I like to consider myself a pretty easy-going person. There aren’t a whole lot of things that get me worked up in life, aside from maybe a long line at the airport or a hotel with no hot water. However, there is one thing that irks me on a daily basis, and maybe more than it should.
Every day when I log into my Facebook app, I see someone peddling a new product. Whether it’s Scentsy, Rodan and Fields, some sort of new magic weight loss tea and the most irritating of them all, essential oils!
It seems like everyone and their dog has decided that pyramid scheme sales via social media is the way to becoming rich quick. Let me assure you, that no matter how many times your company manual says “This is not a pyramid scheme”... that is exactly what it is. Some big shot executive is sitting in a multi-billion dollar mansion, while 300,000 middle-aged women sell his or her brilliant invention, pill, tea, makeup or shampoo via Facebook and Instagram.
However, before I offend every member of my fiancé’s book club I will turn my attention back to the one thing that I never understood. Essential Oils.
You can’t scroll your social media without someone telling you that putting a drop of Lavender Essential Oil on your pillow will send you to dreamland quicker than a right-hand jab from Mike Tyson.
First things first… When did these oils become so “Essential” to my existence and health? I don’t recall my mom and her friends exchanging shot glass sized bottles of potions aimed at alleviating stress. I assure you that whatever stress reliever found in those shot glass size containers was made in Mexico.
Facebook used to be a place where I could connect with old friends, see pictures of my buddy’s vacations and maybe read a funny joke or two but now it is simply a modern-day classified page. Unless I want my house to smell like vanilla bean, or place a humidifier next to my pillow filled with an oil extracted from a pineapple there is absolutely no reason for me to even open the app.
Despite the lack of jokes on the Facebook nowadays, I will always get a chuckle from a post I saw last week. It was an advertisement for an American Bank Savings Account… The message was simple.
“Start putting money into a college savings account now so you’re daughter won’t have to sell detox tea on social media for a living.”
That’s almost enough to have me switching banks.
