Archive for the ‘Crystals and Stones’ Category

Obsidian is a stunning and glassy volcanic rock. The name obsidian is derived from the name of a prominent ancient Roman, Obsius. It is most frequently black or very dark; however there are many variations of obsidian.

Black Obsidian is traditionally used for scrying, gazing, and seeking insight into the future because it is a natural glass from Gaia. It also is a powerful elminiator of negative or harmful energies both from the self and one’s environment. With the strong connection to the removal of disharmonic energy it is often called on to be a stone of protection.

Using black obsidian spiritually can aid in recognizing where you are holding negativity and help to eliminate those negative or harmful emotions and attachements.

An affirmation you might use with Black Obsidian could be “I cleanse myself of disharmonic energies and ground myself in light to the heart of the Earth and Gaia so that I can see clearly as I move in my path”

You can find some beautiful Obsidian pieces at the Sacred Mists Shoppe:
Black Obsidian Scrying Sphere:

http://www.sacredmists.com/obsidian-scrying-sphere.html

Black Obsidian Arrowhead:

http://www.sacredmists.com/obar.html

Black Obsidian Pyramid:

http://www.sacredmists.com/blobgepy.html

Obsidian – Nature’s Power for Protection Amulet:

http://www.sacredmists.com/slg-np-obsidian.html

Monday is ruled by the Moon and it is in the sign of Pisces today. Pisces is the sign of psychic power, creativity and is considered the sign of “old souls.” The Moon rules the dream world. Today we will allow ourselves time to rest.

Traditionally, witches do not work spells during the 4th quarter or Dark Moon. We will draw on this tradition today, to allow our souls time to rest and receive psychic messages from the dream world. We will not focus on the types of messages we would like to receive but simply allow the messages to come to us.

I am setting my altar now and will be performing this before bed tonight with the following items:

Silver Spell Candle
Two Moonstones & One Quartz
Moonstone Ritual Gemscent Oil
Natural colored sizzling spell paper (or any available paper/parchment)
Pen/Quill

On the Color Magick Sizzling Spell Paper I will write:
“Tonight I rest so that I will be at my best”

Again simply rest tonight. Do not focus on receiving messages, do not focus on what you did not get done, what you need to do. Simply be and rest.

In preparation for doing this I will turn off my computer at my desk altar and begin the process of relaxation by lighting a stick of one of my favorite incenses (Lotus Moon) and will release all my stresses through a simple visualization of opening a flow or cord to the universe to allow it to come into me through my crown down through my body and as it fills me I will release stresses down through my body and feet into the earth. This takes but a couple of minutes and is very relaxing. When I feel relaxed I will anoint my candle and light it. Taking the spell paper in my right hand I will fold it up into a small ‘football’ shape and then light it with the flame of the candle.

All the while I will be continuing to relax and simply be. After a few moments at the candle and altar I will extinguish my candle and then head to bed.

How much better will you be on every level, when you get the rest you need?

Monday’s are all about home, family, love, health, magick and dreams. These last two, the association is hard to ignore with the ruler of Monday being the Moon. The colors today are silver and white.

With this in mind today’s magick is going to be postponed to be called tonight’s magick
and one that I will be doing before I lay down to bed tonight.

The moon for today is in Taurus making it a fantastic time to work with inner peace, love,
creativity. These are the spells that take the longest to manifest but the results are
stable and long lasting.

My primary altar is on my desk, I use this altar every day. I do have a secondary altar
on my nightstand next to the bed that houses gemstones and a spot for a candle should I want one and an incense burner with either a small stone offering bowl or a stone goddess in the center.

Materials for tonight’s magick:
White Votive Candle (I am using a Sacred White Sage Votive)
Incense with Sandalwood or Jasmine (I am using Hari – Amber/Sandalwood)
Moonstone gem (if you have one)

Set your altar or bedside table (if safe) with the votive, incense burner and gemstone.
If you have an oil you use before sleep please anoint your votive with it. I will be
anointing mine with what some may believe to be an odd choice, nevertheless; I will be
using the Ostara Creamy Petals – Spellbound Potion on my candle. The scent relaxes and
opens my mind to the possibilities before me.

Sit before your altar, light your candle and focus on a challenge in your life right now.
Something you need to find resolution to, something that blocks your way, something that needs divine inspiration to help you find a creative solution through. Be very specific
in your thoughts. For me personally, I will be working on resolving challenges presented
before me in an effort to relocate with the ability to maintain my bills and life while
simultaneously improving it for the better.

I am looking for inspiration and creativity to help me find the direction, by using the
dream-state to lay the groundwork needed.

You may enter a meditative state while thinking about your challenge, this is perfectly
fine and normal as you will begin to receive visions of symbols by letting your conscious
mind go and allowing your inner-self take over to give you ideas and directions.
When you are ready, dab a little of the anointing oil on your temples and third eye then
lay down for sleep.

You may find your dreamstate to be more active. Before your feet hit the ground in the
morning, write down the symbols you are able to recall from your dreaming. These will
help you find your way through your challenge and bring your goals to fruition.

I know what you’re thinking, “Glass isn’t crystal!”, and you’re absolutely right from a scientific standpoint. Glass itself is man-made from natural sand that has been melted at extremely high temperatures then molded, hardened and cured. Sea glass starts its life out as just such glass that has broken with time and wear, eventually making its way into the ocean and, after many years, finds itself coming to rest on shores that are often thousands of miles from its origins. Keep in mind that the journey this glass has taken to arrive may have begun decades and quite possibly many centuries before it was found. However, from a metaphysical standpoint, sea glass is a powerful gem filled with the energy of the elements that have transformed it from a simple piece of refuse glass into a beautiful and highly sought after gift of nature.

My first experiences with sea glass happened during a trip to Moon Cove near Santa Cruz, CA. Moon Cove is the name we have given to a deep cave nestled into the coastline where water ebbs and flows as the waves break against the outlying rocks before gently rolling through the opening. Walking into the mouth of the cave is like journeying into the womb of our Mother. The healing and restorative energy found within is like no other I’ve experienced before. One day my coven decided to take reflective solitary walks along the shore and would meet back at the cove in three hours time. During my own walk, something caught my eye. There in the sand was a soft bluish stone that was almost translucent. The surf continued to roll over it as the tide began to creep further inland. Fearing it would be swept away, I reached my hand into the cold, foamy water and picked up my treasure. Holding it within my hands I could feel the energy emanating from it and I instantly felt at peace. Elated with my find, I continued to walk along the shore and was thrilled to discover several other pieces of sea glass that day. Some very small, some slightly larger, each holding amazing amounts of energy that were unique to each and every piece.

Sea glass energy possibilities are as vast as the colors in which it can appear. Each piece has had a unique experience over its long journey that has likely spanned longer than you or I have be alive. During its journey it has ridden the waves, stumbled into the depths, been lost in the darkness, and reached for the sunlight. It has seen life and death and in the end has experienced its own rebirth.

Since that day I have become an avid collector and work with sea glass regularly. You will find it on my altar as a representation of water elements. You will find smaller pieces that I take to the seashore with me to leave as offerings to Yemaya. You will find me using them in my healing work to strengthen one’s ability to heal through even the most debilitating illnesses. You will find that I use sea glass in my spiritual counseling work as a reminder to those who are struggling with difficult life challenges that transformation can and will happen if you push through the pain of growth and persevere.

I highly encourage you to explore the amazing world of sea glass and find your own unique ways of working with this miraculous gemstone. You can purchase sea glass to start working with it right away, however the next time you find yourself on the shore of the ocean be sure to keep your eyes on the sand and open yourself to the energy of the pieces that are waiting to be found and heard. They are out there! Sea glass is truly a gift and a treasure worthy of being used in magick and healing as a crystal or gemstone. Each piece is an energy-laden blessing that has been birthed from our Great Mother’s watery, life-giving womb.

Putting together a set of stones for divination can be a really simple and inexpensive way to create a divination tool that you can take with you pretty much anywhere.  From creating a yes/no set of 6 stones to a larger set that mirrors the major arcana in the tarot deck, stone divination is a great way to use your crystals on another level of healing.

The first thing to do is decide on how big of a set you want to create.  You can always put these sets together on the fly when you need them from your collection of crystals, but if you want to create something specifically dedicated to divination, you’ll want to decide how big you want to go.  Do you want this to be something that fits in a small pouch that can go in your pocket?  Are you looking for something that can sit in a nice velvet lined wooden box on your altar and be part of your ritual divinations?  Let’s talk about both scenarios and then you’ll see that you can create anything in-between. Your creativity is your only limitation with this!

First, let’s look at simple, small sets of crystals which consists of 10 or fewer pieces.  A very simple one consists of 6 stones and is a yes/no bag.  All you need are 3 white and 3 black stones.  I would recommend for the white stones I would recommend:

• White Howlite = helps to calm, relieve stress and anger, and is said to also help gain insight from past lives.  (Howlite comes in a few different colors, including blue and green so you’ll want to seek out the white, which usually has black or gray veins through it.)
• Milky Quartz = helps with diffusing issues, relaxes and soothes.
• Moonstsone = connects to empathic energy, brings emotional balance, helps to release unwanted thoughts and emotions (Again, like howlite, moonstone comes in many colors.  Try and find ones that are as white as possible.)

Next you’ll want to find 3 black stones. Here I would recommend:

• Onyx = helps to ground and center, has a calming effect, helps to reveal underlying causes in difficult situations.
• Jet = brings stability and perspective to situations and puts the mind at ease.
• Black Tourmaline = very grounding and protective, helps to strengthen our grip on reality.

While seeking out your stones you’re going to want to look for pieces that are all somewhat uniform.  They don’t need to be the same size, but they should all be close (either all really small or all really large).  You also don’t want to mix raw and tumbled pieces, so either get all 6 as tumbled stones or all 6 as raw stones.  The reason for this is that when you have  your hand in your bag and you’re looking to draw a stone for an answer to a question you don’t want to be using your hands to search out familiar stones, even subconsciously.  You want to use the energy of the stones to draw you.  If you know that all the white stones are larger than the black, for example, you might be tempted to draw one of them just because of what you’d like the answer to your question to be.  By having stones that are all similar this is far less likely to happen and you’ll be able to focus more on how the energy of the stone feels.

Once you have your stones, properly cleanse and charge them, then give them intention.  Take the white ones and charge them for giving off “yes” answers and vibrations and the black ones for “no”.  If you feel for any reason that it should be the other way around, do that!  But charge them with their intent and their new “job”, so to speak.  Then put them in your bag.  Give them a gentle shake while thinking of a question that you already know the answer to.  Then put your receptive hand in, close your eyes, and take a moment to really feel around and let your hand be guided by the stones.  Draw our three stones, one at a time (I like to do this with my eyes still closed) and then see what you have.

• All White = Yes
• All Black = No
• 2 White, 1 Black = Most likely Yes
• 2 Black, 1 White = Most likely No

And there you go!  Really simple and depending on how small the stones are that you chose you can even carry this with you in your pocket all the time and you’ll never be without a quick divination tool.

For a larger set of stones, you can decide to work with a few different ideas.  I once had a stone reading with a woman that had a large Lazy Susan (one of those round spinning trays you might find on a dining table) filled with stones of all colors, shapes and sizes.  She had you think of a question and pick a number of stones with your eyes open.  Then you did it again, this time with your eyes closed.  The idea here was that the stones you picked with your eyes open indicated what you desire, what you were working toward, or even your expressed worries or fears, while the ones you picked with your eyes closed were more your higher self’s answers to some of these questions.  It was really interesting and quite accurate too.   The other method is to take stones that related back to the major arcana of the tarot and then you can use the stones to basically do tarot layouts like the Celtic Cross.

What I’m going to do is give you a list of stones with their meanings and tarot associations.  From there you can decide how you’d like to read them.  You can either just draw them like tarot cards or do the method like the woman that read for me did.  Either one I think works great.

Again follow the same rules when picking out your stones here.  Try and find ones that are somewhat uniform.  When you do the pick from a plate of stones method you can add in other stones that you might not otherwise use in a bag that you pull from, like geodes and points.  Once you have your stones, cleanse them, charge them, then place them in either a bag or box that you will work with them from.  Depending on how big of a collection you work with in this method, either with 22 to represent the tarot cards or with even more from just your personal preference, you will want to decide on a bag or box that will be big enough to hold them while also giving your hand room to move and work with them.

Stone Divination Meanings and Tarot Associations:
(this comes from Scott Cunningham’s book “Cunnignham’s Encyclopedia of Crystal, Gem and Metal Magic”)

0.The Fool=Agate – Scattered energies, waste, extravagance, imbalance, pride, ego, vanity
1.The Magician = Quartz Crystal – Magical attainment, control, power, balance, center, unification of spiritual and physical, self-knowledge, depth and confidence
2.The High Priestess = Emerald – Spirituality, secrets, power, Earth religion, the unknown, female mysteries.
3.The Empress = Peridot – Receptive energies, women, cycles, fertility, abundance, creativity, growth, female sexuality and love.
4 The Emperor = Ruby – Projective energy, men, compassion, force, movement, aggression, male sexuality
5.Hierophant = Topaz – Authority, Captivity, Confinement, Advice, Employer, honor
6.The Lovers = Rose Quartz – Love, sexuality, relationships, friendships, duality, polarity, balance and beauty
7. Chariot = Staurolite (crossed stone or twinned crystals) – Earth power, nature,self-control
8.Strength = Diamond (Herkimer Diamond or Garnet) – Power, courage,will power, activity
9. Hermit = Sapphire (blue tourmaline) – Wisdom, Knowledge, Mysticism, enlightenment.
10.Wheel of Fortune = Sardonyx (black opal) – Transformation, fortune, luck, unknown factors
11.Justice = Carnelian – Law, Legal matters, dominance, submission
12.Hanged Man = Beryl (aquamarine) – Introspection trials, tests, sacrifice
13.Death = Amber – Renewal, beginnings, endings, health matters, Trials
14.Temperance = Amethyst – Moderation, Scattering of energies, nonfocused, disciplined, balance
15.Devil = Black Diamond (black tourmaline) – Addiction, delusion, pity, depression, pettiness, lack of vision, violence, control by others, submission
16.Tower = Lodestone Adversity, accident, oppression, challenge
17.The Star = Meteorite – Universal energies, astrology, eclipse, travel, hope
18.The Moon = Moonstone – Psychism, emotions, night, winter, sleep, dreams, tides, depression, water
19. The Sun = Tiger’s-eye – Mental activity, thought, visualizations, contentment, day, summer, the seasons
20.Judgment = Fossil – Reversal, outcome, evolution, growth, life, childbirth, lessons
21.The World = Opal – Interplay, success, harvest, movement, overview, ability, completion, higher forces.

Another great book to check out for information on stones and crystals for divination and magick is “Dunwich’s Guide to Gemstone Sorcery” by Gerina Dunwich.

One of my favorite stones that can be quite unique from piece to piece is ametrine.  Ametrine is a form of quartz that contains both amethyst and citrine and carries energies of both stones along with bringing a powerful cleanings and balancing energy.

Ametrine takes many forms, but in it’s natural state, the colors can be very dark and blended together in a way that can make some pieces look like they are just very deeply colored amethyst.  Other pieces have clear yellow or gold citrine elements within them.  Ametrine is minded almost exclusively in Bolivia which is where it gets one of its trade names, bolivianite, though some ametrine has been found on parts of India and Brazil in recent years.

Ametrine forms naturally in the Anahi mines in Bolivia because of the various temperature combinations, air pressure and the natural chemicals in the mines which cause a natural oxidation process to happen within the iron of the crystal itself.  Since the temperatures and pressures vary so greatly in this specific mining area, the oxidation rate of the iron deposits are so different that some parts of the crystal form as a yellow/gold color, creating citrine, while other parts turn varied shades of purple, creating amethyst.  Sometimes during the process one area will oxidize at a slightly different rate, just enough to cause part of a piece that would normally have been all amethyst to have a portion that formed as citrine.

When looking for ametrine, especially for healing or magickal work, it’s important to look for natural, raw, or tumbled pieces that are very obviously not meant for the purposes of making jewlery.  Many pieces of ametrine that are made for or sold as jewelry, such as faceted pieces for rings, are quite often (but not always) synthetic.  Ametrine can be easily mimicked either with dyes being applied to heat treated clear quartz or even by using different heat treatments to plain amethyst.  One sign of an artificial piece of ametrine is when the definitions between the amethyst and citrine are very obvious, as though the two pieces were almost fused together with a defined beginning and end to each color.  While this can happen in natural ametrine it’s very rare and you’re more apt to find pieces where one color is more dominant than the other and they blend or swirl together in the stone.  Also, the color of the stone can be a sign of whether it’s natural or synthetic; if the stone has a greenish-yellow color to the citrine part or if the amethyst has a blue hue to it, it is almost definitely synthetic since these colors do not happen naturally in these stones.  Deep, rich purples, as well as deep golds, are a sign of a true piece of ametrine.

Ametrine can be used for a number of healing purposes.  As a stone that brings harmony to the spirit and body, if you are finding that you’re feeling “out of sorts” or if you have a sense of being disconnected, either from your thoughts or your body, meditating or just relaxing while holding the ametrine in your power hand will help to bring you back into balance.  Ametrine is also believed by many crystal healers to be a stone of male/female balance; if someone is having a hard time connecting to one of these halves of their personalities, or if there is a lack of balance between the two, ametrine can be used for bringing them into harmony.

Using ametrine in meditation can help to open up and empower the third eye.  If you or a client in a healing session are having trouble with their psychic senses, or if there is a feeling of not being in touch or in balance with your intuition or psychic senses, place a piece of ametrine on the third eye and let it rest, giving it a chance to open up and balance the third eye chakra.  Ametrine can also help clear out any lingering negative energy from emotional trauma or emotional worries and concerns which makes this a great stone for working with healing sessions for those that are experiencing issues with releasing and letting go from bad relationships, working through issues of abuse and overall problems with moving on from a bad patch in personal relationships.

When looking for some creative ways to use ametrine, consider the fact that both the properties of amethyst and citrine are contained in this stone, regardless of how much of each is evident from looking at a piece.  Amethyst contains the ability to bring serenity and calm as well as protection while citrine helps with creativity, mental clarity and inner strength and confidence.  Ametrine can be a great stone for students who want to create a talisman for helping with their studies.  Take a piece of ametrine and charge it for this by calling on the aspect of amethyst to grant you a calm, focused state of mind, and the citrine to help you better understand the work and have the confidence to display your understanding through homework assignements and exams.

The color therapy, or color magick, available in ametrine can be very powerful as well since the purple of the amethyst can help with visualizing and mentally creating the image of what you desire while the gold of the citrine can help with manifestation in the physical world.  Holding ametrine or using it as part of spells where manifesting something in the physical world can be quite helpful.  These two colors together can also help with balancing the third eye chakra and the solar plexus chakra.  These are two chakras, that when in balance, can help us to feel and follow our intuitions, our “gut feelings”, more confidently.

In healing for physical purposes ametrine can be used for a number of different purposes including releasing toxins, releasing muscle tension, reducing fever and helping with the aches and pains caused by head or chest congestion.  You can make an elixir with ametrine and take to help with any of these, but it can be especially useful in this manner for toxin release.  If you get massage regularly you know about the need to drink water to help with the flushing of the toxins that are released from the muscle tissue.  Taking 3-6 drops of an ametrine elixir in your water following a massage can help this process along and help you feel not only physically but also mentally refreshed after.

Ametrine is a great stone that has endless possibilities because of the unique combination of energies that it brings.  Even just a small piece can be used for a number of purposes and makes for a great addition to any set of healing crystals.