Ultimate guide to crystals and stones - Uma Silbey 2016
Emotional Healing
Crystal and Stone Healing
Mental/emotional constructs very often underlie not only mental illness, but physical illness as well. Our thoughts determine what we feel emotionally. For example, if we think we are being cheated, we will likely feel anger. If we think we are being treated with honor and respect, we most likely will feel happy. It doesn’t really matter that much what is happening in our lives; our thoughts about what is happening are more important. Like the glass half full versus half empty analogy, we have a choice in how we react to the circumstances in which we find ourselves. If someone is trying to harm us in some way, for example, we have a choice to either focus on our thoughts about how unfair this is and feel upset, or we can focus on thoughts about how this is teaching us compassion and feel peaceful and inspired. (Even though we feel compassion, we can still respond with appropriate action at the same time.) These continuous thoughts we have about our life and their accompanying emotions are what construct our sense of reality. This matrix of thought and emotion not only form the construction of our reality or everyday life experience, but our continual focus on them affects us physically.
Meditating, holding, or wearing these stones will help open our heart so we can receive healing from the higher spirit. The square and cross formation, centered with the heart, represent, among other things, the perfectly balanced heart that is open to trust.
Obviously, our mental and emotional bodies are determined by our thoughts and feelings, but so is our physical body. If we continually think we are fat and ugly, for example, not only will our bodies appear that way to us, but very often we will consciously or subconsciously do those things that will fulfill this expectancy, possibly stuffing ourselves with too much food, dressing poorly, or keeping ourselves away from people.
Though this is a rather simplistic and basic explanation of this issue, it is important that we, as crystal and stone healers, be cognizant of its importance. As we release blocked energy, open chakras and other energy centers, or help create any of the endless changes with our crystals and stones, we will find that more often than not these emotions consciously or subconsciously held within are released. If that happens, we need to know how to work with emotions.
It helps if we are comfortable with difficult emotions like sadness, anger, or depression as they arise. To do that, it is first necessary to be comfortable with these emotions as they arise within us. Rather than avoiding them, it is helpful to dive into them and dispassionately investigate, asking ourselves such questions as, “Where does this come from? What are the thought forms that support this emotion? How can I transform it to a more positive emotion?” When we can have our emotions, rather than be our emotions, letting them arise and then letting them go, not only will we be comfortable with any emotion as it arises within our consciousness, but we will be able to learn from them as we view the thought forms that support them. Most importantly, we will know that no emotion lasts forever.
Having learned from our own emotions, we can then work comfortably with the emotions of others. The first thing to remember in any emotional healing work is that if emotions arise as we do the healing, we should not ignore them, hoping they will go away. If we do that, not only will the released emotions tend to grow in importance and intensity, thereby negating the healing, but we also won’t be able to get at the heart of many of the healing issues that are presented to us. Even worse, we will probably increase the fear that the other has about the particular emotional state they are experiencing. If we are fearful, the other person will also be fearful.
Emotions can be worked with in several ways. One is to address the emotion directly, using visualization or verbal guidance to help the other first fully experience the emotion, and then helping them see the underlying experience and thoughts about the experience that hold the emotion in place. As we do this we should place a clear or pink stone on the heart center surrounded by nurturing green stones to help calm the person as they go through the experience. Surrounding their body with amethyst for healing and calming as well as a royal blue stone on the third eye to help the person gain insight is also useful during this process. As the person relives the initial incident or experiences the thoughts behind the emotion, it helps to constantly ground them, either using our hands and crystal to sweep downward, clearing their aura of negativity and grounding them into the earth, or placing earth colored stones beneath their feet.
It is especially important to let the person cry, to not be afraid of their tears. Sometimes people have the unspoken feeling that once they start crying there will be no end to it, and it will eventually destroy them. Help them to be unafraid of their tears. If possible, mirror their tears with your own, teaching them by example that it is okay to cry. If necessary, shift their focus away from the tearful emotion and thoughts, perhaps into their third eye where they can gain insight. Then drop their focus back to their tears, letting them cry more. Doing this several times will teach them that sorrow and tears will pass just as all emotions and thoughts do.
Another way of working with the emotions is to work to deconstruct the construction of thoughts that support the persistence of the emotional reactions. For example, if during the healing feelings of depression and hopelessness arise, we can guide the one being healed to notice what thoughts accompany these emotions. For example, they may discover that they carry the thought, “I’m no good. I can’t do anything right.” As we help them investigate further, they may discover that a parent treated them with disrespect, repeatedly saying that they were stupid or other things that belittled them. As a result, the child took on the parent’s evaluation and began to think, “I’m no good.” Or, a parent may have left the family, causing the young child to decide that if he or she was a better child the parent may not have left. Once thinking these things, the child began to experience their world through these negative filters, seeing everything they did as not good enough, every time thinking of ways they could have been more perfect, done a better job, or been a better person. Furthermore, in a self-fulfilling prophecy, the child may have acted out these thoughts, acting stupid or incapable, which further affirmed their stupidity or “badness,” to which they reacted with even more negative thinking. This painful negative thinking can be buried deep within the subconscious or overtly expressed in their daily life. In this way, an edifice of negative thinking comes to be built on that which the negative emotions and illness thrive and increase. For example, the person may start experiencing sore throats from holding back their tears from such emotions, or feel constant anger burning within them, perhaps resulting in stomach issues such as indigestion, or in an extreme form, cancer. In this case, when we begin working with their stomach these emotions may erupt within the session.
Still using the above example, we can work with these emotions using the deconstruction method. We can do this with the help of visualization, guiding the person into a safe healing chamber or imagined environment while we assist them to notice their thoughts and their decisions about those thoughts. Once they notice their thought construction, ask them if they would be willing to change the thought to another more positive thought of their choosing. (Sometimes people are not willing because their thoughts and suffering are familiar and they are afraid to jump into the unfamiliar, or their particular thought/emotion construction, though painful, serves to define them, and they don’t know who they will be without this definition.) Once they can do that, their associated emotions will likely shift to be more positive.
During this process, it is important to use our stones to help ground them, help them feel the nurturing energy of nature or the higher spirit, and assist their ability to be insightful. If fear, shame, or any other such debilitating emotion arises, help them to stay focused on their heart center and find the self-acceptance within. We can also use our stones to help bring courage to face what may be difficult. Often acknowledging the person’s courage will help as well as using our stones. During this process it is important that we be insightful as we follow them on this journey without telling them how to change, instead assisting them to discover it themselves. Again, it is also important that we remain empathetic and accepting of all that they tell us and all the experiences they present to us.
Another way we can help shift emotions is to use our colored stones, either placed on the body or surrounding it in an empowerment energy grid. Using the above example, if anger is experienced as red fire, we may want to place a soft green stone on the body where we sense the fire. The green will counterbalance the red, and as it assists in its transmutation of the fire, the other person may feel their anger soften. There is no hard and fast rule as to which stones to use, so it is important to use our empathic intuition, to harmonize with the energy of the stones, and then let them guide us in our work. Above all, we must listen to the guiding voice of the higher spirit.
Finally, it is important to realize the power of listening. Often people just want someone to hear them, to “get” them as they are without trying to change anything. That alone can bring healing. In our healing work, it is most helpful, then, to develop the ability to just listen to another without trying to solve the problem or issue or otherwise do anything about it. Just hearing another can be healing in itself. After listening, you can then ask if they would like to work with what they presented. If so, continue with your stone and crystal emotional healing work.
THE ABILITY TO JUST LISTEN AND UNDERSTAND
ARE POWERFUL HEALING TOOLS.