White Sage Smudging

Have you ever walked into work feeling positive about the day ahead, only to have your mood brought down by a few negative coworkers?Have you ever walked into a room and felt like it sucked the joy right out of you all on its own?Chances are you’ve experienced both because they happen to be common experiences.​Chances are you’ve experienced both because they happen to be common experiences.

Smudging your sacred space, your home or office, or even your body with sage is like taking an energetic shower, or doing a deep metaphysical cleansing. The smoke from dried sage actually changes the ionic composition of the air, and can have a direct effect on reducing our stress response.

Conflict, anger, illness or evil is absorbed by the sage smoke to be released or cleansed from the energy field of a person. I can be used weekly, or any time you feel like you might need a little aura polishing. You can’t do it too much.

Some ideal (or necessary) times to sage smudge your aura and/or space would be:

-When you move into a new living space, start a new job

-Before and after a guest enters your home

-Before and after a yoga or healing session, before meditation

-After an argument or any illness

-Upon returning home from crowded situations

-And here is a simple 3-step sage smudging ritual to try:

1. Use loose dried white sage or a white ceremonial sage bundle (aka wand), which is usually bound together by a thin string.

2. Next, place it on any heat-proof burning surface like an Abalone Shell — a traditional vessel used by Indigenous American people that represents the element of water. Light the bundle by holding a flame to it until it begins to smoke. If a true flame appears, shake the bundle gently or blow until it is just embers and smoke. I often find that I have to re-light my sage bundle a few times during the ritual process.

3. Once you have a nice smoke going, use you hand or a feather to direct the smoke over your body from your feet up to your head, then back down again. As you do this, visualize the smoke taking away with it any negative energy from your life, any darkness or malady.

If you feel comfortable with this incantation, repeat the following:

Negativity that invades my sacred place,

I banish you away with the light of my grace.

You have no hold or power here.

For I stand and face you with no fear.

Be gone forever, for this I will say

This is my sacred place and you will obey.

Once you have smudged your body, begin to move through your space. Wave the smoke into all corners, across doorways and into shadow spaces. To maintain the atmosphere of ritual, keep repeating the incantation in your mind as you diffuse the smoke.

Once the space is cleared, allow the sage bundle to either burn out or gently press it out in your heat-proof shell or container. You can even bury the remaining smudge in your garden to really feel the completeness of the cleansing ritual. Once buried, the sage has done its work in completing the elemental cycle. Ideally, you should try to use a new smudge for each cleansing.