Gary Young is the Founder and President of Young Living, and one of the most inspirational men that I know. My husband Noel and I have traveled around the world to listen to him speak, and to drink in the wealth of knowledge that he has to offer.

Gary Young has spent the past 25 years researching natural ways to combat disease and preserve health, and has traveled extensively throughout Europe, the Middle East, India and Pakistan in pursuit of this quest. He has become one of the foremost authorities on the medicinal use of essential oils in North America, and is the author of several studies and books, including: Aromatherapy: The Essential Beginning, Longevity Secrets, and The Truth Behind Growth Hormone.

Gary Young's book, Essential Oils Integrative Medical Guide, speaks extensively about building immunity, increasing longevity, and enhancing mental performance with therapeutic-grade essential oils. And his latest book, Discovery of the Ultimate Superfood (co-authored with Dr. Ronald Lawrence, M.D. and Marc Schreuder) shares scientific research that documents how the Ningxia Wolfberry and four other whole foods help combat heart disease, cancer, chronic fatigue, depression, diabetes and more.

Gary Young was raised in the central mountains of Idaho on a ranch with no indoor plumbing or electricity. Learning at an early age to survive off the land, he left home at age 17 to seek his fortune in the wilderness of Canada. He homesteaded 320 acres and began building a sizable ranching and logging operation.

It was here, in 1973, that he suffered a near-fatal logging accident that changed his life forever. This accident transformed him both physically and emotionally, and would eventually impact the lives of countless people in ways he could have never imagined.

After three weeks in a coma and four months in intensive care, Gary Young found himself paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair for life, according to the doctors' prognoses. Following two years of intense pain and depression and three suicide attempts, he resolved to regain control of his life. He fasted on juice and water for almost a year and finally regained sensation in his toes, marking the beginning of his long and painful road toward recovery.

Later he embarked on a worldwide investigation of natural medicine, from herbology and acupuncture to nutrition and naturopathy. This relentless research coupled with an iron determination enabled him to eventually regain his mobility and ability to walk, although not without pain.

It was this pain that eventually led Gary Young to discover the potential of essential oils - a powerful but little known form of natural medicine. Within a very short time, he cast off the persistent pain that he had borne for almost 13 years as he began tapping into the power of essential oils. By 1986 he was able to run a half-marathon, finishing 60th out of 970 participants.

After receiving a master's degree in nutrition and a doctorate in naturopathy, Gary Young opened a family practice in Chula Vista, California, and a research clinic in La Mesa, Mexico, where he conducted cutting-edge research in many areas of natural healing. He began investigating the effects that essential oils have on the blood, as well as their ability to magnify the effects of other healing modalities such as herbal medicine and acupuncture.

Gary Young’s work was of such magnitude that in 1985 he received the Humanitarian Award from the State Medical Examiner's Office of Baja, California (one of only six ever awarded), for his research and successful treatment of degenerative disease.

Building on his clinical research in the mid-1980s, Gary Young traveled across three continents and a half-dozen countries to investigate both traditional and modern uses of essential oils, gaining insights on every facet of essential oil production, from distillation and harvesting to seed selection and crop management.

Yet despite the enormous power of essential oils, Gary Young was unable to fully harness their potential due to the highly varying quality of oils available at the time. While pure essential oils had the ability to produce spectacular results, he found that chemically altered or adulterated oils were often ineffective and even harmful.

This motivated Gary Young to develop his own organic herb farming and distillation operation in 1993 under the name “Young Living Essential Oils”. Purchasing land in Utah and Idaho, he began cultivating lavender (Lavandula angustifolia), peppermint, melissa (lemon balm), clary sage, and many other herbs. He designed and built the largest, most technologically advanced distillery for the production of essential oils in North America, developing a proprietary distillation process that preserves the integrity of essential oils.

To ensure the finest quality and availability of oils for their products, Young Living is now cultivating hundreds of acres of organic crops for the distillation of essential oils. Click here to learn more about the Young Living farms, and why Young Living’s oils are different.

In 1995, Gary Young was invited to Anadolu University in Eskisehir, Turkey, by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization to present his research on plant germination and organic farming, as well as his research to Weber State University on the properties of essential oils.

He has continued to probe the fundamental basis of human health, by traveling the world to investigate cultures renowned for their longevity. This includes the Hunza people of northern Pakistan. Until recently (when western food was introduced), these people were among the longest-living people in the world. By investigating the Hunza people's original dietary and lifestyle practices, he obtained important insights on not only extending life, but also avoiding disease.

Gary Young has also spent time in the Ningxia province of China, where farmers eating the local berry (the Ningxia Wolfberry) are living extraordinarily long, healthy lives. He was so impressed with the research into the Ningxia Wolfberry that Young Living has since become the largest importer of the Ningxia Wolfberry (one of China’s national treasures), for inclusion in their personal care products, foods and supplements.

Over the years, Gary Young's knowledge of natural medicine and essential oils has become enormously valuable to countless people throughout the world. Many people have sought his help after seeing the results he achieved in his own body.

In his desire to help all people, Gary Young expanded the mission of Young Living to produce not only the highest quality essential oils available in the world, but to offer education and products to support exceptional health and vitality.

As part of this mission, Young Living’s ongoing university research continues to validate the benefits of essential oils, and bring this ancient knowledge back to the modern world. And Young Living is the only company in the world that is growing their plants from seed, harvesting, distilling, formulating, packaging and marketing products with essential oils, as well as educating people about their use and application.

The ripple effect of Gary Young’s knowledge of natural medicine and essential oils has touched countless people throughout the world, and Young Living now has more than 250,000 distributors in 20 foreign countries.

Gary Young has been an inspiration to me – in his passion for helping people, in his choice not to accept physical limitations, and in his mandate for living life to the fullest. And even more than that, his beautiful oils have been a gift of Spirit in my life. I am deeply grateful to he and his wife Mary for everything that they are, and everything they do.

Click here to discover why Young Living’s oils are different, and to learn more about the Young Living farms.

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