Wisdom Rising

Using Crystals for Psychic Protection with Nicholas Pearson

• Christine Renee, Isabel Wells, and Shantel Ochoa • Season 2 • Episode 25

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What if the most powerful psychic protection doesn't come from the crystals we carry, but from how they help us transform our own energy?

Nicholas Pearson returns to Wisdom Rising with profound insights on psychic self-defense that bridge science and spirituality. With his background in geology and decades of crystal wisdom, Nicholas reveals how minerals serve as catalysts rather than crutches in our spiritual practice. "Crystals aren't a substitute for doing the work," he explains, "they just make the work easier."

This conversation takes us beyond superficial crystal practices to explore what truly creates energetic resilience. Nicholas shares how a crystal's internal order and coherence can help us embody those same qualities, making our energy "resonate more loudly than harm." Along the way, we discuss:

  • Staying grounded during chaos
  • Multi-crystal banishing ritual (emerald, sapphire, ruby, quartz, diamond)
  • Building "energetic muscle memory" through practice
  • Protection as ongoing process, not one-time act
  • Importance of wonder and excitement in practice
  • Blending tradition with innovation
  • Guidance for all levels of crystal practitioners
  • Exploration of Nicholas' new book, 'Crystals for Psychic Self-Defense'

Throughout our discussion, Nicholas emphasizes maintaining a sense of wonder in our practice. "Find what excites you," he advises, "because that spark of excitement is the raw fuel that will take you further than any instructions in a book." His approach honors traditional wisdom while encouraging innovation for today's unique challenges.

Whether you're new to crystal work or looking to deepen your practice, this episode offers invaluable guidance for anyone seeking greater energetic sovereignty in an increasingly complex world. 

Connect with Nicholas:

https://linktr.ee/theluminouspearl
https://theluminouspearl.com/contact/

Buy the book: https://a.co/d/gkyE5py

Moon Rising Shamanic Institute Links:
Website: https://moonrisinginstitute.com/
Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/moonrisinginstitute
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/moonrisingmystics
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/moonrising.institute
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@moonrisinginstitute

Book a session with Isabel: https://calendly.com/into-the-deep/schedule

Book a FREE 15 minute connect call with Izzy: https://calendly.com/moonrisinginstitute/connect

Book a session with Christine: https://calendly.com/christinerenee/90-minutes-intensive

Book a FREE 10 minute connect call with Christine: https://calendly.com/christinerenee/10-minute-connect-call-srpt

Speaker 1:

It's time to remember your divine purpose and limitless potential. Welcome to Wisdom Rising, the official podcast of Moon Rising Shamanic Institute. Join shamanic Reiki practitioners Christine Rene, isabel Wells and Chantel Ochoa as we guide you on a journey of radical self-discovery and spiritual guidance. Each week, we'll dance through the realms of shamanism, mysticism, energy, healing and personal development to illuminate your path to true healing and self-sourced wisdom Through weekly inspired conversations and interviews with leading spiritual and shamanic practitioners. We are here to help you acknowledge, reconcile and balance your energy so that you can awaken to the whispers of wisdom rising from within. Welcome back to another amazing episode here on the Wisdom Rising podcast. I'm your host for today, isabel Wells, and today I have the true honor and joy of interviewing return guest Nicholas Pearson of the Luminous Pearl. Nicholas was on our podcast a few months ago to talk about the science of crystal healing which, for those of you who know me, know that I love finding the bridges between science and spirituality and Nicholas was the perfect guest. Nicholas has been immersed in all aspects of the mineral kingdom for over three decades. As one of the leading voices in crystal healing today, nicholas offers a unique blend of science and spirituality alongside a grounded, practical approach to working with crystals. Nicholas is an internationally renowned speaker and the award-winning author of eight books, including Crystal Basics and Stones of the Goddess. Nicholas lives in Orlando, florida, and with his background in geology, he really does bring such a grounded approach to our conversations Today. I'm really excited to have Nicholas on the show to discuss his new book Crystals for Psychic Defense, 145 Gemstones for Banishing, binding and Magical Protection. One of the things that you'll hear us talk about today and one of the things that I truly love about Nicholas, is that while he really brings forward all of these tools and techniques that you can do to implement crystals into your healing practice, he also really stresses the importance of doing the deeper work, having your practices and actually making them a practice, implementing these rituals into your daily routine, etc. Etc. He's really clear that crystals aren't going to be a pick one and you're done with your healing journey kind of thing, but are rather intended to be part of an intentional process of healing and just one component of your work. So in today's episode we talk all about psychic protection and self-defense, both in the realm of crystals and outside of it, as well as some of the science and psychological factors that factor into that and how to use crystals as a piece in your intentional healing journey. This is, as always, a fabulous conversation and it is such a joy to have Nicholas back on the show. I highly highly recommend checking out his book Crystals for Psychic Self-Defense. You can find it in any of your local bookstores or on Amazon. And, of course, in the meantime, be sure to join us over in our Moon Rising Shamanic Mystics Facebook group, a community of over 4,500 amazing individuals who are walking this path together and listening to these interviews together, so you can share your insights, questions and aha moments there. Be sure that you're following us on Instagram, facebook, youtube, pinterest, all of the places and, if you haven't already, be sure to subscribe to the podcast so that you can get access to new episodes sooner. I really hope you enjoy today's interview as much as I enjoyed recording it.

Speaker 1:

So, without further ado, let's go to the show. Hello, hello and welcome back to another episode of the Wisdom Rising podcast. I am so honored and ecstatic to have Nicholas Pearson back on the show. We interviewed him about the science of crystals last year and it is, to date, one of my favorite interviews that we've had on the show. I find it's really rare to find someone who loves balancing the science and the spirituality as much as I do, and so it is an absolute joy to have Nicholas back on the show, and today we're here to talk about his newest book Crystals for Psychic Self-Defense, 145 Gemstones for Banishing, binding and Magical Protection. Nicholas, welcome to the show. I am so excited you're here.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, Isabel. Thank you for having me back. I'm really excited for today.

Speaker 1:

Yes, I am so excited to talk with you again. I have to say at the top of this interview that your book truly blew me away. I've read many a crystal book in my day and the depth of knowledge and wisdom that you bring and balance is absolutely astounding. There is so much in this book where you can see that on the science side of things and the more practical, logical, mental side of things, you really really know these stones and these practices inside and out, but you also know how to apply them and how to bring in the spirit and the energy and the magic of it. And it is just. I think there was probably something every other page that I underlined or wrote down because it was just. It truly is a phenomenal book and a phenomenal resource, so thank you for writing it.

Speaker 2:

It's my pleasure. I wrote it because I needed it. Apparently, I think that's often how these things kind of come about. It's a little bit of a funny story, if you don't mind.

Speaker 1:

Please. It was going to be one of my first questions.

Speaker 2:

Perfect. Yeah, I had finished writing Crystal Basics the big version of that that came out in 2020. So I finished writing it, sent it into a publisher in 2019, was like the final sign off on everything and I thought, okay, what is the number one thing people ask me questions about? At the time, I was still working quite frequently in one of our local occulty metaphysical crystal shops and, like, universally, I think more people come into spaces like that for the first time, seeking something relating to safety, protection, a sense of vulnerability in the world or there's a specific situation going on, and so I thought you know what? I think this is a topic that I would love to address my way. There are some pretty good crystal books on it already and you know I'll pay homage to them, I will cite them, we'll give them some credit. But I really wanted to have something that covered a few different things not normally seen under that greater umbrella of crystals for protection. And naturally, I think we all learned some valuable lessons about boundaries protection valuable lessons about boundaries protection, hygiene, in both a physical and metaphysical sense, the following year, in 2020. So, you know, initially I thought I was going to go on tour in 2020 to celebrate the birth of Crystal Basics, and that obviously didn't happen, for all the obvious reasons that we don't have to get into.

Speaker 2:

But seeing the urgency with which people were now needing to address feelings of vulnerability, feelings of being unsafe or unsound, whether that is socially, energetically or in any other kind of setting, the scope of the book began to change a little bit as I was writing it. And the universe also has a funny way of like testing our competency in things, when, when we decide we're going to do a thing, um, particularly if you're going to go write a book, Um, I know I'm not the only one of my peers to have this experience but you pick a topic you want to write on and the universe is like okay, well, let's make sure you really know this inside and out. So I also went through, like my own personal stuff, that that um kind of reinforced the need for hitting the basics again and ensuring that I had the necessary skill set for my own well-being and that of my household and so on and so forth. So I I think that if I had written this book in an uninterrupted, just one start to finish like I do a lot of projects one, it would have come out a lot sooner. And two, it would be such a different book.

Speaker 2:

There are some heavier topics in here that I might not have included originally because they didn't feel as necessary. I might have been maybe a little bit less sensitive to the bigger systemic issues that contribute to our psychic well-being and our need for psychic self-defense, unless I'd lived through all of that and start to finish. I mean, I started writing it in 2019 and it came out in 2025. So that is the longest it's ever taken me to finish a project and I'm so glad it worked out that way.

Speaker 1:

And it is just such a dense book and I mean that in a complimentary way Like not only is the production quality of it amazing, but the amount of knowledge and the scope of what you cover in this book is phenomenal. And something that I really loved and resonated with about the book because it's something that I find is so important in my own practice is exactly what you were saying a moment ago of how important it is to remember to come back to the basics, and you emphasize that again and again and again, no matter what topic you're talking about whether it's, you know, cleansing your house or keeping your own energy clear, or even all the way to, you know, psychic attacks and those deeper issues it's always about coming back to the basics. And you open the book with some really phenomenal lines that I have underlined and that you put in words that are much better than I've ever heard them put, and one of them was that idea that crystals are there to help us embody the same level of crystallinity and coherence in our own auras and that the most important, or one of the most important elements of psychic protection is that your energy is resonating more loudly. Elements of psychic protection is that your energy is resonating more loudly than the harm. And those two phrases I said those out of order, I think the second comes before in the book but those two phrases to me are so powerful and something that I don't think I have seen really adequately explored in other crystal books.

Speaker 1:

I think there tends to be this feeling of, well, it's a crystal book, so we're going to keep it about the crystals, and what I love about your book is it's like yeah, the crystals are here to help and we can use them and they're a tool and they can be really beneficial. But the reason that they are so beneficial is because they're changing our energy and that our energy and tending to that is going to be our first line of defense. And I was really really pleased to see that come through in your book and it's something that I would love for you to touch on a little bit if you wouldn't mind.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. So you know the idea of crystal energy, like we talked about in a previous conversation. Oftentimes what I will do is I will look at electromagnetism or other forms of energy that we can measure and can observe in real time or at least someone with the right equipment can as a means of understanding how this subtle energy must also behave. Because at the end of the day, energy is energy. And you know, one of my big takeaways from one of my mentors in the crystal world, um, is that at large the metaphysical world, kind of spiritual world, focuses a heck of a lot on frequency and pretty much ignores all of the other things that are important when mapping out how energies behave. So you know, frequency is the, essentially the number of cycles a sine wave makes when you graph it, you know, depending on our unit of measurement so maybe it's Hertz number of cycles per second. We measure brainwaves and Hertz and so many other things and Hertz or megahertz. So that's that is useful. But it's also really imperative that we pay attention to the amplitude of that sine wave, that is, you know how tall or how short it might be. And I like to use the analogy of frequency is like our station on the radio and amplitude is the volume, and we have to adjust both of those in order to hear something loud and clear. And if we don't, what we're trying to listen to will be interrupted or disrupted by the world around us. So what crystals do? Because of their own inherent order and form, they serve as like templates that allow us to kind of conform to a more orderly structure, energetically speaking. And if we can accomplish getting all of the parts and pieces of us in order, in harmony, in sync, then they're going to contribute to a more well-organized field, but also a field that is inherently louder, because they're all singing the same song. One voice can only project so far, but if the whole choir, that is, your entire makeup, body, mind and spirit, is singing in unison, then that signal can be heard from so much farther away, which also means that whatever disruptive energies we're going to encounter are far less likely to permeate or disrupt our energy field. And crystals, yes, they can assist in that process, but they are not a substitute for our own inner work. In fact, I think of them as catalysts, and a catalyst is something that lowers the amount of effort or energy required to achieve a particular outcome. So, you know, digestive enzymes are catalysts and you know we've got plenty of other examples of them in in the body. But you know, energetically, the crystal isn't a substitute for doing the work, it just makes the work easier. It's it's like the equipment at the gym. You can transform your body without the equipment at the gym, but also, just having a gym membership is not the same as going to the gym. So, um, you know, the crystals are there to supplement, to direct, to focus, to enhance the work we're doing, and that all starts from within. And it's it's about getting in touch with your energy, getting in touch with your modes of perception.

Speaker 2:

I think a large part of psychic self-defense.

Speaker 2:

Um, to paraphrase some advice given to me by a dear friend of mine, a good chunk of what we need to do is just mind our own business Energetically.

Speaker 2:

If I am really concerned with the emotional states of all of the strangers around me when I go to the grocery store, I'm going to be conforming to their emotional states, and I think that is a trap that many of us accidentally fall into. When we begin to develop our kind of magical metaphysical skills, our psychic skills, we can too easily let things cross over that threshold. We take things in rather than just observing from that detached space, and that's one of the things that I love about crystals observing from that detached space and that's one of the things that I love about crystals. There's really nothing that I can do energetically that is going to change the fundamental energy that amethyst or calcite or fluorite has. It might need some cleansing from time to time, but it is still always just itself and we human beings are volatile and squishy and so keen to have these kind of capricious changes in our energy field, which is part of what makes the human experience so diverse and varied and wonderful, but it's also sometimes what makes it exhausting.

Speaker 1:

And that's a point that you really drive home in the book of you mentioned it before as well that idea that we're all looking for that sense of safety and security and almost that foundation where we know where our feet are, how we're feeling, we know that there's some of that solidity there. And there's a phrase again that you use in the book that I loved, which was that the world doesn't always show up that way for us. And you go on in the book to talk about some of the sources of psychic attacks and I laughed when I read that section, because the very top cause is your own thoughts and emotions. And what I love about that is that when we can kind of link those two together it really drives home as well, like you were saying, our range of perception and how we're seeing the world, because the world might not always show up for us in that safe and secure way, but a lot of the time or at least some of the time right, it depends on the person, but sometimes that feeling of unsafety and insecurity comes from our own minds and our own emotions and the ability to pinpoint that right from the start and say you know, we can be the cause of our own psychic self-harm and that's not again, you make a point of this in the book.

Speaker 1:

It's not blaming or judging the person, it's part of human life. But you talk about how, like you're saying with the grocery store, if you go in open, you're opening to everything, not just you know the best and highest, as we call it on the show, right, you're open to everything and you're able to conform to everything. And so having that understanding that our thoughts and our emotions really are that first line of defense for not only how we feel but also how we're perceiving the world, I find is so important and I think it's often the thing that I see students and clients missing when it comes to their own psychic self-protection is there's a lot of this emphasis on what's happening outside and coming at you rather than what's happening inside and going out.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and then of course the big question becomes conceptually, it is easy to come up with a framework for shielding from the external, but how do you engage with the idea of psychic self-defense when it's you you got to defend from and it's not really like that? We have to kind of unpack the baggage around that a little bit differently. Like I can shield myself from external energies, I can practice really good psychic hygiene in my space. I can fortify the home energetically to keep outside disruptive influences out, but I'm inside the house. I'm inside my own personal shield, I am my mind inside the house. I'm inside my own personal shield, I am my mind. So how do I engage with these practices in a way that, fundamentally, is really a game of mind training, of cultivating a sense of mindfulness that is taking a step back from the kind of sensationalized experience of consciousness and more into that, um, observational, like emotions are going to come and go. You're going to have that, that script of you know negative self-talk. Oh, nicholas, why did you leave so many things to the last minute? Oh, you should have, you know, taken care of this sooner. You really needed to talk to an editor about this, and now it's too late to change something, or you know, whatever it is, and and we, we project that all of the time and it is contributing to a sense of wellbeing and or not, as the case might be.

Speaker 2:

And so a lot of the practices in the book, even when they look like they are protecting us from the outside stuff, if we engage with them really mindfully, I mean, if you really take five, 10 minutes a day before you leave the house and you do some self-cleansing, a little grounding and centering and all the kind of like fundamentals of our energy hygiene, and then you also pick a psychic shield, chances are you've carved out enough space inside you that those thoughts, when they come up, they don't occupy as much real estate, they don't take over as much of your entire energy field, because because you've done these other practices, it doesn't make that script necessarily go away.

Speaker 2:

Um, that is, that is a separate set of practices which might require maybe a licensed mental health practitioner and I am not that, so I'm not here to guide you through that but I do think that a regular spiritual practice, whatever it looks like, can help us make greater space for that and the idea of just although and I say it in the book.

Speaker 2:

This way, I do believe in a beneficent universe. I genuinely believe that there are forces out there guiding the highest and best, as you put it, but I also know that stuff happens, that not every human being has your best interest at heart and sometimes we don't have our own best interests at heart because we've been trained not to or told not to, or told we don't deserve it or whatever it could be. There are also systemic forces out there that, like we can't change by carrying a crystal. I can't change the kind of extractive nature of the so-called Western world or modern world, but I can reorient my perspective and my participation in that to be a little bit kinder and more compassionate, a little bit more grounded and centered, and hopefully that enables me to have the space to not let things get too urgent too soon, for lack of a better way to put it.

Speaker 1:

No, absolutely. And that idea of reorienting ourselves and shifting our perception is really, really powerful. And I know, at least for me, that was. One of the reasons why I was drawn to crystals in the first place was this idea that you know, I still remember when I bought my first crystal, it was this little heart of rainbow fluorite. I had never had a crystal before. I think I was probably like 15. And I just had.

Speaker 1:

I had so much chaos happening in my personal life and I remember there was this feeling that I didn't have words for at the time, and now I do, in part thanks to you and the way that you explain things.

Speaker 1:

But that idea that there's so much chaos happening around me and here's this perfect specimen of order and clarity and that crystallinity which I think is so rare to find in today's world, and so that idea of being able to hold a crystal, whether we're using it for psychic self-defense or just for amplifying our own energy and healing that idea of being able to hold this piece of order and kind of tune yourself to it instead of to the chaos in the world around you is a really beautiful piece of hope, I think, for a lot of people right now who are feeling like maybe there isn't hope, maybe there's too much chaos around us, but bringing in that piece of that mindful connection, like you were talking about, to create the space within you where you can sit and all that's in your focus is that crystal, is that piece of order, so that you're not focused on the chaos, you're not perceiving everything, you're just tuned into.

Speaker 1:

Where do you want your energy to be, where do you want your perception to be is so powerful, and I wonder if that's something that a lot of people can resonate with, that idea that you know, in this world of chaos, here's this little piece of order that we can hold on to.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and you know, as you were talking like, uh, I think a really nice metaphor kind of came forward and I haven't quite articulated it this way before but a single molecule does not a crystal make. We need enough of them to create that repetition, that order, that symmetry at the internal level. So when it feels like we are surrounded by chaos and we feel alone, it is so easy to be overwhelmed by that and we have to look to the spaces where we can connect, where we find that sense of symmetry and belonging, where we feel the kind of integral nature as in all parts and pieces collaborating. And crystals can be catalysts for that too. They remind us that we fit into a larger pattern, that there are people experiencing the same things, that are hoping for the same outcomes, that are banding together, sometimes in physical community, sometimes in digital community and sometimes just energetically in the ethers, without even intending to. So the idea that there is hope, I think, extends so much bigger. There are so many of us in this world and we don't always know that the support is there and that it doesn't just have to come in a material sense from other people, but out in the ethers. We've got our teams.

Speaker 2:

In spirit, I fundamentally live in an inspirited universe. I like to see the consciousness in all things. I like to see all things as having consciousness might be a better way to put that and recognizing that a crystal is not just the inner tool because of its order, its materiality, can help me affect energy. But it is a part of my community, that I am a part of its community, that the land beneath me is alive and well and trying to breathe through the same chaos. But the land has seen it before and it will see it end and it will see cycles I can't even dream of. So this idea of not letting the chaos in, I think part of it is seeing where you fit in beyond that. You are one molecule in the crystal lattice, so to speak.

Speaker 1:

And I think even in that we have so much to learn from what a shamanic perspective would call the rock people, the mineral people, that ability to stay, to remain, to be solid, to be present. And my husband has a phrase that he uses when he's feeling anxious, and it brings me so much joy he just he'll go outside, sometimes in the middle of whatever's happening in his day, and he'll be like the trees are still there, the rocks are still there. And that is such a powerful lesson for a culture that right now I don't think really knows how to be still. We're not trained how to be still, we're not taught how to rest. We're taught how to go and how to be productive and how to keep moving.

Speaker 1:

And then there's the rock and the mineral and the crystal that just exists and is sturdy and solid. And even just going on a hike and sitting on top of a big rock you know, I think everybody's had this experience at least once and that immediate sense of peace that comes. Because it's not that, you know, to a lot of people they might say, well, there's no consciousness in a rock, like there's no spirit. But to those who are animists, who believe in an inspirited world there is, and that energy is such a sturdy, ongoing, peaceful energy that I think we have a lot to learn from as humans.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and to the people who maybe have difficulty reconciling an unspirited world, I think it is a universal human experience, without exception, that you come to a breathtaking scene in nature and the quality of that space. There's some ineffable change in the air. I mean, we all encounter the ineffable. We might not use the same language for it and I imagine most of our listeners probably. We don't have to sell them on the idea of an inspirited world, but the idea that everything around us is not necessarily just a static part of the scenery but it's contributing to what we feel and see and perceive. That can be a really great place to start and perceive. That can be a really great place to start and when we do need that reassurance.

Speaker 2:

I mean, I think this is one of the most fundamental reasons that we find articles of stone, artifacts of stone that are associated with protection, from literally hundreds of thousands of years ago until the present day. It endures, it lasts, it is, most of the time, far more resilient than I will be in a material sense. Um, and there's something so reassuring about being able to pick up an object that might be millions of years old. I recently got a gift from my husband it's the oldest crustal rock in existence and it's like 4.6 billion years old. All of my problems feel really tiny in comparison to that. Like what has this rock seen? I cannot. That is such a deep, long time that I just everything else evaporates. So even if we have a hard time with the kind of animist piece or the energetic piece, the idea that stone endures and even if it just metaphorically, symbolically, confers some of that endurance to us, that is such a powerful thing some of that endurance.

Speaker 1:

To us. That is such a powerful thing. Absolutely, and going back to that metaphor that you had come through of one molecule does not a crystal make. I think we can take it in a slightly different direction as well and say that doing a psychic protection ritual once does not psychic protection make once does not psychic protection make?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, absolutely Like. This is not a set it and forget it situation. This is, we would call it, spiritual practice for a reason it is embodied practice. It is practice that we have to engage with over and over and over and over again. I tell this to my Reiki students as well, particularly in the third degree. You know some of the techniques we learned then. I want to ensure they get it. So we're going to practice it and practice it and practice it and practice it, and then the next day we're going to practice it and practice it, and when they're really sick of it, we're going to practice it a few more times.

Speaker 2:

And that's kind of what we need for any part of our practice, whether it's shielding, grounding, centering, cleansing or whatever else our practice entails.

Speaker 2:

So, yeah, we have to create a sense of rhythm with all of this, and I will say that once we've done it enough, we generate some inertia and we kind of shorten the distance between I need protection and I feel protected. I'm not saying that we necessarily collapse the distance to zero all of the time, but there are certainly times in the world where I can remember my favorite technique and maybe I'm wearing a representation of that around my wrist. Maybe I've got that crystal on my person and I can, just you know, fondle that bracelet. Or you know, reach into my pocket and grab that tumbled stone and, just you know, press into it and and, and I feel the uh, like the neural pathway I've built from doing the practice I just, I automatically go to the end result of that practice without having to stop and breathe and do all of the things when I'm in the middle of real life. And the beauty of this is, when we do our practice consistently, we're actually more prepared for the in the moment stuff, because we've built that muscle memory.

Speaker 1:

And I love that idea of I like to call these our energetic tuning forks of when you've done something enough and you have that energetic pattern or that neural network or whatever perspective you want to take on this.

Speaker 1:

When you have that inertia, that momentum going, it becomes so much easier to just tune into that.

Speaker 1:

And that idea of closing or at least shortening the gap between needing protection and feeling protected is something that I share with my students over and over and over again, because I find that the're doing in the ritual like there are obviously some things like the banishing ritual, which I want to talk about in a minute that are steeped in history and tradition and have a lot of meaning to the actual practice itself.

Speaker 1:

But a lot of the practices and rituals that we see for especially psychic protection, but even just our spiritual energetic hygiene, it's not really about what you're doing in the ritual, it's more about how are you feeling with the ritual. And that's part of why I love your book, because you have so many different practices that it's like which one is going to resonate the most for you, because this one practice, that maybe your favorite practice, might not resonate as much for me. And then, therefore, because I'm just doing it, because I quote, unquote should, and I'm not in the energy of it, I'm not embodying the energy of protection that that ritual might be able to give me, then that protection that it provides would be less than if I found one that really resonated with and, like you were saying earlier, amplified that feeling of protection within me.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it is how we feel about a practice during a practice. After a practice should tell us a lot. It should be a pretty good indicator of how things are going, and that's not to say you're not going to get bored from things or that you're not going to have to occasionally do things that are good for you just because they're good for you. I am a big fan of, kind of like, staying the course, but it doesn't mean we have to get prescriptive about that. We should be able to stay engaged. We don't wanna check out the part of the challenge of having that say familiarity with the practice. Of course inertia is wonderful, as long as we are conscious of it. But the flip side of if you feel protected, you are protected, is also, if you feel cursed, you are cursed. We often say you are protected is also, if you feel cursed, you are cursed. We often say I think I paraphrase this somewhere in the book like whether you actually are under psychic attack or you only believe you are, the remedy is the same and it's it's just kind of the mirror image of this. It's two ends of two sides of the same coin. But our mental state is a really clear indicator of how things are going, and it doesn't necessarily, if our mental state can't be wrangled, doesn't necessarily mean the practice is bad, but it might mean that our framework needs attention, like what are we really doing to cultivate the mindfulness necessary? And that's sometimes a completely unrelated issue and one that I don't think I addressed super well in the book, because it's kind of a given that if you're going to do the meditation, you're going to be present in the meditation, and if we're having difficulty with that or anything like that, it's a symptom of maybe a different issue. But I wanted to have so many diverse themes as well as diverse practices that correlate to each theme, so there could be something for everybody's flavor of spirituality. There certainly are some more, we'll say, heely-feely practices as well as some more occult-y practices, some that might feel a little shamanic, some that feel a little bit more ceremonial, some that are kind of folkloric.

Speaker 2:

And part of what took me such a long time to write this book was the dialogue I had internally about being concerned I was going to isolate one part of an audience while discussing something else in the book, and so I really wanted to be super mindful about all of that. I wanted to ensure that my serious occultist practitioners didn't scoff at some of the airy-fairy woo-woo stuff and vice versa, that people weren't uncomfortable, and so far, I mean, the feedback is good. I feel pleased with the outcome. But we are also allowed to try new things, and so I wanted lots of different things in the book, not just because I write encyclopedias for a living, but also, if we are having difficulty connecting, if we are having difficulty engaging, if the technique that prescriptively sounds the most appropriate isn't making us feel safe and protected, try a different one.

Speaker 2:

Give yourself permission to experiment. Give yourself permission to be wrong. This a refrain that I've come into a lot, especially in the last year, um, and it actually was kind of born out of my, my, uh, my hobby in the world of music. Like, just give yourself permission to make mistakes and do it confidently, um, and if you do that, then you're going to have probably more hits than misses.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely, and it's funny having this thread of the conversation go in this direction, because one of the things that, again, I think you maybe address without actually addressing it I'm trying to remember if there's a specific part where you're talking specifically about this but one thing that I noticed was that throughout the book, there's this undertone of understanding that, whether you're creating a crystal grid or you're doing the banishing ritual, or you're making a spell or whatever you've chosen as your ritual or your practice for that situation, there's this undertone of knowing that the outcome of that, the goal of that, is that not that you're giving your power away, not that you're saying this crystal is now going to heal me or this ritual is fixing me, it's can you bring that power back to yourself, can you reclaim what is rightfully yours. And that's such a powerful perspective to take when it comes to psychic protection.

Speaker 2:

It is. This comes back to this theme of embodied practice which has shown up really big in my life right now. When we go through the motions well, let's take even a step further back, when we're new to a practice and we experience a kind of magical outcome, we find that piece of rose, quartz, and maybe our grief gets smaller, or we find that that new partner or, you know, the budding romance starts to go really well. It is so easy to outsource the agency. It's not us that's doing any of that, it's it's the magical rock we just bought, but really it's us and the magical rock together. It is relational in how it works and if we put all of the attention on the external and neglect the internal, pretty soon that magical rock feels a lot less magical. It's. It's it's doing less because it was never solely in charge of your life. It is, it is an invited guest in your life, really, if you think about it, especially at the beginning, and that can take us to a place where we get stagnant, where we go through the motions, where we think we're being mindful about picking our crystal and maybe we're cleansing and programming it, but because we're still putting the agency, the responsibility, on the external object, we're losing our own magic, and so what we need to do is really live the practice, however simple it looks like.

Speaker 2:

My favorite daily practice of self-protection the Labradorite shield that's in the book I still use with such frequency that it might astonish people for the number of years that I've done it it is still my first thing to teach people who are kind of new. Labradorite is magical, so it's an easy thing to get people excited about. That's part of the reason why, but also I've had such profound results from it and I make sure that I still have that, that peace inside of me that is really present. And the litmus test for me and I think this will be true for many things, not for every practice, but especially for one like this is the sense of wonderment, the sense of awe. Sense of awe Like we're making magic, we are wielding unseen energies. This piece of the earth has a rainbow inside it. It does phenomenal things with light. How amazing is this universe in which we live. And if I can start from that place, I will be present and I won't just go through the motions. I also won't outsource the agency, because that labradorite can sit on my desk all day long and it's just going to sit on my desk all day long. Sure, I do believe in a kind of electromagnetic inspired model of its energy field interacting with mine, but until we're relational about it, there's nothing to direct it.

Speaker 2:

So that piece of living, our practice of internalizing, our practice of kind of taking self-inventory, how do I feel before, during and after? If I feel vacant, if I feel bored, if I feel stagnant, if I feel distracted, maybe it's time to switch things up and particularly in the realm of protection work, having more than one skillset, more than one tool, more than one layer is really important. We can use the analogy that like if someone picks the lock into your house that compromises your protection and safety, you replace the lock, you don't just lock the same one. So if you have only one kind of psychic self-defense practice and something compromises that, we don't just do it over and over again. We add another layer to it.

Speaker 2:

Maybe we install an alarm in our house, maybe we get a guard dog, maybe we add a deadbolt, there's so many ways that we can think about that. But when we embody the practices inside and out, yes, they are firmer, but it also gives us a little bit more leeway to say you know what, today I feel like embodying something different. Today my energy is not really engaging in the same way with my normal routine, so let's mix it up, and that's the beauty of being able to sample from like a buffet of practices.

Speaker 1:

So one of the practices that you share in the book that I have been using in my own practice because I wanted to be able to talk about it and it's been. It has quickly become a favorite is the banishing ritual and it's at the end of chapter two for those who end up buying the book. Would you mind sharing a little bit about that ritual and how you kind of sculpted it for the book and what it's for kind of sculpted it?

Speaker 2:

for the book and what it's for. Yeah, so thank you. Um, uh, I'm so glad to hear people are putting it into practice, cause this is one of those like weird things that I just kind of came up with and I didn't have a home. So, if we like, hit rewind several years in my life, um, ahead of when I actually started work on this book. Um, I was taking some training with Christopher Penzac with the temple of witchcraft, and the first degree has a whole module on um protection work and, uh, in addition to like the normal textbook, there's some additional assigned reading and I'm going through it and I'm like, oh, I have practices that feel similar to this and that, and there's only so much of that assigned reading we actually had to do and report back on for our homework. But I wanted to just not do the basic stuff. I mean, if you hand me another book and say this is, you know, do all of this, this, this and this are necessary and the rest is optional, I'm going to go well, let's explore some of that optional stuff.

Speaker 2:

So I began practicing what's called the lesser banishing ritual of the pentagram and I, I, I needed a daily practice wherever possible, at least two to three times a day and if I didn't have that luxury, at least once a day at the very beginning. And this is a kind of ritual practice that has at its core some imagery borrowed from, we'll say, the kind of hermetic Western mystery traditions. This is a ritual that's used in a lot of ceremonial magic, such as that of the, the golden dawn and similar kinds of occult orders and mystical for an eternities, and I enjoy the outcome of this ritual quite a bit, all of its imagery, all of the kind of like, um, we'll say, the script, the liturgical aspect doesn't, doesn't necessarily look like the core of my practice, although thematically they may be related. So, um, I I wanted to see if there were other analogs, like could we come up with something that follows this framework, that maybe uses a different metaphor, a different symbol, a different image to tap into the same archetypal forces? And so I thought, well, I mean, the most natural thing for me would be to pick gemstones that are aligned with the kind of angelic forces and directional forces and everything else. And I gave myself permission to wander a little bit off script and not have to make a carbon copy of this, which was a critique I got from some folks who really wanted it to be just a little bit closer to the original. I had an extra step that's not found in your standard banishing rituals and I went back and forth and I decided to keep them in. But when I put this together and shared it with a couple of colleagues, they were all fairly impressed that I would go to such great lengths.

Speaker 2:

But the idea of these rituals is that they offer a sense of grounding. First and foremost, they center us within our kind of like reorient the psyche as well as the energy, body in material and immaterial space. And then the majority of banishing rituals that you'll find, such as the lesser banishing ritual in the pentagram, also call in these kind of elemental or similar forces that are aligned with the elements and the directions to create this holistic kind of protection inside and out. And so I chose five gemstones that did this. I created the kind of prelude of it, which I call the Mineral Cross or the Crucian Mineralium, because I had to like be really nerdy and come up with Latin names for all of this to kind of feel similar to the old school grimoires and that that cross of energy that we make in our our field, gives us a sense of connecting heaven and earth, but also giving us this kind of horizontal axis and we recognize that we sit in the middle of this, we are centered in the universe, and that replenishes our field, it stabilizes our field, it draws forth, we'll say, the kind of nutritive forces to nourish us when we need it.

Speaker 2:

And then the second part, the Vigiliae Lapidus, the sentinels of stone, is where we kind of invoke the qualities of these four different gemstones to stand around us and then one at our heart. So they are, let's see, if we go in order. It should be, uh, emerald, oh gosh, I don't know if I can do this, but we'll say emerald, sapphire, quartz and Ruby, if, if I get it in order. Um, thank you, I'm a little rusty, um, I haven't done this in a while, um, which is probably signal that I ought to pick up the practice again. And then you invoke diamond in the kind of middle of that.

Speaker 2:

And these are four stones of varying degrees of preciousness by today's standard, but were once considered to be very, very precious objects, and they're associated with the directions, with the elements, with the same angels that one might invoke in the traditional LBRP, and we create this like larger field that banishes disruptive and harmful energies. It doesn't just offer protection to you personally when we do these rituals, they actually clear our space. And so in a lot of strains of occult practice and ritual magic, ceremonial magic, this is the kind of thing we do to prepare the setting for whatever we're going to do next, rather than having to, you know, light something up for some smoke cleansing or any other kind of ritual action. Just the banishing ritual itself can do that. But also it can become our kind of portable shield when we think about how we're affixing these energies to us or affixing ourselves within that ontology, that space. And so when I came up with it, it was like a part of my early treatment for a proposal. I had some stones as examples.

Speaker 2:

I had this ritual that I scripted in a sort of semi-finished form and then the majority of a sample chapter, and then, when it came time to sit down and write the book, I really didn't know where this ritual belonged.

Speaker 2:

I couldn't figure out where it was most at home.

Speaker 2:

If we think about it in terms of personal protection, it's great in like the shielding and personal protection chapter, but also if we think about it as banishing unwanted influences, I can put it in the banishing and binding chapter. But if we put it in the context of clearing our space, we can put it in the chapter on psychic hygiene. So I decided I was going to compromise and pick the one that came first, which is why it's in chapter two. So if it feels like a really big practice to take on for folks, you don't have to do it right then and there. You don't have to integrate it ever like if that's just not what your style of practice looks like. But when we learn those fundamentals early on and we make them a part of a regular routine practice whether it's this or some other kind of we'll say something else that shares rhetorical goals with this then when we really need it, when things are urgent, we've already got it and I think that was really why I wanted to insert it earlier in the book versus later.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. And I think it really is a great almost introduction to everything else that you do in the book because it really encompasses everything. It has that presence of coming back into the present moment. It has orienting yourself to the directions and to the stones and those archetypal energies. It has connecting yourself with the heavens and to the stones and those archetypal energies. It has connecting yourself with the heavens and the earth.

Speaker 1:

And one of the reasons that I was drawn to this ritual of all the others and I think our listeners will relate to this as well is I think everybody at this point has heard one of our team members call in the directions from a shamanic tradition where you call in east, south, west, north, you call to the spirits from above, to the spirits from below and then to the spirits within, whether that's your middle world guys or your higher self.

Speaker 1:

And this banishing ritual that Nicholas has in the book to me is very similar to the calling in of the directions.

Speaker 1:

And what I love about the fact that you're really clear about how this is rooted in tradition but a little bit sculpted to the present modern day and to your own practice is it kind of gave me permission to start experimenting with what if I combine this ritual with my calling in of the directions, because it has such a similar intention of rooting yourself into your space, clearing your energy, setting up that sacred nature of what you're doing and the work that you're about to do, and it has quickly become a favorite addition to my calling in of the directions and I just wanted to share that for anybody who's maybe been listening to this conversation.

Speaker 1:

And if you really are, you know, kind of a hardcore shamanic fan like I am thinking where does all of this fit in? There are so many and this is what I love about spirituality and the occult, or animism, or again, whatever lens, like Nicholas was saying earlier, whatever lens you take your spirituality from that. There are so many themes and archetypes that we come back to again and again and again, and when you find that one that resonates with you, you see it mirrored everywhere, kind of like a crystal structure. So I just I wanted to share that because it's it's quickly become one of my favorite pieces of the book.

Speaker 2:

That makes me so incredibly happy. Thank you. The goal when we write these practices, my hope, is the tool as written is useful for people. But I have this secret, subversive, hidden agenda every time I write a book, and it is to encourage people to think for themselves. If I model a way we do something and I explain why we do it this way, or, you know, unpack some symbolism, what I'm really hoping is not just you do the thing, because I said so, but you're able to apply the same logic and reasoning, the same symbol set, the same kind of interpretive lens to anything in your practice.

Speaker 2:

And then a book like this is not just a set of instructions, it's more like a recipe book. And you know if we're, if we're, cooking something. You know I see a great recipe show up on Instagram for you know some kind of curry chicken. I don't eat chicken, but I can. I can take the parts about that that I like and apply it to veg or tofu or whatever else it's going to be and, and and. That kind of creativity, that permission is such an important part. So thank you for sharing that. That is, you just fulfilled my secret, subversive mission there and that that means so much to me.

Speaker 1:

Beautiful. So I do have one final, potentially final, question for you, depending on how you answer. If you could give one piece of advice to someone who is wanting to start this work, what would it?

Speaker 2:

be, oh goodness. Only one piece of advice. It's hard because there's so many angles that we can come at this from, and I think what I might tell people is find the practice you get excited about, find the thing you get excited about and keep finding ways to stay excited. And then it's not so much a case of do things in this order this sequence I'm not trying to tell you. I mean the book follows a logical order on purpose. I'm hopeful that people realize if you do things in that order, you're good. But really find that sense of wonder, find that sense of awe.

Speaker 2:

I still do this Labradorite shield technique that I came up with in I don't know 2017, 2018. I'm not really sure Somewhere around there, and I still get excited. When I take a piece of labradorite and I turn it in the light and I see that flash of color, that kind of spectral luminosity inside, and I internalize that image and I project it into my field, I still feel a sense of wonder. I can't tell you how many hundreds thousands of times I've done it, the countless times I've guided other people through it. I still get excited by it and so, therefore, I'm still happy to do it every day and getting excited about more than one thing is useful, but really start with that piece, rather than a prescriptive. Pick this crystal, do this thing, what crystals do you get excited by?

Speaker 2:

Ignore the interpretations in the books. I say that as someone who writes crystal books Like yes, please buy them and refer to them, but also give yourself permission to pick something that excites you, because that spark of excitement, that spark of wonder, that is the raw fuel that is going to take you so much further than just a descriptive set of instructions in a book. We don't want to be too prescriptive about things. We also don't necessarily need to play everything fast and loose, but the relationship we build with our allies, our material tools and our unseen allies, as well as the allies that we've got in body, that sense of inner fulfillment, wonder, love, call it whatever you will, that is the source of the magic.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely so, nicholas. This has been once again an absolutely fantastic conversation. I'm sad that it's coming to an end, but I am curious, is there?

Speaker 2:

anything that you wish we had touched on, that we didn't. You wish we had touched on that? We didn't. I think I just want to follow one little thread that you brought up with regards to the banishing ritual, and it was the idea that we can examine something rooted in a historical practice. We can understand how things were historically done, but this is not a book necessarily of historical practices. This is for us living today, and there's this attitude we find in a lot of spaces in the world where we assume that something is better because it's older or more authentic because it's older or more effective because it's older, and that is not always the case.

Speaker 2:

There are some very simple, we'll say archaic, historical practices for psychic self-defense involving rocks and minerals that I think are phenomenal. I have hagstones all over the house. I've got some hung up in the bedroom. We do those kinds of historic practices but at the same time, like updating things for the world we live in now, also bearing in mind certain themes regarding material safety of some of these ingredients, like there are some toxic minerals out there, we wouldn't necessarily use them in the same way that our ancestors did. Arsenic compounds are great, but we don't use them to make emerald green dye anymore because it kills us.

Speaker 2:

So I really wanted the book to be a manual for today. So, even when it references a historic thing, I haven't decontextualized it, but maybe I've recontextualized it to make some things more accessible and easier and also to really remind us that this is the world we live in. And maybe the tool from the 17th century is super cool, difficult to execute in today's world, but we can be inspired from it. So I want people to be inspired by these things. Even if you don't follow them religiously or dogmatically, let that inspiration guide you, and I had a lot of fun taking those historical threads and weaving them together with new crystals and new things, as respectfully as I was able to. And yeah, thanks for recognizing that.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely, and it is something that in my own personal practice, I'm really passionate about as a shamanic practitioner.

Speaker 1:

I think everybody kind of knows me in Moon Rising as the shamanic practitioner who really connects us back to what? Moon Rising, as the shamanic practitioner who really connects us back to what are our roots in shamanism, but not in a way that we're saying, just like you were saying, we can only do it the way that it was originally thought of, or if we're straying from tradition, then we're doing it wrong or it's not going to be as useful. It's this understanding that there is so much wisdom there, right, having that respect for our elders and our ancestors and the traditions that led us to where we are today, while also being able to recognize that the energies we're faced with today are wildly different than anything our ancestors faced, and so our practices are inevitably going to need to adapt, are inevitably going to need to adapt, and we're going to have to innovate a little bit to be able to bring that tradition and that wisdom and the healing that was available then and apply it to the energy of today's world.

Speaker 2:

And not to mention for my specific niche in this. We have way more minerals at our disposal now. There's just so much choice. So I think that's a really exciting part about living in today's world. The medieval and earlier lapidary grimoires that list all these rare and exotic gems, sometimes fabulous and invented ones. They pale in comparison to the sheer diversity that we've got in our average crystal shop today, and all of those things that don't appear in those pre-modern texts are equally as magical and valuable and inspirited.

Speaker 1:

And that was also part of the fun and updating the practices with what we've got available to us now part of the fun and updating the practices with what we've got available to us now Absolutely, and I love, like we mentioned, that it has that piece of permission there of take what resonates, leave what doesn't.

Speaker 1:

At least try it before you leave it, but understand that there is room for that play and that innovation and the inspiration to come through so that you can adapt these practices to your own life and to your own energy and to what's going to work best for you.

Speaker 1:

So, for all of you listening, this book is, like I've said many times in this interview, absolutely phenomenal. I highly recommend every single one of you to buy it, listen to it, whatever it is, and just know that it really does run the gamut of everything psychic self-defense and you guys know that we're pretty stringent about our psychic self-defense here at Moon Rising, and so to find a book that meets the cut is really truly a gift and such an honor to get to interview it. It covers everything from your own personal energetic hygiene to clearing your house, to cleansing your crystals, to crystal grids, to psychic attacks, to spells and curses, and in those conversations has a space for everyone, no matter where on the spiritual spectrum you fall, and so I highly recommend that you read this book and Nicholas, for those who are wanting to read or to connect with you. How can they do that?

Speaker 2:

Oh, thank you so much. The book, theoretically, is available anywhere books are sold. Go find it in your local indie bookshop, your local metaphysical store. If they don't carry it, I'm sure they're happy to order it for you. Of course, you can get it from all the normal places and chains as well. If you want to connect with me, it's theluminouspearlcom or at theluminouspearl on social media, and I would just love to connect with more folks. I've got a variety of classes at any given moment and other great events coming up, so you can find all that on my website.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much, nicholas, for another outstanding interview and conversation and for another phenomenal book that you've put out into the world to help people find their way in the energetic realm. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Speaker 2:

My pleasure. Thank you so much.

Speaker 1:

And to all of you listening. Until next time, may you awaken to the whispers of wisdom rising from within. Thanks for tuning in to today's show. The Wisdom Rising podcast is sponsored by Moon Rising Shamanic Institute. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to the show on your favorite podcasting app and be the first to know when we release a new episode. You can find us on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and TikTok at Moon Rising Institute, or visit our website, moonrisinginstitutecom to learn more about our mission and find future opportunities to connect with our community of shamanic mystics. Once again, thank you for sharing space with us today and until next time, may you awaken to the whispers of wisdom rising from within.