Virginia Joy Musacchio—known simply as Joy—is the founder of Stillpoint Aromatics and The School at Stillpoint, where science, spirit, and scent converge with radical authenticity. She doesn’t just work with essential oils—she pours them fresh, in ceremony, as vibrational medicine. Her teachings go far beyond aromatherapy basics, inviting students into a deeper relationship with the energetic intelligence of plants and the sacred resonance of grief, healing, and transformation.
In this conversation, Joy traces her path from a Brooklyn classroom to the red rocks of Sedona—and into the unseen worlds that plants opened for her. What began in grief became a lifetime of listening, teaching, and pouring oils that carry more than chemistry. Joy shares how frequency, intuition, and a deep relationship with the natural world shaped Stillpoint into a sanctuary of remembrance and vibrational healing. She speaks of the plants’ emotional intelligence, the soul of sourcing, and how scent can become a language for the parts of us that don’t have words. This isn’t about oils. It’s about transformation, truth, and trusting your own knowing.
Virginia Joy, your work beautifully bridges aromatherapy, metaphysics, and emotional healing. Can you share how your own life experiences, especially with grief and loss, inspired the creation of Stillpoint Aromatics and The School at Stillpoint?
Virginia Joy: It started with my mother’s death.
She was 66. I was twenty. Her only living child after multiple pregnancies. That kind of loss doesn’t just break you—it opens you. After she died, I found Shirley MacLaine’s Out on a Limb, and everything shifted. That book became my gateway into metaphysics, frequency, and the deeper mysteries of being. That was 43 years ago. I’ve been walking this path ever since.
Grief became the throughline. Not just my mother—many of my dogs have died. Bella was the most recent, but she wasn’t the only one. Each loss carved me out a little more. Each one brought me back to the plants. The oils. The unseen.
Stillpoint wasn’t born from a business idea. It was born from necessity. I was deep in grief, and I needed support that actually met me—vibrationally, emotionally, spiritually. And what I was finding on the market wasn’t cutting it.
The oils out there might’ve looked great on a GC/MS report, but when you opened the bottle, they were flat—therapeutically dead. Like champagne that’s lost its fizz. No soul. No resonance. No life force. And I needed oils that were alive. Oils that could actually connect with my system, that could hold me in my grief, that could speak in the language of frequency.
So I started sourcing differently. I poured fresh. I got intentional. And Stillpoint was born.
The School came next. I’ve taught adults and children, both formally and informally, for decades. So it was natural to build a space where others could learn—not just about chemistry and safety, but about energy, intuition, grief, and a real relationship with the plant kingdom.
Because this work isn’t just academic. It’s alive. Just like the oils should be.
Your integration of bereavement counseling into vibrational and plant-based healing is both profound and unique. How do scent, frequency, and intention interact to support emotional transformation, particularly for those navigating grief and trauma?
Virginia Joy: Grief lives in the body. It lodges in the lungs, the fascia, the breath. It’s not just a feeling—it’s a frequency. And scent bypasses the story. It doesn’t wait for you to be ready. One inhale, and you’re dropped straight into the moment—into the memory, the release, or the stillness you didn’t know you needed.
When I work with someone who’s grieving, I’m not just handing them a pretty smell. I’m offering a living resonance—something that meets their nervous system without requiring words. That’s the magic of plant medicine: it communicates in the language of vibration.
Each essential oil has a frequency. Some are grounding, like Myrrh or Vetiver. Others are expansive, like Fragonia or Neroli. But it’s not just about the oil—it’s about the intention behind it. I pour everything fresh. I don’t pour ahead. That’s not just a business model—it’s a frequency practice. When you pour with presence, the oil remembers. It holds the moment you were in, the prayer you whispered, the vibration you were tuning into.
And in all of this, we have to stop treating grief like something to “get through” or “fix.” Grief isn’t a weakness. It’s one of our strongest parts. It cracks us open so light can move through. And when we allow scent, frequency, and intention to work in concert, we’re not escaping the pain—we’re honoring it. Holding it. Letting it reshape us into something deeper, truer, and more whole.
In your feature on US Times Now, you speak of turning grief into transformation. Could you walk us through how essential oils, when energetically aligned, can become tools for remembrance, release, and renewal?
Virginia Joy: Grief is not linear. It’s layered, ancient, and often unpredictable. One minute it floods you, the next it disappears into silence. You can’t map it. But you can meet it—moment by moment—with the right resonance. That’s where essential oils come in. When they’re energetically aligned, they don’t just “help.” They companion you. They hold the shape of what words can’t.
Some oils invite remembrance. Maritime Pine (Pinus pinaster) is one I work with often in this space. There’s something in it—maybe it’s the wild sea air in its DNA, maybe it’s the memory held in its resin—that helps access the root of things. It brings breath and perspective without erasing the ache. It honors what was without turning it into a story.
Others support release. Agarwood (Aquilaria crassna) and Black Pine (Pinus nigra) are powerful here—not because they force anything, but because they create space. They’re not afraid of the shadow. They let the nervous system soften enough for what’s buried to rise and move. It’s not about catharsis. It’s about permission.
And then there’s renewal. Coriander Seed (Coriandrum sativum) is an unexpected ally here. It carries a clarity that’s both earthy and uplifting. It doesn’t rush the process—it simply reminds you that life is still moving, that something fresh can grow even in soil soaked with tears.
But the oils don’t do the work for you. They hold the field. They vibrate at a frequency that says, I’m here. I can walk this with you. And when they’re poured with intention—not mass-produced, not sitting stale on a shelf—they carry that resonance in every drop.
This is what I mean by transformation. Not fixing. Not forgetting. But walking the spiral path with plants as mirrors, as messengers, as medicine.
You have often referred to yourself as a “Plant Magician.” What does that mean in the context of your teachings at The School at Stillpoint, and how do you help students access the deeper energetic intelligence of plants beyond their chemical profiles?
Virginia Joy: To me, a Plant Magician isn’t someone who casts spells—it’s someone who listens. Deeply. Consistently. Fiercely. Someone who refuses to reduce a plant to its chemistry, its Latin name, or what some textbook says it’s “good for.”
It means I work in relationship—with the plant, with the person, with the unseen threads that connect them. At The School at Stillpoint, that’s the foundation of everything I teach. Yes, we study chemistry. Yes, we talk distillation and sourcing and safety. But underneath all of that, we train ourselves to hear the plant’s voice—to sense its frequency, its presence, its message. That’s the real curriculum.
I teach my students to work with oils the way I do: energetically, intuitively, through muscle testing, pendulum work, and somatic tracking. We don’t guess. We don’t go by what’s trendy. We ask. We wait. We listen. We drop below the noise and into the knowing.
Because the deeper intelligence of a plant isn’t something you “use”—it’s something you meet. And when you meet it with reverence and clarity, it responds. It’s alive. It collaborates. And sometimes it’ll tell you something that blows your protocol to bits.
Being a Plant Magician means trusting that moment.
It means having the courage to follow the scent trail into the unknown—and bring others with you.
Many holistic practitioners struggle to blend spiritual insight with scientific credibility. How do you balance the metaphysical aspects of your work, such as frequency healing and intuitive formulation, with the practical demands of aromatherapy education and client care?
Virginia Joy: You don’t need to choose between intuition and science. That whole idea—that you’re either “credible” or “woo”—is outdated and lazy. The body is frequency. The plants are frequency. Chemistry is frequency. So when I talk about vibrational healing or muscle testing or oils that carry a specific resonance, I’m not bypassing science—I’m expanding it.
At Stillpoint, I teach from both sides of the brain. I can tell you the chemical constituents of Helichrysum italicum, how it modulates inflammation, and why its diketones matter. But I’ll also teach you how to sense when that same oil is calling to you because your inner child is finally ready to release stored grief from age six. Both are true. Both matter.
The problem is when we silo these ways of knowing—as if the lab and the soul can’t speak to each other. My work is about reuniting them. I pour every oil fresh because that energetic presence matters. I choose oils based on vibration, not marketing. I formulate in ceremony—but I can also back up every blend with clinical reasoning, safety data, and decades of experience.
That’s how you earn trust. Not by hiding the spiritual parts, but by rooting them in practice, presence, and precision. When people feel that you’re both educated and energetically aligned, the guesswork disappears. They feel safe. They feel seen. And they heal.
As holistic wellness continues to evolve, what role do you see for grief work, ancestral healing, and intuitive aromatherapy in the next generation of practitioners? What legacy are you hoping to leave through Stillpoint and your wider body of work?
Virginia Joy: I think the future of wellness isn’t going to be found in another protocol or product. It’s going to come from practitioners who have the courage to sit in the fire with people—who know how to hold grief without fixing it, how to listen to the body without overriding it, and how to work with plants as allies, not tools.
Grief work isn’t a niche. It’s the core of everything. We are living in a time of mass loss—personal, collective, and ancestral. And if we’re not addressing that at the vibrational level, we’re just rearranging symptoms. The same goes for ancestral healing. We carry what’s been unspoken for generations. Oils can open that portal—but only if we’re willing to go there.
That’s the legacy I want to leave: not just oils, not just education—but remembrance. I want Stillpoint to be known as the place where people came home to themselves. Where science and spirit were never at odds. Where oils weren’t sold—they were met. Where people learned to trust their own knowing again.
The next generation doesn’t need more content. They need realness. They need resonance. They need to learn how to sense what’s not being said—and how to meet it with sacred precision.
If I can leave behind a field of practitioners who know how to do that—who walk with depth, integrity, and a little wild magic—then I’ve done my work.
Conclusion
This isn’t just about oils. It’s about relationship. Remembrance. Frequency.
In Joy’s world, scent is a doorway. Every bottle is poured with presence. Every oil is a conversation between the visible and the unseen. She teaches students how to track vibration, how to meet grief without fixing it, and how to work with plants—not as products, but as allies and mirrors.
Her legacy isn’t just in what she teaches—it’s in what she invites. A return. A rewilding. A remembering.
For anyone who’s ever felt the pull of something deeper—this is your invitation. The plants are always speaking.
The question is:
Can you hear them?
