Laurey Simmons Archives

Laurey Simmons of The Colourful Dot Boutique, shares a sacred space ritual to open your heart this Valentine’s Day…

Beyond the chocolates and red roses, Valentines Day for me is a precious reminder to keep our hearts open. As psychotherapist and spiritual teacher John Welwood says, our heart’s true purpose is really: “to be an open channel through which great love flows into this world.”

One of my favorite ways of opening this channel is by spending time in my sacred space. A sacred space is simply one corner of our home environment where we keep beautiful objects that are special or sacred to us. The space can be as large or as small as you want. Even if you only have a small section of a shelf, this too can be a perfect place to make your sacred space.

Keeping a sacred space is a precious gift to our soul, a reminder of how we want to be in the world, a mirror reflecting back to us our Inner Beauty.

Read on for a sacred space ritual for an open heart…

1. First thing to do is to cleanse the energy of your space. One of my favorite ways to cleanse is by burning Frankincense resin. Dropping a few pieces of the resin onto a burning charcoal disc allows for the heavenly smoke to rise and fill the surrounding air. Breathing in this aroma, I find my mind-chatter settles, my body relaxes, and my energies become grounded.

2. With the theme of Love in mind, I’ll be adding a few drops of Rose Oil into my diffuser. The combination of Frankincense and Rose Oil smells seriously divine! Rose of course exudes love and beauty, both visually and through her perfect scent. Did you know that Rose essential Oil has been proven in studies to reduce anxiety and produce deep levels of relaxation?

3. Now for some visual beauty. Nothing opens my heart more than beautiful objects from Mother Nature, especially crystals. Three pink, heart-centered stones I’m working with a lot at the moment are Rose Quartz, the mother of Love stones; Mangano Calcite, which radiates the energies of the heart in a very gentle, nurturing, and soothing way; and Pink Morganite, also known as the Pink Emerald, and a wonderful tool to help cultivate qualities of the heart, like compassion. I also love to add fresh flowers to my sacred space—in this case, either fresh pink roses or a bowl of dried pink roses.

4. The next step is to connect to the energy of those who radiate an open heart or Unconditional Love. It could be a spiritual teacher, a historical or mythical figure, a friend or family member. At the moment, the chosen beings of light in my sacred space are Ram Dass, Maya Aneglou, Thich Nhat Hann, Joni Mitchell, and Heqet (the Ancient Egyptian goddess and symbol of new life). Ideally, print off some small images of these people so they can beam their light right back at you from the heart of your sacred space.

5. An open heart is only truly open if we can keep it so in challenging situations. With this in mind, I like to have an object in my sacred space that symbolizes this challenging situation or person. This practice is taken from one of my spiritual teachers, Ram Dass, who spoke about his own puja table and how he’d have pictures of his teachers there, Buddha, Hanuman, Maharajah, Mary, and how every morning he would greet them with love. This included a picture of one of his most difficult people, Caspar Weinberger, President Reagan’s Secretary of Defense. An alternative to a picture of a specific person is simply to include a broken or damaged object. I sometimes use a decaying leaf to, reminding me of those spaces in my heart that sometimes struggle to stay open, allowing feelings of compassion towards that situation or person that challenges us.

6. To finish this ritual, I love to place my hand on my heart and set a little intention: to keep the people who inspire me and the beauty, especially the beauty of imperfection, in my heart throughout the day, so I can be a more compassionate and loving person in the world. I also recommend placing your hand on your heart throughout the day, especially if you ever feel it closing up. This simple gesture can bring you directly back to that inner space of Beauty and Love.

Discover more about Laurey and her work at The Colourful Dot Boutique, an online sanctuary for Inner Beauty. Pre-order her new book, The Inner Beauty Bible: Mindful rituals to nourish your soul, today.

Learn how to use a Rose Quartz ritual as a tool for self-love and beautification. By Laurey Simmons of The Colourful Dot.

What is it about children and their innate attraction to sparkly and beautiful things? I remember so clearly walking along the beach as a child, looking for the prettiest pebbles, just feeling so full of LOVE, even at this young age, for the beauty of Mother Earth and her magical powers.

This kind of instinctual love can become more difficult to access as we get older and our hearts carry more scars. And with Valentine’s Day approaching, this is a sacred moment for us to remember our innate sense of LOVE ENERGY – which Mother Earth can effortlessly remind us of, if we are open to receive.

Crystals are my direct path back to that instinctive childlike enchantment, and as a make-up artist and spiritual adventurer I have found magical ways of using them to help my clients embody inner and outer beauty. After all, nurturing our innate beauty is not an exercise in vanity, but actually a practice in bringing us closer to the divine.

For me, unconditional self-love is an essential ingredient of inner beauty. And one of my favourite tools to activate this aspect of our self is a Rose Quartz ritual. This gemstone works with the energies of the heart, gently nurturing compassion for self and other.

So how can you use a Rose Quartz ritual to awaken your inner goddess? A simple but very nurturing ritual I love weaves Rose Quartz into a bathing experience. Here’s how:

I always begin with spiritual cleansing of myself, my space and my crystals. I love to use the smoke of burning Palo Santo, a ‘holy wood’ from South America that was used in ancient ritual and ceremony to ward off bad energy. It’s really important to make sure you open a window while cleansing, so that any energy you are wanting to be rid of can leave. Trailing the burning wood around myself and the Rose Quartz, I watch as the smoke travels and fades mystically, as if in a sacred dance. I instantly feel lighter. As I breathe in this rich, heavenly scent, I visualize the smoke spirits soaking up any negative energies, and kindly transporting these energies away.
Placing some flowers or a plant at the end of the bath will also allow you to drop deeply into the present moment. I often just gaze at the flowers, absorbed intimately with Mother Earth and all her natural beauty. I have this beautiful quote about flowers as a reminder:

“When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it’s your world for the moment.” – Georgia O’Keeffe.

To elevate your sense of smell, have a relaxing oil burning. I like to use Rose and Geranium oil with this specific ritual. As the aroma fills the air, I enter deeper into a meditative state, visualizing the molecules of scent travelling up through my nose, down my chest and into my heart centre. Here the scent is absorbed by a delicate pink rose, slowly opening its petals to reveal a white healing light.
With this image firmly rooted in my heart, I mindfully place the Rose Quartz pieces around the bath. I will usually have a blessing which I will speak when placing each stone. A great blessing for this ritual is: ‘“May I be bathed in the light of unconditional love.” I will also add some Rose Quartz tumble stones (small polished stones) to the water, so that when bathing, I’m fully immersed in the absolute and unconditional love of Mother Earth. Once in the bath, I then imagine the crystals surrounding me linking with each other in a loving, active embrace.
When your bathing ritual is over, it is important to ground yourself. I like to visualize tree-like roots anchoring me down to the core of Mother Earth as I dry myself.

Beyond bathing, I also recommend adding some magic to your morning beauty routine. Did you know you can use a Rose Quartz massage stone to apply moisturizer? In ancient times, Egyptian women added powdered Rose Quartz to their beauty potions to prevent wrinkles and to restore a glowing complexion. So, with gratitude and respect for the ancient beauty wisdom of our sister goddesses, I will apply the cream with my stone and visualize my face glowing with a white nourishing light, restoring my inner and outer beauty. An extra little tip to give you Rose Quartz energy on-the-go is to add one or two small Rose Quartz tumble stones into the cream itself, making sure you have cleansed and blessed the stones beforehand.

I hope this Rose Quartz ritual brings you the space to relight the flame of self-love and inner beauty. Here is one of my favorite passages on inner beauty to send you on your way:

“Beauty is life when life unveils her holy face.
But you are life and you are the veil.
Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.
But you are eternity and you are the mirror.”

– Kahlil Gibran, excerpted from The Prophet (A Borzoi Book)

Laurey Simmons

A SACRED SPACE RITUAL FOR VALENTINE’S DAY

UNCONDITIONAL SELF-LOVE: A SACRED ROSE QUARTZ RITUAL

@NUMINOUS_BOOKS