Healing With Crystals & Gemstones - Balance Your Chakras and Your Life author: Daya Sarai Chocron Introduction by: Judy Hall Weiser Books 1986, 2005 ISBN #1-57863-344-3 With the pace of today's world, and the inherent stress placed upon us, we are all looking for ways to feel better, to bring true healing to ourselves, and to be proactive about our health. We are learning to realign ourselves with the natural world - the world of color, sound, and nature. In Crystals and Gemstones - Balance Your Chakras and Your Life, Daya Sarai Chocron introduces the healing system inherent within Gems and Crystals, connecting them to color therapy and the chakras, and showing how the individual vibrations of gems and crystals works within our energetic system to bring about better alignment, correct imbalances (those pesky energies that show up as dis-ease or ill health), and function in a pro-active manner to sustain good mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health. Chocron begins by introducing the reader to the concepts of light, color, and the chakra system. She defines the first three chakras as functioning within our physical selves, and the last three chakras as functioning within our spiritual selves. The middle chakra, our heart chakra, functions as the mediating point between our physical and spiritual worlds. The seven aspects of color are presented (vitalizing, animating, healing, enlightening, supplying, inspiring, and fulfilling), along with the applications of the science of color (healing, psychological, and esoteric). There is a well done chart of correspondences presented linking color, specific chakra's, and quality. This is a very fundamental chart, and an easy way to understand the chakra system. The world of color is gone into in depth, beginning with the association of the associations of the primary colors (blue/spirituality/all blue stones; yellow/wisdom/all yellow stones; red/vitality/all red stones). From there Chocron moves into the seven major chakras, a discussion of their color associations, and specific stones relating to them. There is a wonderful reference chart associating specific conditions (calming, revitalizing, inspiring and stimulating) with our mental, physical and spiritual selves. For those interested in astrology, there is a listing of each astrological sign, and the stones associated with it, followed by an elemental grouping (Fire, Water, Air, Earth). Here we see the first reader interaction - a presentation of the Rainbow Visualization. Now begins the serious work - the healing power of crystals, and how crystals may be used. A Crystal Meditation is presented as an action that we can take to attune ourselves to the Source, to whatever we consider the Divine to be. The discussion of crystals begins with short comments on Smokey Quartz, Rutilated Quartz, Tourmaline Quartz, and Diamonds. In her section on the use of gems and crystals, Chocron presents a working chart corresponding the days of the week, their planetary ruler, and associated gems. This is important information if the reader wishes to work with ritual in any manner. There is a short discussion on wearing gems, and on their mystical qualities, with a presentation of the layout for a stone mandala, using the seven rays of the rainbow (the seven primary colors) surrounding a diamond or clear quartz crystal. From here we go into a section on individual gems/stones, the energy they are associated with and their healing uses. An interesting note here is that Chocron also talks about which gems/stones work well together, and which do not. At the end of this section is a series of photographs of various gems/stones, and how they would be placed on the body for healing purposes. The photographs are in black and white, and really do not represent well the energy that a color photograph would have captured. The final section in this book addresses the nature of disease, and how to bring about harmony using, amongst other things, breathing techniques. The various uses for meditation are discussed (amongst which are obtaining/rebuilding health, bringing in prosperity, protection, and understanding dreams), as well as ways of laying on the gems/stones. Chocron has also shared some of her clients reactions to healing with gems/stones (and she makes a very important point of never leaving the patient alone with the gems/stones on them). Chocron presents an in-depth appendix that lists specific gems, their Physical Cure and Spiritual Effect. I found Crystals & Gemstones to be a wonderful introduction to working with crystals and stones, written by an individual who is eloquently sharing her life experience in the field. For the beginning or mid-level student of healing and gems, this is a wonderful working resource. © July 2005 Bonnie Cehovet Personal Lifestyle Reading - I offer a Personal Lifestyle Reading using Tarot that looks at past, present and future influences in your life, at the energies that are currently available to help you along your path, and at those energies that are appearing as challanges. My goal is to offer you insight into your decision making process, as well as tools that you can use to both better understand your path and make conscious, choice centered decisions. Home Personal Empowerment links Personal Empowerment articles Graphics by Art for the web