Sacred tourism is increasingly popular but not everyone can travel to locations that may be in the most inhospitable of places. Fortunately you don’t need to physically travel to a site, you can journey there in your imagination.
Have you ever wondered exactly what makes space sacred? Why our ancestors venerated natural features? Why they moved Bluestones 150 miles from Preseli in the Welsh mountains to Stonehenge on Salisbury plain? Why the ancient Egyptians quarried pink granite in Aswan and carried it the length of Egypt to line the pyramids? Why an ancient meteorite is embedded in the most holy shrine of Islam? The meteorite at the heart of the Kaa’ba was venerated for thousands of years before Mohammed set foot on the site. Crystals hold the energy of creation itself. They are imperishable, immutable and incorruptible. They form a portal between the visible and the invisible worlds. Legends tell us that crystal caves underpin many sacred places and that the earth has crystal bones.
I’ve always been interested in sacred sites. One of my earliest memories is of reaching out of my pram to touch a stone in a remote Welsh stone circle. Almost seventy years later the imprint of the jolt of energy I received is still with me. It probably kick-started my spiritual journey, downloading information I would need in the future. Such circles are almost always constructed of granite, a stone that generates measurable energy and which has many legends attached.
Your crystal travel agent
I’ve been to many of the world’s most sacred sites but, as I don’t like flying, there are others I couldn’t visit. Until now. I’ve found a way to access the sites through their crystal connections. Thanks to an interesting experience with a Preseli Bluestone, I’ve become an armchair traveller. It picked me up, whisked me away to Wales and then flew me back to Stonehenge. All without moving from my armchair. And so can you. All you need is the right crystal and if you have a photograph that captures the energy of the crystal, such as those in Crystals and Sacred Sites, that will take you travelling. When I look at a photo of the great black basalt figure of Skehmet in Karnak Temple, I am immediately back there prostrate on the ground before her honouring My Lady.
Crystals harness the innate energy of a site and its healing and transformational potential. That’s how my American publisher came up with the sub-title: Use Crystals to Access the Power of Sacred Landscapes for Personal and Planetary Transformation. We created a sinuous dragon line of sites around the world and the more attention, and intention, that’s put into this power line, the more our planet – and you – will benefit.
The crystals in the book were specially chosen because they have an energetic resonance with the sacred site with which they are paired. They may come from the area immediately around the site or from further afield, or, in some rare cases such as Sedona or Pipestone the site itself. To choose your site, select one that has a particular resonance for you. This may be because of ancestral or past life links, cultural or belief connections, or you may have been attracted to the site and wish to know more. Looking at photographs of a site may give you a jolt, the kind that says ‘I’m here, waiting.’ Or, you may already have one of the crystals associated with a site and want to explore further.
The book opens with the Circumpolar Regions and the Insuksuk figures that the Inuit have built for centuries. When I first saw a picture of one of these figures striding its way across the landscape it gave me the shivers – pleasurable ones but powerful. I just had to have one. When it arrived, I sat down and meditated with it and found it took me to a place of deep peace and honouring of the land and the people who had gone before. I found that an Insuksuk had been built at Kandahar airfield in Afghanistan to honour the fallen there. A plaque at its base reads:
Inuksuk
The term inuksuk means ‘to act in the capacity of a human.’
Among the many practical functions,
they were employed as hunting and navigational aids,
often showing the direction towards a food supply or home.In addition to their earthly functions, certain inuksuit*
had spiritual connotations and were objects of veneration,
often marking the threshold of the spiritual landscape
0r, in other words, Sacred Ground.We hope that this place will remain sacred and that the
Spirits of our fallen comrades will find their way home
to peace and rest.
Ritual: building an Inuksuk
At its simplest, an Inuksuk can be built from three or four stones – any type of flat stone but I recommend serpentine – stacked on top of each other. As you build the figure, focus your attention on the power of inua (life force) so that it imbues your sculpture. If you are building it as a memorial to one of the fallen, keep that person in mind and ask that the Inuksuk will help to carry their spirit home. If you are helping the planet, focus your thoughts on steps you can take to stop the icecaps shrinking, and how you can radiate peace to our world.
In 1976 I walked into a dimly lit room in the London Museum of Mankind. A crystal skull perched on a plinth suddenly glowed blue and pulled me towards it. I had no choice but to approach, it was like being reeled in by a tractor beam. I stood entranced, looking into the back of the skull watching life at a Mayan pyramidal temple. I thought I had spent a few moments watching the images form but a guard tapped me on the shoulder and said they were closing shortly. I had been standing there for two hours! The book closes with a crystal skull meditation that connects to the Mothers and Fathers of Wisdom and the serpent temple at Kukulcan, Chichen Itza which honours the mystical powers of nature.
© 2012 by Judy Hall.
Crystals attuned by Judy are available from www.angeladditions.co.uk
*Inuksuit is the plural of Inuksuk
