The Magic of Flowers: A Guide to Their Metaphysical Uses & Properties - Tess Whitehurst 2013

Lily
The Flowers

Aligned with numerous goddesses, angels, and saints (including Quan Yin, Mother Mary, Venus, Archangel Gabriel, and Saint Anthony), and a traditional symbol of purity and protection, the lily just may be a visual manifestation of divine energy. With her strong and sweet fragrance, her perfect magical blend of delicate and bold, and her breathtaking appearance, she is a worthy representative of the heavenly realm.

Please be advised: as it says on a plaque at my vet’s office, lilies kill cats! So if you live with one or more felines, you might want to find another ingredient or at least exercise extreme caution when working with lilies (or, to play it especially safe, employ the flower essence). Still, if you make it yourself, be extra careful and be sure you’re in a cat-free zone.

Magical Uses

Angel Invocation

Lilies are especially aligned with the angelic realm: in fact, their energy might be thought of as one and the same. If you’d like to bring more angelic energy into your life, spend time with lilies, add lilies to an altar dedicated to the angels, or work with the flower essence.

Divine Assistance

In fact, lilies are not just aligned with angels but also with the entirety of the divine and heavenly realm—and especially divine energy that is both strong and feminine (see “goddess alignment” later in this entry.) And since, in truth, we are all fountains of the same divine radiance, the more we align with the divine realm, the truer, more authentic, and more harmonious our lives become. To receive these benefits, spend time with lilies, add lilies to an altar dedicated to the angels, or work with the flower essence.

Divine Love

If one were to attempt to describe divine energy, one word in the English language could be used more accurately for this purpose than any of the rest, and that word is love. Of course, the word love is also used in a lot of other ways, including “I love that restaurant” or “How’s your love life?” But when we want to align more closely with the truest and most potent meaning of the word—i.e., divine love—every aspect of our life benefits, including all our relationships.

Divine Beauty

If it’s your magical intention to radiate beauty that is so potent, pure, and goddesslike that you intimidate some people, lily is very likely the ingredient for you. To illustrate what I mean, imagine for a moment that Isis or Venus walked into a bar or nightclub: while she would doubtless be the most beautiful woman there, she wouldn’t exactly inspire boldness in potential suitors. On the other hand, if someone were to approach her, there’s a pretty good chance he’d be on the level. (And if not, she’d know it in a heartbeat.) But the point is, we don’t always want to be beautiful just so that we can attract pick-up lines: perhaps we’re preparing for our wedding or a special belly-dance performance or we’re just ready to exude goddesslike beauty as a matter of course. In any case, to awaken your goddesslike beauty, work lily into your magic, take lily essence, surround yourself with lily blossoms, or create the lotion potion below.

“BEAUTY OF THE GODDESS” LOTION POTION

Mix six drops stargazer, oriental, or Asiatic lily essence into a bottle of unscented lotion. Also add twenty drops ylang ylang essential oil and ten drops jasmine essential oil. Shake well. Hold in both hands, call on Isis or Venus, and ask her to bless the lotion with her blindingly beautiful divine essence. Apply after bathing or showering anytime you’d like to exude intense, mesmerizing, and, yes, intimidating beauty.

Entity Clearing and Protection

Because lilies are so aligned with the divine realm (like lilacs), they can create a doorway of light to help wayward spirits and earthbound entities cross over. For those stubborn spirits who want to stay in this realm, lilies can help move them out of the space and get them out of our hair. And lilies can also help protect spaces by preventing entities from entering in the first place. To experience these benefits, employ lilies in your own space-clearing rituals or try either of the practices below.

STARGAZER CLEARING SPRAY

If you live, work, or spend a lot of time in a place where you feel earthbound entities seem to gather and linger, you might want to add forty drops stargazer lily essence to a mister of rose water. Mist the space as necessary to evacuate the unwanted guests and lighten the energy.

TIGER LILY PROTECTION

Author Judika Illes, in The Element Encyclopedia of 5000 Spells, suggests planting tiger lilies near windows and doors to prevent ghosts (a.k.a. earthbound entities) from entering the space.

Goddess Alignment

Anytime you’d like to invoke or align with the energy of the divine feminine, you might like to employ the magic of lilies. For example, you could place a bouquet on a goddess altar, add lily essence to your water, or create a “goddess garden” by planting lilies and other goddess-invoking plants (such as lavender and rosemary) near a statue of a particularly bold, beautiful goddess of your choice.

Harmony and Ease

Lily’s very potent alignment with divine energy and assistance means that she can help smooth out life’s little difficulties and infuse our lives with feelings of harmony and ease. So if you’ve been feeling harried, harassed, overwhelmed, or annoyed by life in general, try adding four or six drops lily essence to your drinking water in the morning immediately upon awakening. To help with clutter clearing (another way to bring in more harmony and ease), mist the space with rose water into which you’ve added six drops lily essence.

Legal Success

Provided you’re in the right, lily’s divine powers can help you realize swift and harmonious success in situations related to fairness and justice, such as court battles, neighbor or coworker disputes, and insurance claims. Work dried lily or lily essence into charms and rituals designed for the purpose, or perform the following ritual.

LILY IMMERSION RITUAL AND CHARM FOR LEGAL SUCCESS

The night before the case, add forty drops lily essence to your bath water and soak for at least forty minutes. Before bed, add four drops lily essence to a cup of chamomile tea, sweeten to taste, and drink. In the morning, wake up before sunrise and drink a cup of coffee or tea containing four drops lily essence. As the sun is rising, place part of a fresh lily blossom in a small red flannel bag, along with a pyrite crystal and two cloves of star anise. Tie closed with hemp twine. Hold it in both hands and say:

I now invoke the swift and powerful assistance of the divine and heavenly realms. Great Goddess Isis, queen of heaven, I call on you. Thank you for staying with me and granting me success.

Safety-pin it to the inside of your clothes, ideally near your heart or belly. Bring a bottle of water with you to court containing four drops lily essence to sip.

Safe and Harmonious Travel

As you may imagine, lily’s divine alignment and powers of swiftness and ease make her a wonderful ingredient for magic relating to travel. For example, if you’d like to conjure up a delightful trip to a certain locale, you might place a picture of that locale on your altar and put a bouquet of fresh lily blossoms next to it as you say a simple prayer invoking the assistance of Isis, angels, or simply the “realm of heaven.” To help ensure a safe and harmonious voyage, add two drops lily essence to your coffee or tea the morning of the trip.

Magical Correspondences

Element: Water

Gender: Female

Planet: Venus