Choosing crystals

Choosing with your eyes: the soul stone

When we look at things we immediately make comparisons. Our subconscious will always compare a visual impression with old memories and experiences. The soul is our inner world of images that has stored all impressions and experiences. The soul perceives everything and nothing is lost – something we are made conscious off through unexpected memories of thing we had thought we had forgotten long ago.

Choosing a stone with your eyes must have triggered a response to some memory, or you would not have chosen it.

  1. It may awaken a memory in your that is supportive and strengthening and is like a recovery for you.
  2. The stone may endow do with trust in your own inherent capabilities and bring to light again qualities that have been dormant for a long time.
  3. The stone may respond to an unpleasant memory that you have suppressed and may churn things up inside you. Again, you will notice this very quickly and the important thing is to accept what is happening and face the emerging feelings and images without blocking them.
  4. The stone may represent something that would be a beneficial experience for you.

Meditating with the stone or simply looking at it and quietly contemplating it will have a positive effect. 


Choosing a stone with your hand: the stone for your body

Close your eyes and move your hands over some stones. The impulse to pick one up comes to you from your own body. Our bodies possess a very finely tuned sensitivity that is always present, even when you are not consciously aware of it. Depending on our general state at a given moment we will automatically choose things that will help us balance ourselves – in this case a stone that represents a balancing factor for an inner deficiency or excess.

At the precise moment when your hand is close to the stone, the information radiated by the stone will already begin to have an effect.

  1. The stone will encourage your body to heal itself as it helps to regulate a disturbed inner equilibrium.
  2. The stone will help you improve the capabilities of your body.
  3. The stone will put you in touch properly with your own body. This alone will have pain-relieving and healing results but will also lead to your being able to gauge your physical needs better and to understand them.

Wear the stone next to the skin. You may lie down in a quiet moment and allow yourself to feel it working inside. Place it wherever it appears to produce the feeling of greatest well-being. 


Choosing via the word: the stone for the intellect

During the process of choosing you were neither able to see the stone nor touch it, the only connection to it being through the spoken or written word that stimulated you to choose it. This choice is a conscious one, compared to choosing visually. When you are choosing a stone via the word, you know what qualities of the stone are addressing us and here we touch on the fundamental quality of reason.

  1. It can server to increase your consciousness and guide your attention to present matters. The stone will help you to control your life or your body more consciously.
  2. The stone reflects the way you think and communicate. It also represents your world view, your ideals and your ideas. “Knowing yourself is the first step towards improvement.”
  3. The stone can represent a current problem and can help you develop a creative solution.

The best way to encourage its effect is by interacting with it: carry it around with you, gaze at it, meditate with it and obtain information on its mythological, mineralogical and healing nature. Always question the information your gather with: “What do these statements have to do with my situation, the current problem, my task or my imminent projects?”


Choosing a stone at random: the stone for the spirit

The question is whether it really is at random, or rather, how does the stone become chosen? A random stone may come to you in many ways. Someone may give you a stone as a gift, or you could pick it up in nature.

  1. It represents a decision you have made and the result of which you will experience now or in the future. If you keep the message of the stone in your consciousness you will experience how you actually determine your own life.
  2. The stone will improve your means of perception and will make you conscious of your spiritual capabilities. The important thing is that you recognise the resulting phenomena as your own spiritual qualities and leave “chance” out of the game.
  3. Your stone will simply show you what game you are playing at the moment or what game you want to play.

How you use your spirit stone is up to you. There are no rules, anything is possibly. Make your own game!


Crystal Care

WARNING: Placing certain crystals or stones in water can make the water toxic for consumption while other stones may be damaged by water. Some stones are light sensitive and it is not advisable to place them in directly sunlight. Consult with a qualified Crystal Healer if you are unsure. 


Discharging

Crystals become statically charged when they come into direct contact with the body. The most extreme example is Amber, which may become quite hot in a few minutes.

  1. Static charge can be discharged again under running water.
  2. Placing the stones in the midday sun for a few hours is another way to discharge them. 
  3. Healing stones can also be placed in a bowl of hematite. Hematite does not need any cleansing or clearing of its own.

Cleansing

Any information a crystal received will remain stored even after the stone has been discharged. In order to completely wipe stored information, a more intense action is required.

  • Some crystals* can be placed in coarse sea salt. Salt needs more careful handling. Direct contact with salt may produce chemical reactions with some crystals, making the stone lose its polished finish or change colour. I recommend laying the crystal in a small glass dish that is embedded in a larger glass dish full of salt. The energy cleansing process is still maintained, but the stone itself is not affected.
  • Another method is to place stones on an Amethyst druse. The high iron atoms and the energy of concentration of quarts give Amethyst a powerful, fiery radiation. Healing crystals “irradiated” in this way are stripped of information they have stored. Leave the healing stone on the druse for 24 hours or less, depending on the how long the stone was in use for. Leaving healing stones on the druse for longer will not cause any harm to the stone.
  • Placing healing crystals in a bowl of uncooked brown rice is also an effective way of removing stored information from crystals.
  • Healing stones can also be placed in a bowl of hematite and citrine chips. Hematite and citrine do not need any cleansing or clearing of its own.
  • Reiki practitioners can use a technique called Jakikiri Jôka Hô to cleanse crystals, minerals and gemstones.
  • Laying stones in salt water or sea water, burying healing stones in soil or cleansing it in fire are definitely to be avoided, as many crystals will be severely damaged by this: Salt water penetrate pores and cracks and make the stone cloudy, some secondary minerals will be attacked by acids in the soil and transformed and fire will obviously tend to disperse too efficiently!

Charging

The intensity of radiation from a crystal is connected with the absorbed energy, so its healing effect can be increased and fortified through targeted charging. The most gentle method consist of laying the stone in sunlight at sunrise and sunset. The time during which we can dare to look almost into the sun without damage to our eyes is when the sun possesses a charging quality. 

Stones may be charged immediately before using it for a treatment, by holding it in your hand or near a radiator. This too will intensify the effect. In most cases charging is not necessary as the stone will be charged, warmed up and stimulated by body contact.


Care

Physical cleansing should be restricted to eliminating dust from mineral groups and mineral druses. Use a fine paintbrush for the purpose. If you are cleansing a druse with water, only use mineral-poor water. Never use abrasive household cleaning agents on crystals. Some of them are almost impervious to such substances, while others are extremely sensitive.


Storage

It is very natural to want to display beautiful stones so you can see them most of the time. However, if you do not want regular dusting to become your main hobby, I recommend keeping them in a lockable display cabinet. I would not recommend the windowsill, with exception to agate sections and other light-insensitive crystals such as rock crystal (quartz), hematite, jasper, lapis lazuli, tiger’s eye and black tourmaline. Many stones will lose their colour in direct sunlight, like amethyst, kunzite, rose quartz, etc.

WARNING: Placing certain crystals or stones in water can make the water toxic for consumption while other stones may be damaged by water. Some stones are light sensitive and it is not avisable to place them in directly sunlight. Consult with a qualified Crystal Healer if you are unsure.