John Steele (aromatic consultant)

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For other people named John Steele, see John Steele (disambiguation).

John J. Steele is an aromatic consultant, archaeologist, author and thinker. His work, whether with aromas or philosophy, engages questions about the nature of memory, time, consciousness and being. Among other notable thinkers, he has worked with Terence McKenna and Paul Devereux.

While his work is often closely related to the psychology of fragrance, in talks and writings Steele also explores Buddhism, Vedic culture, the great yugas, geomancy and geomantic amnesia, geobiology, time out of balance, shamanism, the effects of geological formations on human consciousness, cross state retention, and the importance of sacred sites and spaces.

With Paul Devereux and David Kubrin, John Steele is co-author of EARTHMIND: Communicating with the Living World of Gaia (Destiny,1992), a book which explores ways of interfacing with the earth for planetary healing. John Steele also contributed an essay, "Perfumeros and the Sacred Use of Fragrance in Amazonian Shamanism," to the book The Smell Culture Reader, an anthology edited by Jim Drobnick and published by Berg in 2006.

Together with aromatherapy researcher Robert Tisserand, Steele has studied the effects on brain wave patterns when essential oils are inhaled or smelled. They found that calming oils have a sedative, tranquilizing effect and function by altering the brain waves into a rhythm that produces calmness, while stimulating oils work by producing a heightened energy response.^[1]

As an aromatic consultant, John Steele is reputedly a skilled distiller of essential oils.^[2] He has worked with Avraham Sand of Tiferet Aromatherapy,^[3] served on the board of the American Aromatherapy Association and consulted for the Avedia Corporation. John Steele has also lectured for the American Society of Perfumer’s, the Fragrance Foundation, and the Bowers Museum.^[4] Steele's fragrance company, Lifetree Aromatix, is based in Sherman Oaks, California. John Steele keeps a low profile, and while Lifetree does not have its own website, the company's products are available from several online retailers.