Save a whale ...use jojoba oil!!!

Jojoba oil is more commonly known as a hair care ingredient, but it is primarily a natural skin care products that also provides benefits to the health of your hair.

Although natural products are generally more beneficial than their synthetic equivalents, it is important to understand that this is not always the case, and that the benefits of the natural substance have to be evaluated in terms of what they, themselves, contain, and how these ingredients benefit your skin.

It is not enough to simply descry the synthetic ingredients of most commercial skin care products, and state blandly that 'natural is best'. This is not always the case, and you must either prove the statement or not make it. To do that you should investigate the substances that the natural products contain and the make the case for them.

In the case of jojoba oil, we first have to qualify the term 'oil'. In fact, it is not an oil but a wax. Technically it is a liquid wax in structure, and once it has been hydrogenated it very closely resembles the solid wax obtained from the sperm whale, spermaceti. In fact, this is where it finds its most important applications and the case for it being used as a skin care product.

At one time, the wax and oil of choice by the aristocracy and the glitterati of the day was spermaceti and sperm oil. However, since the sperm whale has been declared an endangered species, jojoba has taken its place, and because of its relatively low price relative to that of sperm what extracts, it is available to the masses.

It contains the long-chain alcohol and esters and the unsaturated fatty acids that characterized sperm oil and spermaceti, and that are so good for your skin. The same type of materials characterizes coconut oil and other natural products that are beneficial to your skin. There are many synthetic cosmetic preparations that contain the same alcohols and acids, but they are also likely to contain emulsifiers, mineral, oils and surfactants which can be damaging, and at worse leave routes open into your skin for bacteria, viruses and carcinogens.

Jojoba oil is closer in nature to natural skin oil, or sebum, than any synthetic oil developed, and if you had a choice to make between the synthetic alternative and the natural substance, which would you opt for? The closest natural substance you can find to your own skin oil, or a synthetic equivalent that could contain substances that rupture your skin cells?

The choice is yours, but before making it just think again on the sperm whale and on yourself. Its own oil never did it any harm, and your own skin oil never did you any harm, so why choose an unnatural mixture of oils (some may be natural) and synthetic chemicals over the real thing?

Using jojoba oil may not save the whale, but it might help, and it will certainly save your skin.