The realm of magic, mystery, and the ancestral is near to us all the time, however it feels most palpable and inviting at this time of year. Halloween and Dia de los Muertos bring us a sense of cultural acknowledgement, and celebration, of what many of us already feel at this time. We are interconnected with the unseen, and the more we acknowledge the subtle, energetic levels of life, the more they acknowledge us as well. Yet, as sensitives that have largely lost touch with many of the older cultural practices that would help us to understand and integrate what we perceive and absorb psychically, we are often vulnerable to unconscious subtle influences, from both within and without. These healing and protective allies, Rue and Orange Calcite, meet us there, and can bring tremendous magical support into the realm of the everyday.
Rue
I have a special love for Rue, and so I have to admit that the first thing I tend to find when reading about its properties is something I don’t personally experience or entirely understand. It is often first described as a foul smelling herb. Even its Latin name, Ruta Graveolens, hearkens to this notion. The word “graveolens” in Latin means “foul smelling,” however it can also mean “strong smelling,” and whether you enjoy the scent or not, it is certainly strong. I work closely with Rue, as a Limpia herb, for spiritual cleansing and healing, and everyone who has smelled it in these personalized rituals has reflected being more enchanted and uplifted by its scent. The variation of reactions to it more broadly may have everything to do with how it is approached. I think this this is a clue about its deeply magical nature and its history as an herb of enchantment. Rue is also commonly known as “herb-of-grace.” This comes from the practice of wearing a sprig of Rue to church on Sundays in order to dip into the holy water at the church entrance, as a means of cleansing and blessing. Whether it delivers grace and protection, or a kind of olfactory attack may greatly depend on the circumstances. In literature, Rue can also symbolize sorrow and regret or the need for repentance. Ophelia, in Hamlet, wears Rue to express her sadness and regret over the losses in her life, but she gives one to Queen Gertrude as well, letting her know that she “must wear her Rue with a difference.” In other words, she should wear it to help her realize the need to repent her actions, which have contributed to the violence in the Kingdom and the madness of her son. In this case, Rue is meant to bring clarity back to the mind and heart of someone blinded by infatuation.
A lot of Rue’s magical or energetic medicine does seem to relate to its highly scented oil. I have heard that it is an herb that helps to protect one’s home or property, for example, by sending out an overpowering, even noxious, scent to those who would enter to do harm or to steal. For some people, the highly sweet and sharp fragrance that it emits can cause headaches or a skin rash, particularly if brushed against, while for others its scent is deeply soothing, and a leaf applied to the forehead can help to cure a headache.
I began my studies in Curanderismo with herbs and will always have a special reverence for their subtle power. It is said that Rue can help us remember to accept and love ourselves, wherever we are in our journeys of growth and healing, just as we are right now. This is huge spiritual medicine for our time, when we are attempting to heal generational legacies of trauma, while facing the collapse of many imbalanced systems in our world, and trying both to reclaim our forgotten gifts and step forward towards the co-creation of a new era. Rue helps to call the soul home to the heart, bringing grace to the emotional and spiritual healing process. Simultaneously, it helps to push away what is toxic or unwelcome, even using its scent to ring a kind of alarm bell when harmful intrusions are approaching. Rue is an herb for magic, healing, protection, and purification.
It is not ideal, however, to take Rue internally in any form other than a flower essence. Flower essences are the spiritual and emotional medicine of the plant, gathered with prayer and highly distilled, rather than the physical medicine that is more fully present in a tea, tincture, oil, or powder. In the more direct forms taken internally, high amounts of Rue can cause problems for the kidneys and bladder, even organ failure. It is also an abortifacient, and was once used to terminate pregnancy or as a contraceptive, though this was not always a safe practice. For this reason, this herb is not one that should be used or touched by pregnant women. The younger leaves and flowers are the most potent, whereas the mature leaves are non toxic when fully dried. Smaller amounts of Rue have had culinary applications as well, though not as much in modern times. It was also once mixed with Oleander, a baneful herb, as an antidote for snake bites.
Rue is a good plant to grow around your home with intention. It is a beautiful bluish green, almost silvery color, with small yellow flowers that grow in clusters. It can grow in partial shade and in difficult soil, as long as there is some drainage. It is a great herb for a garden, known for protecting and for amplifying the other plants’ properties, and can be an excellent perimeter for around the home or near the entrance to the property.
Rue also has many applications in ritual magic. Here are some lovely suggestions of folkloric magical uses that are listed in The Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs, by Scott Cunningham.
Suggestions for working with Rue:
1. Wear Rue leaves around the neck to help recuperate from illness and to ward off future health issues.
2. Add Rue to healing poppets and incense.
3. Breath in fresh Rue to clear one’s head in matters of love and for improved mental acuity.
4. Add Rue to spiritual baths, to break curses, hexes, and heavy legacies carried through generations.
5. Add Rue to incense and cleansing, blessed waters for spirit clearings.
6. Protect your home by hanging fresh Rue by the front door, having Rue in sachets around the house, or by rubbing the fresh leaves on the floor boards.
7. Use a sprig of fresh Rue to sprinkle salt water throughout the house to cleanse it from negativity.
8. Carry a Rue charm as a protection from the evil eye.
9. Mix fresh juiced Rue with morning dew and sprinkle it in a circle around yourself or another, while you perform protection rituals.
Orange Calcite
Calcites, in general, are great healing allies that have an affinity for helping us to overcome blockages and to cleanse and revitalize our energetic systems. Calcites work powerfully but with gentleness, providing a soothing and spiritually uplifting presence. They are a calcium carbonate mineral and are often a component in limestone and marble. The name Calcite, in fact, comes from the Latin word “Calyx,” meaning “lime,” showing their relationship to limestone. Somewhat translucent, smooth, and deeply colorful, Calcites are sensory rich magic in harmony with the everyday. However, Calcites are also part of what makes up stalactites and stalagmites in caves, those mystical and arresting spires hanging down like icicles, or spiraling up like towers, and glowing from within. Knowing this can help us to recognize the power Calcites hold to cleanse and make sacred space.
Orange Calcite looks close enough to a juicy slice of orange that you may at first consider eating it. It is a vibrant, energizing burst of radiant light that can instigate emotional cleansing and healing, burning through negative emotions, like depression its corresponding stagnation. It helps to stimulate creative energy and a new perspective, so that one can find new solutions to long standing problems, emotional blocks, and conflicts with others. It can help bring harmony between people and within family systems, partly by giving a boost of creative energy to help release the gridlock of repetitive patterns of thought and behavior, burning through negativity and habit.
Orange Calcite also have a relationship to the second chakra (or tonalcayo), making it a good healing support for those who have experienced sexual trauma and abuse. If this area in the energy body is blocked or too out of balance, it is hard for the flow of energy to move further up to the centers of the will, heart, third eye, and crown. When this happens it can become harder to use our creative energy, also located in the second chakra, to create what we intend in life, and our access to the higher arts of lucid dreaming and psychic receptivity, for example, may be limited. Orange Calcite can help us to heal from shame and restore our inner sense of playfulness, joy, sensuality, and confidence, when our second chakra has been wounded.
It is an excellent stone for bringing more light to the places where darkness resides within us, and for giving us new eyes to see old situations in a different light. When feeling stuck, whether frozen in fear or depleted by despondency, Orange Calcite can bring in the element of fire to reignite hope, harmony, and energy, so that one’s will can be directed in more effective ways. It is a stone of restoration and radiance and warmth, one which is ready to support in burning away negative energy, as well as that which is outworn, so that we can release what is not serving us and bring in more positivity. As we move into the darker seasons, crossing through the threshold of Samhain, we can call on Orange Calcite to heal the old winds of generational trauma that has created blocks within us. Where are you frozen or stuck, unable to access your emotions or gifts? Where have you been struggling with old issues that seem like they will never change? In what area of your life does the road forward still look too dark to see the best way ahead? These are the areas where Orange Calcite may have an illuminating influence.
Tips for working with Orange Calcite:
Orange Calcite is energized by being in cluster of stones, so it is nice to bring in a few pieces and place them together. Create an altar of light in your home, or perhaps lay them on your body to help clear away what has been wounded or stagnant, inviting energy to flow, new perspective to develop, and radiance to return.
Working with Rue and Calcite Together:
My suggestion is to infuse these two magical helpers into a cleansing water to sprinkle throughout your home, or to use to wash your wooden floors. This would be a simple purification to do on Halloween, or Samhain the Witches’ New Year. After cleansing, make a crystal grid combining these two elemental allies, maybe as a pentacle, to protect, cleanse, brighten, and invite more harmony and creative insight into your home and life this next astrological and agricultural year. This may provide a perfect gateway into the quiet and dark dreaming months of Winter.
May you be protected from all negative influence.
May you radiate with new clarity and joy.
May this sacred time of year ignite the mystical energy within you.
Ometeotl.
Happy Samhain,
the eleventh house
-This blog was written by Melusina Gomez. For more information about her work and healing practices please visit www.metzmecatl.com