Crystal Power
Donald Michael Kraig
Do you remember pyramid power? It was popular in the `60's and `70's. People wore pyramid hats and slept under, or above, pyramid grids. People kept their razor blades in pyramids to keep them sharper for a longer period of time and treated water with them in order to improve the water's taste. Where are all those pyramids now? Where are all those Kirlian photography devices now? What happened to the Harmonic Convergence?
The New Age (a friend of my pronounces it to rhyme with sewage) has moved on. It moved to channeling and crystals. People have now moved past most of the channelers. From all the reports I have seen, sales of crystals and gems and books about them to the New Age market has markedly decreased. The New Age has moved on to include Shamanism, Men's groups and Women's spirituality groups. In a few years it will move on again—to what I don't know, but move it will.
This is because the New Age is simply a name for pop occultism, and any sort of pop culture needs new interests to keep it manifesting. But when it moves on, it leaves some people hungering for more. These are the people who become the occultists of the next generation. And what they are doing with the remnants of yesterday's New Age is remarkable.
Some occultists are working with the energies of pyramids—not wearing them as hats but investigating the effect of meditating and doing rituals in them. They use Kirlian photography devices not to read auras or prove the phantom leaf phenomenon, but rather to investigate the effects of meditation and ritual on the coronal discharge that is in a Kirlian photograph. Occultists channel, but they investigate the information received rather than merely accept it. Astrologers, in part because of the Harmonic Convergence hoopla, are now seriously investigating Mayan astrology.
This leads us to crystals. Frankly, I have a hard time believing most of the information I have seen concerning crystals and gems. For example, I don't believe that the Romans were able to avoid getting drunk by embedding an amethyst in their wine cups. I don't believe that putting various crystals and gems around a person provides any special healing abilities unless the client simply believes in their power and they have a placebo effect. I don't think that a particular crystal or gem has any power to increase the strength of a ritual, meditation etc. by its very nature.
I am not implying that it is not so, nor am I criticizing those who do research and believe in the innate powers of stones. I'm simply saying that I don't believe it. Perhaps it is my lack.
And yet, I have some very special stones. I have a huge Herkimer given to me by a man who was thankful for a Tarot reading I gave him. I have a piece of rock from Merlin's cave in England. I have a large stone from the grounds of the home of Houdini. I have several other stones that I deeply value.
I use them in a variety of ways. In the past I have used some stones as guardians, implanting in them artificial Elementals. Some I use to focus my mind during meditation. Certain stones can be used as keys to trigger the mind into sephirotic and pathworking associations. Many books, including 777 and my own Modern Magick have correspondence charts giving lists of traditional stone associations. I also have used various stones as talismans and amulets.
Many people have seen the publicity picture I use which shows off my ring. A wonderful woman in San Diego made it for me. The sterling silver was melted down from other rings that had been used in rituals. I originally used a leaded glass crystal in it, but replaced it last year with a cubic zirconia: a hand-made gem similar in properties to diamond. The gem is mounted backwards so that the point, rather than the flat side, is facing out. I generally wear it on my left hand so that it receives external energy and focuses that energy into me. In ritual I shift it to my right hand and use it to focus energy going out into a thin line as needed. Traditionally (and my experience confirms that) the left hand receives energy and the right hand sends it. (Some maintain that this is reversed for people who are left-handed. Not being a lefty, I cannot say.)
Does the crystal do it? Does my mind do it? Does it involve both mind and physical material? I don't know. I do know, however, that it works. That's good enough for me.
The New Age interest in crystals and gems has put them into the minds of people of varying interests. They are used and investigated by occultists all over the world to see how they can be used without depending on myth, tradition or channeled information. That's why New Age crystal power is dying or dead. Long live the real investigation of crystal power.
1992, Donald Michael Kraig | 
