9 - Healing Magick
Herbs have been used for healing since time immemorial in cultures all over the world. In herbal medicine, the herbs whose properties alleviate a particular illness or state of mind are taken internally or applied to the physical body externally. However, in healing magick, light and healing energies are transmitted through colour, crystals, herbs, oils and incenses and used as a focus for transferring healing energies to trigger the body and mind's own immune system, through visualisation and telepathic waves. In this way, healing magick is akin to spiritual healing.
By directing the natural restorative energies of the Earth, nature and the cosmos towards a sick or distressed person, animal or place through mind or soul flow, we can stimulate and amplify their self-healing powers.
A number of witches are formally trained in the healing arts, using both conventional methods, such as surgery, and alternative therapies, such as chiropractic, aromatherapy and Reiki. Witches may also be members of healing associations, and conventional medicine is increasingly recognising the value of alternative and much older methods.
But many witches without any formal training in either conventional medical treatment or spiritual healing follow the tradition of the wise men and women, the Wicca. These practitioners passed their craft down over centuries, from one generation to the next, but we also all have an innate ability to heal, which tells us how to soothe a loved one's headache or a child's distress. If you do wish to learn more of the craft see pages 299 and 305-7 where I have listed books on herbalism and aromatherapy and healing organisations.
Unlike some modern physicians or surgeons, who sometimes regard the prolonging of life as the major purpose of their work, regardless of the quality of that life, many witch healers, like other spiritual healers, accept that sometimes decline and death are inevitable. So they work to ease the parting and the passing over, knowing that this life is not the end. Magical healing has a very gentle tradition.
You can carry out healing with the sick person present, by directing the light and energies towards them. This can be done, for example, through a candle flame set between you. Alternatively, you can circle a pendulum over their head, widdershins to remove pain for whole-body healing or to ease a painful place, and deosil to restore energies. If the subject is absent, you can visualise them and send healing light across the cosmos. Healing magick can also be used with your pets, and for more general purposes, such as healing a particular place or the planet.
Do note that I am not claiming that the methods of magick healing given in this chapter will always effect a complete cure; if you suffer from a chronic or acute condition that does not quickly improve, you should consult your conventional doctor or registered alternative medical practitioner. However, magick has successfully been used in speeding healing, partly, it would seem, by stimulating the body's own self-healing system, operating through the close connection between mind, body and spirit in a way that the medical profession is only now beginning to understand.
Creating A Healing Sanctuary
Many practitioners use their magical altar for healing work and because each piece of work is related, this adds to the positive energies already concentrated there. However, if you have room, you might like to set aside a corner specifically for healing.
You can use a table or any flat surface for your altar. On it, you should keep a single, pure beeswax or white candle; this is a symbol of the unity of all life and the one divine source that flows through every natural being, whether it is male or female, god or goddess, animal, bird, fish, tree, plant or stone. You will also need your special healing crystals, perhaps arranged in a circle around the candle and a clear crystal sphere or crystal pendulum for directing sunlight and moonlight.
The crystals could include gentle rose quartz and amethyst for healing all ills and bringing harmony, moonstone for female and hormonal disorders and for fertility, citrine for energy and lifting depression, and agates for balancing energies. Later in this section I have listed some healing crystals I use under their different colours, as these are related to healing properties. You can also refer to the list of crystals in the previous chapter on psychic protection.
You can also keep here pots of healing herbs, seasonal fruit, flowers, nuts and seeds that will be empowered by the healing energies. These can regularly be given to anyone feeling tired or anxious - not forgetting yourself.
A covered jar of empowered salt and a bottle of sacred water are also important. However, you might like to bless them before use, in the name of the Goddess, a healing deity or simply the powers of goodness and light, by passing them three times over the healing candle flame.
You will also need somewhere to keep all you need for your healing work that you can also use in more general magical work with a healing focus. You might have a box at the side of the altar, or, if you adapt a cupboard for your altar, you could use the space inside it. In this place you would have your dried herbs, healing oils and incenses, favourite flower essences, coloured bottles containing empowered water and small crystals or glass nuggets. You could also collect twigs or small carved artefacts from healing trees, such as ash, olive, rowan, palm and aspen. (See page 139 for details of incenses and page 128 for information on oils.)
On the table in front of the candle you could keep a special healing book in which you could write the names of people or places you know who need healing. These could include pets, a hospital or hospice with which you have connections, sanctuaries for injured creatures, threatened species and places. It is better to have this separate, rather than as part of your Book of Shadows, but if you prefer you can use your Book of Shadows for both areas of work.
You might also like to keep a special 'Loving Connections' section for the names of friends or family members who are away from home and may be feeling lonely, and also anyone from whom you are estranged.
A bound journal with blank pages is good for this kind of work or you could buy a leather loose-leaf binder and insert blank pages with dates. If you work in a group, one member can be responsible for regularly updating the book.
A Ritual For Creating Healing Magick
Each evening or morning - or whenever you have time - light your healing candle and hold one of your special crystals and your crystal sphere or pendulum and focus on of the names in your book, sending the candlelight reflected though the crystal to wherever it is needed. The traditional healing hour is ten o' clock at night, but what is more important is that the time is one where you can be quiet and are not pressurised by other demands. Begin by holding a healing crystal and focusing the energies through the candle flame; you can then extend this ritual for specific healing purposes.
You will need a photograph, newspaper cutting or symbol of the person, animal or place to which you are sending healing energies.
* Take a dish of sacred water and place it near the candle.
* Hold the symbol of the person to be healed between your hands and speak a few words of love and reassurance as though they were with you. If you have already created for the sick person a herb poppet (see page 108) or sachet (see page 106), hold that between your hands and repeat the original herb empowerment or sit in silence recreating the ritual in your mind. You can add words of healing as above. If the object of the healing is a place, such as a lake or woodland under threat, imagine that you are in that place.
* Circle your crystal pendulum or a pointed healing crystal over the symbol (or sachet or poppet) nine times widdershins, saying as a mantra:
Go, pain and sorrow, change to star or sunbeam, transformed in joy and in tranquillity.
* Plunge the pendulum into the water and hold it to the light so the drops of water fall off and scatter as rainbow light beams all around the symbol. You can also create the light beams by angling your candle or hanging rainbow crystals in your window. It is not cheating, but directing natural forces for a purpose and infusing physical light beams with spiritual energies. Mirrors are another good way of reflecting light beams.
* Now circle the pendulum nine times deosil over the symbol, saying:
Sunbeam, star beam, rays of light, replace, restore, renew, rejoice.
* Blow out the candle, sending the light to the sick or sorrowing person, saying:
Go, light of healing, radiance of love and friendship, to where you are needed most this night, with - [name the person, animal or location].
May blessings fall, darkness and doubts recede into nothingness. So may it be in the name of all that is good and loving and pure [or 'in the name of the Goddess', if you prefer].
If you are feeling ill, worried or afraid you can go to your healing place and light the candle, holding your favourite crystal and expressing softly your needs and fears. However, the more healing you carry out for others, the more harmony will fall on you under the Threefold Law.
If you are working with friends or in a group, after showering it with light beams, pass the symbol round to each person, adding individual blessings. Give each person a small, white candle to set before them so that they can personally send light and blessings.
The words can be spoken as a joint mantra or chant.
A Short Ritual For Absent Healing
This can be carried out once a month for those who regularly need your help and support. Use natural candles such as beeswax rather than paraffin-based for this ritual if possible.
* Light your healing candle and burn rose or lavender incense or a healing oil, such as Chamomile or rosewood.
* Read through all the names in your healing book, adding any new ones to the list and giving thanks for any who have recovered.
* Speak your own prayer or mantra to your god, the Goddess, or any healing deities who seem appropriate. You may call upon an Archangel or the benign powers of Light and Love, if this seems more meaningful. Each person present can again add blessings.
* Leave the candle and incense to burn away and bury any ash or wax afterwards in the earth beneath a tree.
A Healing Ritual With Sunlight And Moonlight
This is a very magical form of healing and can be carried out either alone or as a group activity. Quartz crystal balls were traditionally used medicinally to concentrate the rays of sunlight upon a diseased or painful area of the body or in the direction of some internal organ.
This clear crystal stone has always been associated with energising powers and with healing. In its spherical form of completeness, it is perhaps the ultimate healing and magical stone. You can buy tiny spheres quite cheaply and these work just as well as a large crystal ball.
Sunlight is good for energising and improving physical health and vitality, encouraging re-growth and regeneration, and for matters of the mind where clarity and optimism are needed.
Moonlight is potent for removing illness or pain and for all problems concerning emotions, hormones or fertility and is especially effective in healing women, children and pets.
* Direct the sunlight or the light of the full moon into your crystal sphere, so that it shines on the person you are healing, or their photograph or other symbol. If you are using sunlight, be careful that the crystal does not become too hot and of course do not look directly at the image of the Sun.
* Stand in a circle in the open air and in the centre, place a dish of pure spring water. Use a golden coloured bowl for sunlight, and a silver bowl for moonlight.
* Into the water, drop tiny clear quartz crystals (if you are working in a group, each person adds one crystal). As you cast the crystals, make a wish for healing the sick or distressed person.
* Hold a crystal pendulum and swirl it on its chain to catch within it either rainbows or sunbeams, or the silver light of the Moon.
* Cast the beams into the water, calling:
Go forth with love and healing. You can, if you prefer, create your own words.
* Pour the water into a clear glass bottle with a stopper and send or give it to the sick person. They may drink it or use it in a bath.
* Return the energies to the cosmos by placing yellow flowers or seeds in a pot for the golden energies if you used sunlight, and white flowers for the Moon.
Colour Healing
Colour has long been believed to have the power to influence not only our moods, but our physical well-being. The Babylonians called the healing power of light 'the medicine of the gods'. Healing colours have been used for thousands of years in Chinese treatments and in Ayurveda, an ancient Indian medicine. The Ancient Egyptians wore amulets of coloured stones: red to treat disease, yellow for happiness and prosperity, and green for fertility.
Colour healing is not just a fancy: we know for a fact that each beam of coloured light has its own wavelength and is absorbed by the body through the skin and the optic nerves. This triggers complex biochemical changes. Each of the seven primary wavelengths or vibrations of light visible to the human eye focuses on different parts of the body, evoking in them both a physiological and psychological response. Red has the longest wavelength of visible colour and violet the shortest. The colours that we can see make up only a very small segment of the electromagnetic spectrum and lie between the infra red and ultra violet rays.
Methods Of Using Colour For Healing
You can use specific colours to charge water with magical healing energies. You can then drink this water or pour it into your bath, to absorbing the essence of the colour. You can also place one of the appropriately coloured healing crystals listed below in water for a few hours to increase its life force.
Coloured candles may also be used: light a candle in the appropriate colour, then breathe in the specific colour energies and exhale the darkness. This can be practised alone either for your own benefit or to direct the colour energies towards a sick person.
Colour breathing, which is used to create a cone of power (see page 40) is another healing method. You can also co-ordinate healing breathing within a group, again directing the energies to where they are needed.
Healing With Crystals And Colour
The healing colour associations listed here are drawn from a variety of traditions and my own experience. You may find that for you the colour correspondences are different - this is the reason there are so many alternative systems. I have included the key colours here, but you can also refer back to the colour correspondences that I mentioned from page 90 onwards in the section on candles.
White / Clear
White is for limitless potential, clarity of vision, the life force, integration, seeking what is of worth.
White can form a focus for all kinds of healing since it is the synthesis of all other colours. It promotes health and healing, integration of mind, body and soul. White light is a natural pain-reliever, and can help to protect against cerebral disorders, increase breast milk in nursing mothers, speed the mending of broken bones and relieve calcium deficiency and toothache.
Clear crystals include diamonds, clear crystal quartz, zircon and pure white stones, especially those from the sea.
Red
Red is for power, courage, energy and vitality.
Red restores energy levels and is good for raising blood pressure and improving circulation, promoting cellular growth and activity; red crystals are used in healing blood ailments, especially anaemia. Red light is linked to reproduction and fertility and relieves sexual dysfunction especially impotence; it also helps with pains in feet, hands and bones. Red crystals include agate, jasper, pyrites and garnets.
Orange
Orange is for confidence, assimilation of knowledge and experience, personal desire and needs, the boundaries between self and others.
Orange, like red, is a colour of energy and warmth, easing arthritis, rheumatism and increasing the pulse rate, relieving gall-bladder and kidney pains and stones, menstrual and muscle cramps and allergies, and lifting exhaustion. Orange is also used to strengthen the immune system.
Orange crystals include amber, agate, coral and carnelian.
Yellow
Yellow is for happiness, the mind, intellect, communication and willpower.
Yellow stimulates the nervous system, improving memory and concentration, easing eczema and other skin problems; it also promotes a healthy metabolism and calms anxiety and stress-related ailments that may affect the digestive system adversely.
Yellow crystals include jasper, topaz, calcite and citrine.
Green
Green is for the heart, emotions, peace and balance and all gentle re-growth.
Green lowers high blood pressure, acting as a restorative for the heart, lungs and respiratory system and fighting infections and viruses, especially influenza, bronchitis, fevers and colds. It also counters panic attacks, addictions and food-related illnesses. Green is a good healing colour because it stimulates tissue and cell growth and general body regeneration.
Green crystals include jade, malachite, olivine (peridot), emerald and cat's eye.
Turquoise
Turquoise is for tranquillity, empathy, altruism and wisdom.
Turquoise strengthens the immune system, soothes inflammation and calms the nerves. It helps to relieve asthmatic and general respiratory difficulties and skin complaints such as eczema, swellings and thyroid problems.
Turquoise crystals include aquamarine, malachite, opal and turquoise.
Blue
Blue is for ideals, the expansion both of perspective and physical horizons and authority, and for allowing what is not of value to be gradually replaced by higher purpose and direction.
Blue is called the healing colour because a blue aura is often seen around healers. It is a soothing and cooling natural antiseptic, relieving burns, cuts, bruises, insomnia, inflammation of the skin and mouth, sore throats and childhood rashes and teething pains; blue also lowers high temperatures and high blood pressure. All shades of blue, such as violet and indigo, reduce migraines and headaches.
Blue crystals include sodalite, lapis lazuli, sapphire, blue lace agate and turquoise.
Purple
Purple is for inner vision, psychic awareness and spirituality, the colour of the evolving soul.
Purple is cleansing and uplifting, counteracting doubts and negativity.
Within the range of purples, specific shades are good for certain areas of the body, though in practice they are usually interchangeable.
Indigo helps to ease eye, ear, nose and skin problems and migraines, and soothes the nervous system. It aids healing of deep tissue and bones and is a natural sedative.
Lavender increases the power of all herbs, oils and flower and tree essences used in healing.
Violet is effective for treating allergies, asthma, sleep disorders and stress-related illnesses.
Purple crystals include amethyst, sugilite, sodalite, peacock's eye (bornite) and purple kunzite.
Rose
Rose (or pink) is for unconditional love, reconciliation and gentleness and for soothing loss.
Rose is the gentle healer, promoting restful sleep, pleasant dreams and optimism. Ear, eye and gland problems, head pains and psychosomatic illnesses fall under its auspices, as do disorders relating to children and babies, especially fretfulness and hyperactivity.
Rose crystals include pink kunzite, rose quartz, tourmaline and coral.
Magenta
Magenta is for spirituality expressed in the everyday world, for originality of vision and for a path of service to others.
Magenta is good for all matters concerning the mid-life crisis, menopause and anything that blocks physical or spiritual fertility.
Magenta crystals include sugilite, rhodonite and rhodoschrite.
Brown
Brown is for nurturing powers, for acceptance of frailty in oneself and others, and earthing power. Brown heals stress, restores physical energy and gives the strength to go on under difficulty. It aids the healing of the feet, legs, hands, skeleton and large intestine. It also heals the Earth and its animals.
Brown crystals include rutilated quartz, tiger's eye, fossilised wood, desert rose and leopardskin jasper.
Grey
Grey is the colour of compromise, adaptability and the ability to merge into the background, and keep one's own counsel.
Grey is good for healing the immune system and for calming stress and fears, giving peaceful dreams and helping the subconscious mind to work though conflicts. It is also good for bones.
Grey crystals include smoky quartz, apache tears and grey-banded agate.
Black
Black is for transitions, regeneration, acceptance of life as it is, the positive confrontation of mortality and an awareness that we are all ultimately alone.
Black heals the feet, legs and bones, and helps to heal trauma and leave behind old stresses and anxieties. It encourages rest, cures insomnia and assists in working through loss. It is used only rarely in healing, followed by the infusion of light as, unless used carefully, it can bring out dormant depression. Breathing out black and darkness and breathing in light and colour is very restorative.
Black crystals include jet, apache tears, smoky quartz and onyx.
Silver
Silver is for meaningful dreams, visions, a desire for fulfilment beyond the material world and hidden potential.
Silver alleviates hormonal problems in men and women, regularises and heals the female menstrual and reproduction system and assists in all matters of fertility. It eases water retention and nightmares.
Silver crystals include moonstones, whose colour deepens as the Moon waxes, haematite, mother of pearl, snow and milky quartz and rutilated quartz.
Gold
Gold is for perfection, immortality and peak experiences, visions and the achievement of major life goals, especially those that change the world.
Gold is especially potent for overcoming addictions, obsessions and compulsions and relieving depression. Gold is the most powerful healing colour of all, associated with long life and immortality, and will give a surge of healing energy in any chronic or debilitating illnesses.
Gold crystals include amber, golden tiger's eye, topaz and citrine.
A Colour Healing Ritual With Candles
Candles of specific colours can help in the healing process. If you are not certain of the root of a problem, you can use a white or pure beeswax candle, plus, if you wish, one for the perceived area of pain. For your monthly major healing sessions, this ritual can be used after the names have been read, working with pink or white candles to include everyone in the book who is sick or sad. It is especially good for chronic conditions or when healing may take some time. This is a gentler method than creating a cone of colour. Early evening just after dusk is a good time to work.
* Choose a candle of the appropriate colour. Extinguish all other lights.
* If the person to be healed is present, they can work with you in building up the energies. Sit on cushions on either side of the candle, allowing room for movement.
* Place a dish of small dish of dried rosemary or lavender for general healing next to the candle. If the healing is for yourself or for someone who is absent, light the candle. If you are working as a group, sit in a circle, each person holding their own coloured candle (you can make rainbow with different colours round the circle if you wish), with a large white candle in the centre. Each person will also need a small dish of herbs.
* Gaze into the flame and if there are others present, ask them to do the same, gently drawing in the coloured light and exhaling darkness or pain.
* Breathe in and take in the light, as you do so saying in your mind:
Welcome, light.
* Hold the breath while you mentally count 'One and two and three', then send out the healing energies, saying silently:
Farewell, pain [or sorrow, darkness, etc.].
* Continue to breathe and visualise the colour entering and radiating and the darkness or pain fading away. If you are working in a group, one person can sit near the central candle and speak the words or drum the rhythm of the breathing. You may hear clairaudiently (in your mind) the collective voices rising and falling. After a time, you will see with your mind's eye that the same colour breath is being inhaled and exhaled by each person, and at this stage the healing energies are balanced.
* Gently circle your arms over your head and sway from side to side, either sitting, kneeling or standing, while scattering gently your healing herbs like a gentle shower of rain (your hair will shine wonderfully when you next wash it). At the same time, chant softly:
Go forth, increase and multiply, cosmic light intensify, healing Earth and Sea and Sky.
* When the energies feel right, add to the last chant a final long melodious 'Heal!' and extinguish the candle(s), letting the light and sound fade into the silence.
* Press your hands and feet gently to the ground and let the energies flow back into the Earth, saying softly:
We thank you, Mother Earth, for healing blessings soon to be received.
Healing With Water And Coloured Glass
Spring water placed in glass bottles of the appropriate colour will absorb the colour energies and can be used in rituals of all kinds, magical as well as healing. They can be further empowered by adding crystals of the same colour as the bottle to the water. If possible, work out of doors.
You can use this method for endowing living energies into any symbol of healing, such as an amulet, popper, sachet or even a photograph of the person to be healed. Use bottles with stoppers or corks (these can be obtained from most household shops or from antique stalls). Build up your collection so that you have a bottle of the correct colour for every need. Although the water retains its clear colour, some people are able to detect a faint glow of the colour.
As before, the water can be drunk or added to a bath, in order to benefit from the energies. You can also add water to an animal bowl or a place in which wild birds come to drink, use it for plants that are failing to thrive or pour some in a polluted water source or on barren land.
You will remember, for example, that water from a pink or indigo bottle will bring harmony and gentle healing calm. But more specifically, a drink in a teenager's lunch box made with pink water will heal any hurts and fears a sensitive youngster experiences in the outside world. Clear water to which a quartz crystal has been added is an instant energiser, transmitting the life force in concentrated form.
You can use the colour-infused water in rituals to send healing to a species, people or place far away by sprinkling a circle of water around a picture or symbol.
You can empower a larger quantity than you immediately need, and pour it into small bottles of different colours, preserved in your fridge for future healing work when they are needed. By combining the magical and healing colour associations of the different colours, you can adapt your empowered waters for almost any need.
Water made in a soft blue bottle empowered with a blue lace agate softens harsh words: use it for making coffee if difficult relatives come to call. A darker blue, perhaps empowered in a deep blue bottle with a sodalite crystal, is calming and so the infused colour would help to alleviate panic experienced when flying. Just moisten a small cloth with it, take the cloth on to the aircraft and dab it on your temples and pulse points on take-off and landing or at other times when you feel panic rising.
Healing the body is only one small part of health and so you should experiment and note any uses you find for your infused waters. Take some colour-charged water to work or to a difficult social event in a mineral water bottle. In my on-going struggle with my weight, I have found that orange water in which a carnelian has been soaked is wonderful for restoring balance and self-esteem and so preventing food binges.
A Healing Ritual With Coloured Glass
This method of healing is one of the oldest in traditional folk magick, using the equivalent of the ceremonial elemental substances that I wrote of in Chapter 6. Folk magick was originally based on substances that have comprised the diet of ordinary people for thousands of years. They are all infused symbolically as well as actually with the life force.
* Empower your water, if you wish, and pour it into the chosen coloured bottle. Close your bottle and surround it with a circle of fruits, unprocessed food, flowers or crystals of the colour to be used. Leave space between the bottle and the edge of the circle.
* Inside the circle, to the North of the bottle, place a large golden, white or orange vegetable, preferably grown under or close to the ground. This represents the fruits of the Earth, born of the Earth Mother.
* In the East of the circle, place some seeds or nuts that represent the source of new life and potential.
* In the South, set a small dish of honey, which is considered as sacred as salt in many traditions and is especially associated with healing.
* Finally, in the West, place a seed roll or bread, representing the cutting down of the corn, so completing the cycle.
* Take a twig or a wand from a healing tree, such as ash, or a long frond of greenery and walk round the circle deosil. Infuse each of the magical foods in turn with circles of the wand deosil, saying:
Fruits of the Earth, born from the womb of the land, give life and healing, health and joy from your ever-replenishing store.
* Touch the vegetable with the wand and then lift the wand in a high arc before lowering it to touch the bottle of water in the centre.
* Now move to the East and circle the wand deosil over the seeds, saying:
Seeds of potential, from the loins of the Father, give growth and power, possibility and regeneration from your limitless treasury.
* Touch the seeds with the wand and raising it in a high arc as before, project the energy into the bottle.
* Go now to the South and circle the wand deosil over the honey, saying:
Melissa, Mother Bee, bring abundance, warmth, sweetness and nourishment from your ever-replenishing hives.
Touch the dish and transfer the energies as before to the water.
* Finally, go to the West and circle the wand over the bread, saying:
Corn Father, willing offering of the life-sustaining bread, bring an ease to sorrow and suffering and the peace and fulfilment of healing harvest home.
* Touch the bread with the wand and transfer the energies as before to the water.
* Finally, pass the bottle of water over the vegetable, seeds, honey and bread, saying:
Fruit and seed, nectar and corn, enrich, empower and endow this water with your healing powers and the life force that flows though our lives and through all creation.
Eat the empowered food to boost your own energies and to spread calm or healing.
