So you’ve had a hard day, you come home to hug your favourite crystal and reset your energy to light and fluffy happiness.  After a while maybe that crystal needs a hug back, yeah?  Sad crystal L.  So, what can you do to look after your best crystal buddies?  Cleansing and retuning to the rescue! 

We humans are very easily knocked off our dominant oscillatory rate (DOR) and are highly susceptible to entropy, our crystal buddies, not so much.  In fact crystals have low entropy and are stable transmitters of energy.  No wonder they have such a profound effect on us.

Your crystal may not be so easily knocked out of its groove (dominant oscillatory rate) as it is a low entropy chap, but it does happen.  Sometimes it can collect congested energy, sometimes they can receive a blast of something that just makes them feel yuk, or not feel like they are working as well as they used to. Sometimes they have just been working way too hard to balance you…

So, what is a dominant oscillatory rate (DOR)?  The Dominant Oscillatory Rate is essentially our balanced state of being… or as Hibiscus Moon would say…

“We’re so easily energetically-influenced, partly due to our emotions & partly due to our mainly non-crystalline structure. Unlike crystals, our body’s vibrations can move out of its dominant oscillatory rate (DOR) so very easily when we experience any type of stress. We’re also made of many varying oscillatory rates as our organs & even cells have all their own DORs.” Hibiscus Moon

SO HOW, WHEN & WHY DO I CLEANSE & RETUNE MY CRYSTALS?

Why would you retune your crystal?   You may find that it doesn't feel the same as it used to, doesn't work The Way It Used To, or has an icky feeling.   Maybe it’s been handled by others, has been sitting around in a difficult environment.  You’d also want to cleanse and retune any new crystals you receive or buy even if they are just for your own personal use. 

If you are a crystal therapist you would be cleansing your crystals between each client.  Energetic hygiene is so, so important.  You may find you need to retune your crystals fairly regularly if they are hardworking & residing in difficult environments.

“Retune: The act of retuning your crystal is essentially recalibrating your crystal and clearing it of all previous programming and returning it to its dominant oscillatory rate (DOR) or Base resonant frequency.  Cleansing and Retuning can be used as interchangeable terms, although cleansing would more refer in my mind to a more superficial physical cleaning, and retuning could be used more to describe the energetic cleanse and reset.”

HOW CAN YOU CLEANSE YOUR CRYSTALS?

Before you cleanse your crystals you need to decide the safest & best method for your crystal.  Referring to the chart at the bottom of this article, you’ll see a list of crystals against a number.  This number is the MOHS hardness rating.  If your crystal is a 5 or less, it is too soluble/soft to wet and you’ll need to use of the dry methods.  If it is more than a 5, you can use any of the methods.  Then choose which method you feel works for you.

Methods of Cleansing your Crystals with a MOHS hardness greater than 5 you can:

• SALT WATER: Soak it in salt water or spritz it with salt water, rinsing with fresh water and drying it afterwards. Some crystals in my experience just don’t like salt water, especially if they have iron in them, so take care!
• FRESH WATER: Rinse it in fresh water then dry it off. I like to leave my solar loving crystals such as tourmaline & pyrite out in the sun after a bath.
• GENTLE DETERGENT: If your crystals have oil on them you can use gentle detergent to cleanse them, then rinse in fresh water and dry them.

Methods of Cleansing your Crystals for softer or water soluble crystals with a MOHS hardness of less than 5 you can:

• BED OF SALT: Lay your crystals on a bed of dry sea salt, the sea salt will absorb the negative energies. You’ll need to dispose of the salt after cleansing your crystals.
• CRYSTAL BED: Lay your crystals on a flat slab of amethyst or selenite. I sometimes store more crystals in my healing room this way.
• SOUND: A singing bowl, tuning fork or some other form of good sound at high amplitude (loudness). If using a singing bowl, 3-5 circles of the bowl would be sufficient, if use a tuning fork 2-3 taps of the fork should be sufficient.  This is a short, sweet and easy method of cleansing.
• SMOKE: Incense or white sage. You can hold your crystal above some burning incense or white sage smoke to cleanse your crystals. 
• COMBINATION: You can combine as many of these methods as you wish or see fit.

HOW CAN YOU RETUNE YOUR CRYSTAL?

So your crystal is cleansed, now let’s retune it and get it back to its absolute happy place. There are various methods of returning your crystal you can use either:

• SOUND: A singing bowl, tuning fork or some other form of good sound at high amplitude (loudness). If using a singing bowl, 3-5 circles of the bowl would be sufficient, if use a tuning fork 2-3 taps of the fork should be sufficient.  This is a short, sweet and easy method of cleansing.
• LIGHTNING STORM: Simply pop your crystals out in a thunderstorm to be naturally returned to their dominant oscillatory rate (Do this only to crystals with a MOHS hardness of 5 or more)
• EARTH BURY: Bury your crystal in the garden for a month, followed by 12-24 hours of sun and/or moon light. (For crystals prone to fading, and deep coloured crystals that may fade, use moonlight only). What a wonderful stone holiday!

What if that doesn’t work?  Well maybe your crystal needs a long break?  If you have tried retuning your crystal via the first 2 methods, give the earth bury method a go.   If after this it’s still not back to its old self, maybe it needs to be gifted to a new human, to help someone else’s healing & wellbeing path…