I acknowledge my poor neglected blog, so this year, I want to focus more energy on my blog, newsletter, and writing about my work (and maybe finishing one of those books I have started). I am going to mix it up with pieces about tarot, crystals, soul work, incorporating mysticism and shamanic work into your life, earth medicine, and earth centered parenting. So, I thought I would answer some of these questions on my blog, have some conversations with people in the community, and just muse on my own. So, send me your crystal questions, or tarot questions, or spiritual questions you'd like to hear me tackle in the blog. Now onto my musings for today.
When people who begin getting interested in crystals come to my classes, or email me on-line, the questions they generally ask me revolve around normal logistical questions. One of the questions I get the most is "How do you store your crystals?"
I have many ways of keeping my crystals. First, I have this beautiful cabinet that my friend gave me from her father's art studio. They kept his slides for artwork and inspiration. I have kept his letters, and now fill it alphabetically with crystals. I have one of these cabinets at work in my healing studio and one in my home, and yes, they are both filled with crystals.
Inside this cabinet, I have each crystal in a bag labeled with the crystal name and sometimes the Moh's hardness, etc. These are things I like to know, and even though I am pretty good at identifying crystals, it is much easier to have them listed out and accessible in each drawer. It is my Earth-sign nature to keep things color-coded and alphabetized.
This is primarily for tumblies that I sell or give to clients. I often give little mojo bags to clients. I sometimes have rare smaller crystals that I have one piece of in these cabinets too. For gridding, I have bought art bins and storage bins for art supplies. I find that trying to come up with six crystals of relatively the same size and color can be difficult. I never seemed to have the right amount at the right time, and sometimes I have two extra-large tumblies and four small ones. So, I began collecting and buying crystals six at a time, or if I buy a nice pound or two for a class or the boutique at Alta View Wellness Center , I will nick six of them for gridding. I store them together in these containers. The top open one is for smaller tumbled stones. I always store six stones, as that is sort of the number I use for most of my gridding. The one on the bottom has bigger specimen pieces for gridding or tumblies for gridding. It is about 4" deep. I had them labeled, but they don't completely match anymore to their label.
I do have larger specimen pieces that I use to center grids, or for altar making. I keep them in our old secretary with fossils, old bottles I collect and other curio items. I keep it them all in my meditation room, so the vibe in there is Ah-mazing. It is probably my favorite place in the house.
For my crystal healing practice, I have to carry my crystals back and forth from my home to the office. I share the room with other healers, and one of them talked about how the vibration is too strong for her clients, so they began traveling. It isn't the easiest situation. Rocks are heavy, and I like to keep a variety available for my clients. So I found this perfect case for them and it has broken and cracked, and I still keep using it because I cannot find another that is exactly the depth and size I need for my practice. I took a picture of it this afternoon after weeding out the crystals I am taking with me to Tucson for the Gem Show, so it isn't as full as normal.
Again, I chakra coordinated it, and it holds nice thick pieces and also small ones stay together. I also keep full layouts I use on people in there. I keep this and some of my items I need for a healing session--like a huge magnetite, selenite wand, eye pillow, pendulums, and a box of lemurians, malachite, smoky quartz point, auralite 23 wand and another laser wand for special work--in a box carrying case from thirty-one bags. Someone once came to a class I had and saw my carrying container and snarkily said, "A shaman carrying a thirty-one bag?!? Now I have seen it all." I don't call myself a shaman, but other people do, and their ideas about what a shaman, mystic or healer is and is not is really none of my business (this should probably be a whole blog post in and of itself!). But my first response was, "Shamans are practical, and this thirty-one bag can carry a whole hell of a lot of stones." It is the most durable bag I have. Seriously!
That was a serious tangent. A tangent supreme.
AT any rate, the whole reason all of this came up is that I am trying to find a way to carry a very pared down version of my healing kit to Tucson without exceeding the weight limit in my bag, busting crystals or otherwise causing crystal mayhem. So, I went searching on-line and found my friend and fellow ACM Paula Martin's etsy shop with these cute little chakra bags that zipper. Then I bought a cool larger bag from East and Market. And it fits everything.
I love that it is color coordinated, and I can easily find which crystals go where. It also fits my selenite wand and my huge magnetite, which I posed next to my normal size hand for perspective.
And unbelievably, it all squishes in there. All my chakra stones, a few five + inch crystals (lemurians and smoky) and other smaller crystal points for bridging chakras, plus fifteen hematite for a few layouts...it's amazing and only 8 pounds. (um, maybe I shouldn't say only.)
Eh, voila! So, these are the various ways I carry crystals and store them in my home. How about you? Where do you keep your crystals? How? Let me know in the comments, and don't forget to share what you want to read about on this blog and in my newsletter.
Love,
Angie