Azalea Lee - The Crystal Workshop: A Journey into the Healing Power of Crystals

Azalea Lee is a crystal healer and founder of the Los Angelesbased spiritual wellness space Place 8 Healing, where she specializes in private crystal healing sessions, crystal workshops, and flower essences. She has been featured in publications such as T: The New York Times Style Magazine, In Style, W, Autre, Elle.com, Porter, Byrdie, the Zoe Report, the Financial Times, Town & Country, and Dazed Digital. Lee is also the designer of the metaphysical jewelry line As Above So Below.

A Journey into the Healing Power of Crystals

Azalea Lee

Artisan | New York

Dedicated to all who wish to work with the crystal beings in sincerity, integrity, and love

Contents

PREFACE

A CRYSTAL HEALERS JOURNEY

I have always known I had come into the world for a purpose, but for what, I did not know. As a small child, I prayed to the Universe to tell me what I was supposed to do, for I could not shake the feeling that I was here to do something. Because of this persistent feeling, finding my calling became my utmost concern. My dreams did not include getting married or starting a family but were about solving the riddle of this yearning I had inside of me. Nothing was more important to me than discovering my purpose and giving my life to it.

I knew that my teenage years were supposed to be a time of discovery in all ways, but I still worried that I had no idea in what direction I was supposed to go. I became even more concerned when I was about to begin college, for I did not feel I was getting any guidance or opinion from the Universe. There were plenty of subjects that interested me, each leading to its own trajectory of a career, but as desperate as I was to begin on a path toward something, within me was an insistent pull that kept me from fully committing to anything but my purpose.

Life delayed my finishing college but, still seemingly without any sign of what I was supposed to be doing with my life, when I returned to school, I decided to major in film. Since film was a medium of stories, and stories had great power to heal, I surmised, perhaps, this might be my purpose. After graduating it seemed providential that I began immediately working with people whom I had long admired, so I thought I had been given the sign that I was on the right path to discover my lifes purposeand maybe that purpose was to share stories that healed.

But it felt as if the Universe was conspiring against me. My personal life kept thwarting any energy I put toward making my own stories to share, and the years were starting to roll by. Now in my thirties, I found myself working in costume design. I had unexpectedly met and married the love of my life. I fulfilled a dream of a home full of happy critters. It was wonderful, but that feeling I was born with still wouldnt leave me... just what was I supposed to be doing?

Working in costume design didnt feel like my purpose, and after so many years, making films didnt quite feel like it either. As much as I implored and begged the Universe to tell me, as much as I was still chomping at the bit to devote my life to my purpose, as much as I was willing to do whatever was asked of me, the Universe continued to remain mum.

Though I had been a lifelong student of metaphysics and spirituality, I had never been interested in crystals. Having passed through a childhood stint of devotion to Christianity, I eventually rejected the unquestioning for-the-Bible-tells-me-so dogma of the religion. The crystal books I had read had this same matter-of-fact tone, with firm declarations of the crystals metaphysical properties. I wondered: How did these people get their information about the crystals? How did I know they werent just making this information up? How would I be able to tell if all the people writing about the crystals were sincere about their work and truly devoted to helping humankind? What if they just thought they knew a lot about crystals? Or even worsewere outright charlatans?

So I avoided crystals.

There eventually came a time when I wanted to pick out a special piece of jewelry for myself, and I aimed to find something that was energetically supportive. But I found myself disappointed with what was available. Much of the metaphysical jewelry I saw was poorly made and though I believed there was merit to the healing powers of crystals, I was dubious of the claims that came with the jewelry. The metaphysical properties in the descriptions of the crystals seemed to be copied from somewhere else, making the jewelry feel as if it had been created in blind faith, rather than with true understanding of the healing energy it possessed. Though I wasnt clear exactly what I was responding to, I knew that I could at least pick out stones that agreed energetically with me. So I decided to make some jewelry for myself.

I found a few stones and made myself some pieces I was happy with. But the response I got from others, how the pieces seemed to inspire and touch them, made me realize how much I would love to make healing jewelry for them too. Though I trusted my intuition to pick out stones for myself, I wasnt sure I would be able to choose the right stones for someone else. I knew I wasnt going to be comfortable making jewelry based on metaphysical descriptions I found in crystal books, so in order to feel confident standing behind my work, I needed a personal understanding of what the stones could do. I figured the best way to do this was to establish a direct relationship with the crystals and see if I could develop even an iota of intuitive understanding of the crystals myself. So I took a class in crystal healing.

It was during this course that I was assigned to facilitate a crystal healing. My teachers friend lay on a mat as I intuitively placed crystals on her body while my teacher sat nearby to guide me in case I got stuck. But right after the session, my teacher looked at her friend, gestured to me, and said, Can you believe this is her first time? Facilitating the session had been quite engrossing and I was still processing the experience for myself, so I didnt exactly realize I was being complimented when I brushed the comment off, saying that it had all just made sense to me. But driving home from the class, it dawned on me: I understood the crystals!

I went home in a daze. All my life I had struggled, begged, and pleaded to understand what my purpose was, and suddenly, by what felt like happenstance, I was tuned in and connected to the crystals. Instead of directly telling me what my purpose was, the Universe had sent me on what had felt like a wild goose chase. All my life I had had interests in so many subjects, and I had always felt encouraged by the Universe to explore them. Sometimes I would pick up a hobby for a short while before circumstances in life forced me to change direction. Though I was intrigued with everything I learned, I found it confusing that none of the things the Universe had led me to try had any relationship to one another. I had followed each sign hoping it would lead me to my purpose, but more often than not, each situation I found myself in would feel more perilous. It felt as if the Universe was sending me deeper into the wilderness and at every fork encouraging me to take the scarier and more treacherous route. And following each nudge meant choosing the path of less stability, the path that presented an even greater chance of dire consequence if things did not turn out well.