Essential Oils for Betrayal

I recently suffered a painful betrayal from a friend whom I trusted and supported for almost a decade.  

Definitely a knife through the heart experience that stirred up not just pain and sadness, but clarity.

I realized that I had noticed — but chose to ignore — red flags for years, both in the way this person treated others and the way they treated me.

In other words, I had allowed disrespectful and undermining behavior by not standing up for myself or others. And what is almost worse, I rationalized and made excuses for this person even when I knew in my heart that they were in the wrong.

I realized that I had not only been betrayed by this friend, but I had betrayed myself by staying silent and trying to ignore and accept behavior that is simply unacceptable.

Necessary Endings

As I was struggling to process this betrayal and how I wanted to respond to it, another very dear and supportive friend gifted me the book Necessary Endings, which helps unpack when and how to let go of relationships that are holding you back or hurting you in order to make room for greater happiness and success.  

It is kind of a Marie Kondo approach to relationships.

I tend to be conflict adverse and have avoided this individual for weeks for fear of handling this potentially necessary ending poorly. This individual has many positive traits and has shown up as a good friend over the years. But the betrayal really killed the trust and I honestly do not see how I can be in relation with anybody that I don’t trust.

I toyed with the idea of setting boundaries, but realized that in order to move forward either with a modified friendship or a necessary ending, I needed to engage in a courageous conversation.

I talk more about setting boundaries and making it clear what behavior you will and won’t accept in your relationships in this post. In it, I note that “When you do not speak up for yourself nor demonstrate to others that you have boundaries, you are conveying to the universe that you do not value yourself.”

As for courageous conversations, they only make sense if the other party is willing or capable of receiving your feedback and altering their behavior. If a friend is unable to show up in a positive way, boundaries may not be enough. Instead, pruning – the process of removing relationships that either drain your limited resources of time, energy, emotions, or money or in my case, intentionally undermine you — might be in order.

This is where the book Necessary Endings does an excellent job in helping to identify 3 types of people and how each type responds to feedback to help determine if a relationship can be salvaged or needs to be pruned.

How Different Personality Types Receive Feedback

If you believe that you’re a responsible and loving person, it’s easy to assume that other people think like you. I made this assumption for years with my friend which, in all honesty, influenced my ability to see a pattern that is now abundantly clear.

I assumed that they were a good person. I assumed that they cared about me and other people and how their actions affect others. The unfortunate truth is that not everyone takes accountability or responsibility for themselves or cares about how their actions affect others. Sadly, some may actually be out to do you harm if it serves their own self-interest or find ways to justify their behavior when stuck in a mindset driven by entitlement, jealousy, or competition. 

Necessary Endings proposes that character is predictive of whether or not people will be receptive to change and feedback. To that end, the book identifies three styles of behavior that a person may exhibit in response to feedback and notes that not all of these styles are open or ready to modify their behavior in a way that is respectful to you or others.

There are responsible people, irresponsible people, and dangerous people and you will want to make use of different strategies when dealing with each type of person. 

Responsible people are characterized by their ability to take ownership of their actions without excuses or blame. Responsible people are able to listen and receive feedback positively, admit to, and apologize for any behavior that might have hurt others, and they readily incorporate feedback and modify unwanted behaviors.

Irresponsible people are unable to take responsibility for their actions. Instead, they tend to see themselves as the victim, resist your feedback or become defensive and minimize the problem. When pressed about their behaviors, irresponsible people will deflect or become angry or defensive, rationalize or make excuses for their behavior or shift the blame to someone else (like you – it’s your fault that they treated you badly). They are never in the wrong or to blame for any conflict. Irresponsible people attempt to adjust the truth, so they do not have to adjust to it.

You cannot talk about issues with irresponsible people as they will never acknowledge their role in any problem. Instead, Necessary Endings advises that you take steps to protect what is important to you and give limits that stop the collateral damage of their refusal to change, or enforce consequences that will cause them to feel the pain of their choices. These consequences serve a dual function—they both communicate that your needs are serious, and protect you from people who don’t respect your boundaries. For example, you may choose to limit your time with irresponsible people, as it both protects you by limiting your exposure to them, and strongly communicates that a change is needed.

Dangerous people intentionally try to hurt or harm others with their words or their actions to get what they want. They may envy you, feel slighted, jealous, competitive or just be unhappy in their own life or circumstances and take their anger out on you. They may be divisive or actively gossip, undermine or plot to destroy you or the things that matter to you.

Nothing you can do will change the behavior of dangerous people. You cannot reason with them.  Instead, you have to go into self-protection mode, ending the relationship and doing your best to keep away from them.

Essential Oils for Dealing with Betrayal

Essential oils can help you identify and support healthy mental, physical, and emotional boundaries for yourself and others, supporting courageous conversations and helping you work through your own emotional responses.

A betrayal is defined as “harmed by intentional actions of people we trust” and the lack of loyalty and reciprocity triggered a range of negative emotions, including sadness, grief and heartbreak.

While I will need to address the issue with the friend at some point in the near future, I first need to process these painful feelings in my own body. Essential oils are powerful tools to help you process and reflect on the relationship and the betrayal.

I have been using the following essential oil blends to help me process the painful emotions associated with this betrayal.

Heart™ for Heartbreak

The more in touch you are with your heart and what you desire and do not desire, the easier it is to be clear on what you will allow and will not allow into your life.

The Heart™ blend was formulated to balance the heart to support, integrate and reset all the systems of the body, including mental clarity, physical health and emotional balance. The heart is our body’s reset button. By applying the Vibrant Blue Oils Heart™ blend over the heart, it helps return the heart to balance, and strengthen our ability to recognize what the heart needs and desires.

Lung Support™ for Grief

Feelings of grief, sadness, regret, loss, and remorse are often associated with the lungs. The lungs are sponge-like organs located near the backbone on either side of the heart. They function as a fundamental source of life energy – transporting oxygen from the atmosphere into the capillaries so they can oxygenate blood – as well as an important channel of elimination, releasing carbon dioxide from the bloodstream into the atmosphere.

Grief can obstruct the ability of the lungs to accept and relinquish, impeding their function of “taking in” and “letting go”. Grief that remains unresolved can become chronic and create disharmony in the lungs, weakening the lung’s function of circulating oxygen around the body. When lung function is impaired, it leads to shortness of breath, fatigue and feelings of melancholy, like that experienced with grief. Sadly, many chronic respiratory diseases and conditions develop after a major loss or bereavement.

The essential oils in the Lung Support™ blend have helped me move through and process the feelings of sadness, and the profound sense of loss over what had been a healthy reciprocal relationship for so many years.

Liver Support™ for Anger

Standing up for yourself and your values at the risk of offending or hurting others requires courage and may bring up feelings of fear and uncertainty. It is not uncommon for other people who have benefitted from your poor boundaries to push back or lash out when you try to instill healthy boundaries and pull back on your commitments to others.

They may use blame, shame, or guilt in an attempt to manipulate you and undermine your boundaries.

Going against them might feel overwhelming and scary, but essential oils like Liver Support™, may help you set some boundaries and reclaim the power of your time, energy, and mental well-being.

If you continually allow others to tell you what to do when it is not beneficial to you, you may begin to feel angry and resentful. Liver Support™ allows you to release anger, blame, and shame that are often stored on very deep cellular level. Just place the bottle under your nose and breathe deeply, fully inhaling the oil for 3 – 7 breaths, then slowly exhaling while intentionally releasing the anger. It helps you breathe into and work through the emotion. You will know that the essential oil for blame is working when you stop smelling it.

You can also topically apply 2- 3 drops of Liver Support™ over your liver (right side of the body under the breast) to help work through and release your anger. You can also apply it around the ankles as this is often an area where we hold resistance to moving forward in life and block the ability to receive joy and pleasure. Start at the back of the ankle and apply under the ankle bone around to the front and back under the other ankle bone, all while allowing yourself to release your anger.

Small Intestine Support™ for Healthy Boundaries

On the physical level, the small intestine plays a critical role in the digestion process, absorbing and assimilating key nutrients while preventing harmful pathogens and toxins from entering the body.

On an emotional level, the small intestine plays a similarly discerning role with emotions, helping to understand experiences and determine healthy and appropriate relationships and boundaries.

It is also an area where we can hold deep childhood scars of rejection, abandonment, or abuse. Negative thoughts fueled by feelings of lack of self-worth, low self‐esteem, loneliness, neglect and anxieties about survival and success will interfere with our ability to identify and support healthy boundaries.

Small Intestine Support™ blend supports the healthy functioning of the small intestine as it sorts and transforms food, feelings, and ideas into useful ingredients for the body/mind. It also helps correct imbalances where you are overly in tune with another’s criticism, feelings, or opinions at the expense of your own.

Small Intestine Support™ can be smelled or applied around the ears. You can start on the bottom of the ear at the earlobes and gentle massage upward along the exterior of the ear, hitting many of the major reflexology points. This article and chart show specific points on the ears for specific issues.

In closing, I know that the decision to prune a relationship is not something that should ever be taken lightly, and it’s crucial to have good criteria for deciding whether or not to continue to remain in a relationship post betrayal.  

I hope this post empowered you with tools for self-care and assessing others that will help set you up for the greatest success in your life and your relationships.

Featured Oils:

• Heart™ available here
• Lung Support™ available here
• Liver Support™ available here
• Small Intestine Support™ available here

Reference:

• Necessary Endings