Whether you are using a new crystal for the first time, or just want to refresh your crystal’s energy after using it, cleansing your crystal’s energy on a regular basis is important.
Cleansing your crystals removes stagnant energy, old programming, and any other unwanted energies they’ve picked up over time.
It’s especially important if you are using your crystal to remove negative vibrations because healing crystals absorb that energy from your space.
Cleansing them refreshes them and gets them ready to absorb more energy.
It also restores your crystals to their original energetic properties and frequencies.
Don’t forget to cleanse and charge your crystal jewelry as well!
How to cleanse crystals to remove old energy and vibrations:
- Put it out under the full moon
- Run it underwater
- Use a bowl of saltwater or ocean water
- Use a sage wand, incense, or palo santo wand and pass it through the smoke
- Place in a bowl of sea salt
- Use a bowl of rice
- Place in the sun
- Sound bath
- Bury in the dirt
- Use selenite
- Smudge spray
- Visualization or meditation
Now let’s go through each of the cleansing methods and how to do them!
12 Ways to Cleanse Crystals:
Using the full moon:
Setting your crystals outside, under the moonlight is probably the best method (and the most well-known way) of cleansing your crystals.
Cleansing your crystals under the full moon does double-duty.
The moon cleans the crystal’s energy and returns it to its original state, but it also charges your crystals with fresh energy!
To cleanse your crystals under the moon, you just need to set them in the direct moonlight.
You can leave them out overnight or for just an hour or two, it’s up to you!
It’s best done under the full moon, where the moonlight is the strongest.
Make sure each crystal will be under the moonlight. Don’t put your crystals out in piles.
You can use your windowsill if you need to or want to, you don’t have to put them outside.
If you want to use the full moon, new moon, or a lunar eclipse to set specific intentions for your crystals, feel free to do so!
Cleansing your crystals with water:
IMPORTANT: Only use water to cleanse your crystal if it is water safe. Some crystals will dissolve in water or even rust, so do this at your own risk!
If you have a lot of soft stones, porous crystals, crystals made of salt or mineral deposits, or fragile crystals, avoid the water methods and use one of the other cleansing methods.
To cleanse your crystal with water, place it under a running faucet for a few seconds.
Imagine all of the negative energy or programming going down the drain.
As the tap water is running, imagine new, fresh energy entering your crystal.
You can also imagine the water is full of golden light, showering your crystals with high vibes.
How to use saltwater to cleanse your crystals:
You can also cleanse your crystals with saltwater.
Put the saltwater in a bowl and dip your crystals into it.
Set the intentions that the water is absorbing the negative energies and refreshing your crystal.
Use a soft brush or cloth to clean the surface.
Dry your crystal with a soft cloth.
Do not leave the saltwater on the crystal for more than a few moments.
Make sure your crystals are WATER SAFE!
If they aren’t, do not use this method because they could dissolve, tarnish, or rust.
There are plenty of other ways to cleanse your crystals, so don’t worry if you have a lot of salt crystals, metal crystals, fragile, or soft stones in your collection.
How to use smoke to cleanse your crystals:
Sage and smudge sticks have a long history of energy cleansing.
If you already use sage to smudge your home, you can also use it to cleanse your crystals.
You can pass each crystal through the smoke, or blow the smoke onto your crystal.
You don’t have to use the smoke for a long time, a few seconds per crystal will work!
The benefit of using a sage wand or other smudge stuck is that you can cleanse your crystals whenever you want.
How to cleanse crystals with salt:
To cleanse crystals with salt, you can use a bowl or bag of salt.
Sea salt is best, but table salt will work in a pinch!
Place your crystals on top of the salt or within the salt.
Set the intention that the salt will absorb the negative energies or frequencies and return your crystals to their natural vibration.
Leave them in the salt for a few hours or up to 3 days.
Once the time has passed, be sure to throw the salt away so that the negative energy is removed from your space. (Related Post: 7 ways to cleanse negative energy with sea salt)
Place your crystal in a bowl or bag of rice.
Rice can also absorb negative energies and vibrations.
Place your crystals on top of the rice or in a bag of rice.
Similar to the sea salt method, leave them for up to 24 hours.
Once your crystals have been cleansed, throw out the rice.
Make sure you place the brown rice in the trash or compost bin so that birds or other animals won’t eat it.
How to use sunlight to cleanse your crystal:
Like moonlight, direct sunlight can cleanse your crystal.
Place your crystal in the sun for a few minutes to cleanse and purify its energy.
The drawback to using sunlight to cleanse your crystals is that it can fade their color.
Don’t leave them in the sun for longer than a few minutes every few months.
The good news is that direct sunlight is very potent fire energy, and can burn away negative vibrations very quickly!
But if you want to cleanse your crystals more often, use one of the other cleansing methods in between the sunlight method.
How to cleanse crystals with sound:
Sound moves energy, and can be used to cleanse your home’s energy as well as your crystal’s energy!
You can use a Tibetan singing bowl or tuning fork near your crystal to clear its frequencies and cleanse its energy.
You can also play energy cleansing music near your crystals.
Sound is a great way to cleanse lots of different crystals (and lots of smaller crystals) all at once.
It’s also one of the safest ways to cleanse crystals when you don’t know if they’re safe in water or sunlight.
Bury your crystals in dirt to clear their energy:
Burying your crystals outside in the dirt can also cleanse their energy.
It essentially returns them to their natural habitat, refreshing their frequencies with mother earth.
Burying them in dirt grounds the crystal, allowing any negative vibrations to be reabsorbed into the earth.
If you want to use this method, leave the crystal buried for 24-72 hours.
When you remove it, use a soft brush to clean off the dirt.
How to cleanse crystals with selenite:
To cleanse your crystals with selenite, you can use a selenite plate or selenite wand.
If you have a selenite charging plate, place your crystals on top of it.
Otherwise, just place your selenite wand near the crystals you’d like to cleanse.
Set your intentions that the selenite will absorb the energy from the crystals, cleansing them and recharging them to their natural vibrations.
You can leave them for a few hours or even a few days, allowing the selenite to absorb unwanted frequencies and recharge your crystals.
Since selenite is a cleansing stone, you can use it to cleanse your crystals whenever you’d like.
How to use a smudge spray or salt spray for cleansing:
Using a smudge spray, sage spray, or salt spray around your crystals cleanses and purifies the crystals and the energy around them.
Just spritz the spray around your crystals and make sure you wipe them off if they get wet.
Caution: Don’t use spray directly on crystals that will rust, tarnish, or dissolve in water.
Using visualization or meditation for clearing and resetting energy:
You can also hold your crystal while doing a white light visualization or meditation.
This is one of the easiest ways to cleanse your energy AND your crystal’s energy at the same time!
Hold your crystal while you visualize a white, healing light beaming down from above.
Imagine the bright, white light purifying and dissolving any energy you and your crystal are holding.
Imagine that energy washing away, being replaced with the clean, clear energy of the light.
Hold the visualization or meditation for a few deep breaths. It is done!
How to cleanse your crystals step-by-step:
Choose the crystal that needs to be cleansed.
Physically clean your crystal, if necessary.
Use a soft brush or cloth to dust it off or wipe it down if it has a smooth surface. (If you are burying your crystal in dirt, you can skip this step until you remove it!)
Use the cleansing method you chose.
When you place your crystal outside, under the water, in the dirt, or pass it through the smoke or sound bath, set the intention that your crystal is clean and clear of any outside energies.
Feel the feelings of your crystal being restored to its natural frequency.
Leave the crystal for the required amount of time.
If you ran it under running water, make sure you dry it well!
Once your crystal is cleansed, you can now program it to hold your new intentions!
Hold or touch the crystal. Feel the feelings of your intentions. If you want, you can say an affirmation or ask the crystal to hold the intentions of what you want. If you are using a crystal for protection, imagine the protective bubble radiating out from the crystal, protecting you and your space from negative energy.
Once you’ve felt the feelings and set the intention, your crystal is programmed and ready to go to work for you!
Set it wherever you feel is best. (If you want, you can set it in the feng shui bagua area of your space that relates to your intention. See the bagua map here!)
How to cleanse crystals FAQ:
How often should you cleanse your crystals?
It depends!
If the energy in your home (or work, or wherever you’re using your crystals) has been especially depressed or negative lately, cleansing your crystals often can help.
You can cleanse them once a week, once a month, or more often if they are removing a lot of negative energy and things feel stuck.
A good rule of thumb is to cleanse them whenever you think about it! Your intuition is telling you it’s time – the most important thing you can do is to listen to it!
6 times you should DEFINITELY cleanse your crystals:
- When you bring a new crystal into your home to erase any predecessor energy they might be holding.
- When you want to reprogram them with a new intention or new goal.
- Whenever you feel the energy around them is stale or stagnant.
- If you haven’t used them for a while and want to refresh them.
- Whenever you feel like you need a new start or a clean slate!
- If your space feels frustrating, stuck, or there have been a lot of arguments or bad vibes.
As with everything related to crystals: use your intuition!
If you pick up one of your crystals and feel like it needs to be refreshed, then it’s the right time to cleanse them. There’s no right or wrong way to do it!
How do you clean your crystals?
You can clean your crystal with a clean, dry cloth or a soft brush.
You can also use a small fan or blow on them while using the brush or cloth to remove the dust.
If the crystal is water safe, you can also run them under warm water (or use a bowl of clean water) and dry them with a cloth or small fan.
Don’t use harsh chemicals, hydrogen peroxide, alcohol, or soap because you could tarnish or ruin the finish.
Because there are a lot of crystals that aren’t safe in water, only use it if you know for SURE the water won’t affect the ones you own.
And never put them in the dishwasher!
Can you cleanse crystals in moonlight?
Yes! Moonlight will cleanse and charge your crystals.
You can put them outside, on your windowsill in the moonlight, or even on your balcony.
If you are cleansing or charging more than one, lay them out so that each crystal will receive direct light.
You can even lay them out in a crystal grid that you’ve set up with a specific intention, to charge your crystal grid!
Leave them outside for an hour or overnight if the night will be clear and not raining or too cold.
Do you need a full moon to charge crystals?
No. You can charge your crystals any time.
With the light of the full moon, however, the light is at its strongest so it will have the most cleansing and charging power.
Each full moon also has specific intentions and meanings, so it can be helpful if you want to charge your crystals in alignment with the moon’s intentions.
What do crystals do in a full moon?
During a full moon, the crystal is fully cleansed of all residual energy it’s holding and returned to its natural frequencies.
Since crystals can absorb energies and intentions of their surroundings, cleansing the crystal returns it to its natural vibrations.
The full moon also charges the crystals, giving their natural properties more energy and power.
You can also set specific intentions for your crystal with the full moon, giving your intention even more power.
Should I charge my crystals during a new moon?
You can use the new moon to charge your crystals, too!
The new moon also has specific energies and properties depending on the lunar cycle and where it falls in the astrological chart.
If the new moon aligns with your specific intentions, charging your crystal with that new moon will help enhance those energies.
How to cleanse crystals with incense:
Choose which incense you’d like to use for cleansing.
Sage, palo santo, frankincense, or positive energy incense blends are best for cleansing and purification.
Set the intention that the smoke from the incense will absorb negative energies and dissolve them away, replacing them with positive vibrations.
Make sure you open a window so the negative vibes can leave your space.
As you pass your crystals through the smoke, feel the feelings of the negative energies melting away. It is done!
How to cleanse crystals with sage spray:
To cleanse your crystals with sage spray, spritz the spray around your crystals.
Set the intentions that the sage spray is cleansing and purifying the air and energy around your crystals and in your home.
Feel the feelings of the bad vibes melting away and being replaced with positive frequencies. It is done!
What is the BEST way to cleanse crystals?
As you can see, there are so many different ways to cleanse your crystals!
Each one has their own benefits and drawbacks.
Use whichever one you feel led to use!
You can’t get it wrong – each method works in its own way.
Follow your intuition!
Your crystals are always speaking to you through their energy, so don’t second-guess yourself.
And feel free to try different methods at different times to see which one you like best!
Now that you know all of the different methods to cleanse crystals, you might also want to know:
How to use crystals for plants to enhance and amplify their energy!
How to use crystals for grounding and protection from bad vibes.
The best crystals for manifesting everything you want.
All of the crystals for positive energy and happiness.
How to use crystals for self-love and self-acceptance.
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