperity one that you talked about. Kavachill Euphoria Drops Digestif. I mean, dude, like, I could spend all day on your website just surfing around and all these crazy tinctures and knowing that they've all been created by joyful humans without cell phones. It's a great concept, dude. I'm really glad I was able to hook up with you and these essential oils. I mean, I'm looking forward to experimenting more with everything from vaping some of these bad boys to using some of the other formulas that we talked about today. And I know for folks listening in, if you guys have questions for Dr. Nick about any of the things that we've talked about, if you want to order stuff from Essential Oil wizardry, from the tinctures to the kava, he's got things we haven't even talked about, like different CBD blends, rares, exotics, all sorts of things. Just go to the show notes over@BenGreenfieldFitness.com OilWizard that's BenGreenfieldFitness.com Oil Oil Wizard. I might even be working with Dr. Nick in the future on some custom formulations that I would love to put together that I haven't seen yet. And so stay tuned for that as well. If I have created anything like that with Dr. Nick, by the time this episode gets released, I'll have those in the resource section as well. But for now, you're equipped with everything you need to know for using essential oils as a shower in a bottle, for sore throat, to herpes, and beyond. So, Dr. Nick, thanks so much for coming on the show and sharing all this with us, man.

Oh, it's been a pleasure, Ben. Thank you to all the listeners as well.

Yeah, you're a real wizard, man. I just opened up this. This Ravana stuff. It smells amazing. It smells really good. I might not even wait till I get herpes. All right, cool, folks. Well, again, BenGreenfieldFitness.com Oil wizard is where you can grab the show notes. And until next time, I'm Ben Greenfield along with Dr. Nick from the Essential Oil Wizardry website. Dr. Nick Barry signing out. Have an amazing week.

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