Pleased to Meet You
Getting to Know Your Crystals
How do you learn what an individual crystal can do? How can you discover its specific strengths, its properties, and its gifts?
Go right to the source: the crystal. The easiest, most efficient way to know your crystals is to spend time with them.
Hold your crystals. When you add a new crystal to your collection, simply hold it and ask, “What do you have to teach me?” Yes, it’s a little hooky spooky—but you might be pleasantly surprised by the answers you receive. You might hear a word, a phrase, or a sentence in your head. You might hear a snippet of song. You might get a visual impression, or sense an emotion, or simply discover that your new crystal wants you to hone your intuitive skills a little more.
Carry your crystals. Whether you’re heading off on a world cruise or a trip to the corner market, take a few crystals with you in your pocket or your purse.
Get your mojo workin’. You can tuck small crystals into a medicine pouch or mojo bag. Medicine bags are sacred to some Native American cultures, who typically made them of animal skins. Mojo bags are a development of the Deep South, where hoodoo practitioners usually crafted them of flannel or felt.
You can make either type of bag quickly and easily. Simply buy a ready-made bag, or use the fabric or material of your choice and sew a small drawstring pouch. Fill it with magical crystals, herbs, amulets, and talismans. Tie your medicine or mojo bag to a string and wear it around your neck, tucked underneath your shirt.
Most people keep their medicine and mojo bags private and open them only when they need to access their contents for spiritual work.
Wear your crystals. You may already own some gemstone jewelry. Whether polished, cut, or carved, genuine gemstones have the same mystic properties as crystals in their natural state. You can also buy crystals that have been drilled so that you can hang them on a chain or a velvet cord, crystal beads for stringing, or wire wraps and cages so you can wear your crystals as jewelry.
Keep your crystals in sight. Keep crystals on your desk, your nightstand, by your phone, or on your kitchen table. With just a little extra effort, you can even create crystal displays that will add depth and drama to your collection.
Set the stage. As you start to surround yourself with crystals, you will probably want to put them in obvious places, such as bookshelves, coffee tables, and fireplace mantles. While windowsills are a good display area for some stones, be careful about which crystals you leave in the sun. Many crystals will fade, change color, or lose their color completely if they are exposed to direct sunlight. Choose a shady spot for your amethyst, apatite, aquamarine, aventurine, beryl, celestite, citrine, fluorite, kunzite, rose quartz, sapphire, and smoky quartz.
Whatever you do, don’t treat your crystals like an ordinary rock collection. Avoid tucking your stones into little boxes with tissue paper liners and reference tags—unless, of course, you plan to have a very large collection, in which case you could put a tiny removable sticker with a numbered key on the bottom of each one, corresponding to notes and records in your crystals journal. But do try to avoid the temptation to close your crystals up in drawers and cabinets. Crystals can’t work their magic if they’re in storage. The whole point of having crystals is to enjoy them, even when you’re not actually holding them.
While you could put some of your crystals in glass-front display cases, you will get the most out of your crystals if you place them strategically throughout your home, where air can circulate freely around them. The crystals can sparkle in sun and moonlight, and their presence can lift and energize everybody’s mood.
Try the following techniques:
• For a decorator impact, group your crystals by color. From an aesthetic perspective, odd-numbered groupings look best. Try arranging your crystals in groups of three, five, or seven.
• Unify your displays by putting your crystals on trays, mirrored tiles, or pedestals.
• Arrange your crystals on loosely gathered scarves or swatches of fabric.
• Try grouping your crystals around a tabletop fountain.
• Stack your metaphysical books on their sides, like shelves, and display your crystals on top of the books.
• Make tiered risers by draping fabric over boxes or blocks of wood.
• Categorize your collection by shape, particularly if you recognize the metaphysical properties of each formation.
• Keep crystal balls and egg-shaped crystals from rolling around by setting them on hematite rings.
• Display any type or shape of crystal on plastic, wood, and metal stands.
• Keep tumbled stones in baskets, bowls, and clear glass jars.
• Tuck flowers and greenery around your crystals to make your crystals look like part of an outdoor landscape.
• Intersperse your display with other natural elements, such as feathers, driftwood, and shells.
• Display your crystals alongside figurines and small statues, or framed photographs of people you love.
• Tuck prayer cards or affirmations underneath some of your crystals.
• Add candles and incense burners to your collection.
• As seasons change, rearrange your displays. Try to incorporate elements that reflect the outside world, such as buds and blossoms in spring, cut flowers in summer, colored leaves in fall, and pine branches and pinecones in the winter.
• Create an altar to remind yourself of the beauty and sacredness of the physical objects in your life—not only the crystals, but also tokens and reminders of the people and activities you love. Your altar could be the top of a bedroom dresser, the mantle in your living room, a shelf in the kitchen, or a table in your front hall—anywhere you have the space and the desire to display your most meaningful items.
• Develop a calming Zen meditation garden by strategically placing your crystals in a shallow box or a tray filled with sand. Use a miniature rake, a stick, or your fingertips to sculpt waves and swirling patterns in the sand around the crystals.
Keep your crystals out and on display, and their beauty and charm will fill your home—and your heart—with light and energy.