Cleansing, no matter what culture, religion, or practice you’re part of, is seen as something beneficial and sometimes necessary – it is the removal of old energy (negative or not), and the creation of a clean slate for new energy, blessings, or other to come into one’s life.
With many popular cleansing options being part of closed practices – you can read more about white sage here, and we only recommend our Palo Santo if you belong to the cultures that use it – you may be left wondering what is best.
I’m going to list my go-to’s for cleansing a variety of different objects, tools, and the self.
Let’s get a free one out of the way: water
Visualization, mantra or affirmation, and water is sometimes all you need for a good cleansing. Ritual baths or showers can be done with nothing but the body and the water. Many times, people will ask their deities or higher powers to bless the water, and scrub or clean themselves with the intention to cleanse. Sometimes, prayer is involved – think traditional Christian baptism. Sometimes, it’s silent and takes place in a dark bathroom – that’s my preferred method.
Rosemary
Depending on what you’re cleansing, the type of product might change. Rosemary is both healing, cleansing, and protective – meaning when you remove the old, possibly negative energy, it won’t be able to creep back up (unless you let it, of course).
Incense or smoke bundles are popular for large spaces and homes, or for those who want a bit more ambiance or visual to signify the cleansing. Be careful if you have pets in your home, especially those who are elderly or have health issues. Remove them from the room and open a window – which can actually give that negative energy a way out and away from you, by the way.
I prefer essential oil, though. It can be diluted into oils, or mixed with cleaning products. I just gave my sister a bottle of rosemary essential oil drops for her to mix with Windex to clean a mirror that’s been giving her the creeps. It won’t set off her sensitive apartment smoke alarms, or harm the animals she pet sits. I like essential oils for objects, if you couldn’t tell.
Selenite – specifically wands
Selenite wands or plates are perfect for passive cleansing. Tossing something next to the wand or on the selenite plate or in a selenite bowl is easy to do and low-energy. Let is sit overnight and your object will be fresh and clean and good as new. Selenite also is known to charge objects, so it’s great at adding fresh power to those objects as well.
Selenite is said to be cleansing due to its color – white, and slightly reflective like the moon, another big powerful cleanser, selenite inherited those properties for itself. Its color also connects it to the light of the angelic realm, and thus brings in healing angelic energies. It has been known for these properties since the ancient Greeks named it after their goddess, Selene.