Crystals: How to Use Crystals and Their Energy to Enhance Your Life (Hay House Basics) - Judy Hall 2015

Preparing your crystals
Crystal Foundations

To fully harness the power of your crystals, you need to take a few essential steps first. As crystals rapidly absorb negative energies and pick up the vibes of everyone who handles them, they need to be kept purified, so they require cleansing both before and after use.

They also need to be activated so that they work to their fullest potential. People often say, ’Crystals don’t work for me,’ and when I reply, ’Have you asked them to?’ they are surprised. But asking your crystals to work with you for your highest good — and that of others — amps up their power enormously.

You also need to look at what you intend to do with your crystal. Intention is the power that focuses your crystal on the task ahead. When you hold an intention, it directs the crystal energy. It’s a bit like putting the correct program onto your computer — you wouldn’t expect it to work without — but a crystal has its own intelligence and may well do even more than you asked.

So, let’s look at these essential steps now.

Remember, always work in an energetically clear, safe space (see Chapter 14).

First cleanse your crystal

This is a fundamental rule of working with crystals. No matter whether you’re working with a favourite crystal you’ve had for a long time or one you’ve just bought home from a shop, a crystal needs cleansing before use.

And it needs cleansing after use too. People say, ’This crystal used to work, but now it’s stopped.’ When asked, ’Have you cleaned it?’, they look perplexed. To keep a crystal working at optimum level, it needs regular cleansing and re-energizing. This is especially the case with crystal jewellery, which will be working for you whether you intend it to or not, so you may as well help it along. It will be collecting energies and will transmute them and pass on its properties to you as long as it’s kept clean.

Also note that crystals that are on display need to be cleansed frequently.

Exercise: Cleansing a crystal

✵ If your crystal is tumbled or robust, hold it under running water for a few minutes or carefully immerse it in a stream or the sea. Remember that salt water damages delicate crystals, especially those with many points on a bed or layers, so use it with care. Alternatively, use a drop of a proprietary crystal cleanser or spray your crystal with it. (To make a spray bottle, put 7 drops of the essence into pure spring water. You can add essential oils or vodka as a preservative, but the spray will keep for several days without. See Resources.)

✵ If the crystal is delicate, layered or friable, place it in brown rice overnight or pass it through the light of a candle or the smoke from a smudge stick, or use a proprietary cleanser in a spray bottle.

✵ Pop the crystal into sunlight or moonlight to recharge its batteries, or use a proprietary crystal recharger. One drop or a quick spray and it’s done.

Exercise: Feeling the difference

✵ Hold an uncleansed crystal for a few moments and note what you feel. Pay attention to your whole body as well as your hands.

✵ Then cleanse the crystal and hold it again and note the changes.

Asking a crystal to work with you

Crystals are very wise beings who see much further than we do, but if you don’t ask one to work with you, how does it know what you want it to do? Having said that, I try not to be too specific, as I feel it restricts the crystal if I only ask from my limited Earth perspective. So I ask for the crystal to work for my highest good and that of other people, and to do what is appropriate for my personal and spiritual growth, and I add ’this or something better’ or ’as appropriate’ to requests. There are times when I feel stuck in a situation I’d much rather get out of, but if there’s something I need to learn from it, or a gift I need to gain, scrambling out too quickly may lose me that opportunity. Therefore, I would rather have a crystal support me as I go through the necessary challenge and out the other side.

Exercise: Programming and charging

Holding a crystal and focusing on it for a few moments charges it up, filling it with intention.

✵ If you have a specific purpose in mind for your crystal, hold it between your hands.

✵ Concentrate your thoughts on the crystal and ask it to cooperate with you to fulfil that purpose in the best way possible and to attune itself to your purpose.

✵ Once you have stated your intention, let it go. To go on focusing on it is to force the energy, and that is counterproductive.

Getting to know your crystals

Each time you become the keeper of a new crystal, take the time to attune to it.

Exercise: Attuning to a crystal

✵ Open your palm chakras (see Exercise: Opening the palm chakras) and sit quietly holding your crystal in your hands.

✵ Breathe gently and focus your attention on the crystal. Ask that it works with you in love and truth for your highest good.

✵ Half close your eyes and simply gaze at your crystal. Ask it to communicate with you in the most appropriate way for you.

✵ Continue to breathe gently and be receptive to the response you get — which may come in the form of a bodily sensation, a feeling or an intuition.

✵ After a few minutes, notice how you feel. Are you calm and relaxed, or twitchy and jittery? Is an emotion rising? Does a particular part of your body tingle or ache? Is one of your chakras lighting up? (You’ll find a chakra diagram in Chapter 9 if you are unfamiliar with the location of these.)

✵ Move your crystal around your body to check out sensations and intuitions. If it feels good to keep it in a particular place, leave it there for a while. Don’t force anything, simply allow things to happen. Let the crystal be your guide.

✵ Ask yourself if your crystal is dropping thoughts into your mind. If so, trust the process. Or has your crystal found another way to communicate, through bodily or intuitive sensation, and so on? Crystals are creative beings.

✵ After five minutes or so, thank the crystal for its work, put it to one side and consciously disconnect your attention from it, unless your intuition tells you to keep it in your pocket or somewhere close by.

✵ Repeat for your other crystals.

Case history: Connecting to universal love

I picked up a piece of Tugtupite and held it to my heart. Instantly I felt my heart expand until it filled the whole universe. I was connected to everything and felt universal love flowing into and through every part of my being and into my cells — which included all the other parts of the universe. Everything was love. Even when I put the crystal down, the love stayed with me and I felt deep compassion for everything. (Source: workshop participant.)

If a crystal doesn’t feel right

If you don’t respond to the crystal within a few moments, put it aside and ask yourself, ’Have I cleansed this crystal?’ Then ask yourself, ’Have I asked it to work with me?’ Pick it up again, follow the steps above and if you still don’t feel in harmony with it, put it aside for now. Not every person responds to a specific crystal, or responds in the same way, even when they are in harmony with it.

Also, not every crystal will suit you, as your individual energy patterns will harmonize better with some crystal frequencies than others. It may be that a crystal that causes you discomfort when attuning simply isn’t the crystal for you at this time, so try another type. If a crystal feels uncomfortable or unappealing, however, it might be stirring up issues that need addressing later. If this is the case, see my book Life-Changing Crystals. That’s why learning to attune to a crystal quickly helps you to select exactly the right crystal for you, rather than picking one that someone else suggests. When you are starting out, always work with crystals that feel good.

Recording your experience

To get the most from your attunement sessions with crystals, write down all that you remember from them in a notebook. Record:

1. The date and time.

2. The moon phase (dark, new, waxing, waning or full).

3. Your mood before you started.

4. The type of crystal.

5. What you experienced.

6. How you felt afterwards.

This helps keep track of the effect that different crystals have on you, but it also charts whether you are more sensitive to crystal energies at particular times — the moon cycle affects your sensitivity, for instance, as can the time of day.

Deprogramming a crystal

Once you no longer need a crystal, deprogram it and put it away for a rest. People often forget to do this. Although cleansing may sometimes be sufficient, specific programs do need careful and intentional dismantling.

Exercise: Deprogramming

✵ To deprogram a crystal, cleanse it, then hold it in your hands.

✵ Thank it for working on your behalf and state that the work is now complete. Ask that any program in the crystal is dissolved and the crystal becomes quiescent until required again.

✵ You may wish to state that if the crystal is working on your behalf at a higher level of which you are unaware, it continues with that work.

Keeping your crystals active

Crystals benefit from regular cleansing and recharging. Having a monthly ’crystal day’ when you purify your crystals and then put them out into the sunlight or moonlight to recharge helps you to attune more closely with them and raises your own energies too. You can also meditate with your crystals then to see if they have anything to share with you (see Chapter 16).

Storing your crystals

Keep your crystal(s) in a drawer or box when not in use. Tumbled crystals can be stored together in a bag — add a Carnelian to keep them energetically purified and cleansed — but delicate crystals need to be wrapped separately.

SUMMARY

✵ Crystals need cleansing and programming before and after use.

✵ Always ask your crystal to work with you.

✵ Intention is the power that focuses your crystal on the task ahead.

✵ If a crystal doesn’t feel right for you, it may be because it is pushing your buttons. To begin with, work with crystals that feel good.