Smudging is the common name given to the sacred smoke bowl blessings. A powerful cleansing technique from the Native North American tradition. Smudging calls on the spirits of sacred plants to drive away negative energies and restore balance. It is the art of cleansing yourself and your environment using simple ritual and ceremony. For thousands of years smudging has been a part of Native American tradition but now its power of cleansing is available to everyone.
The Power of Smudging
How can smudging be so powerful? The answer lies in the subatomic world of subtle or spiritual energy. Homes and bodies are not just made of purely physical matter; they also vibrate with quiet, invisible energy. Cleansing a space or our bodies with techniques such as smudging clears away all the emotional and psychic “garbage” that may have gathered over years or even hundreds of years. It’s like spiritual spring cleaning.
The effect of smudging can be surprisingly swift and dramatic. There are a variety of different rituals available that can help with a number of different areas such as; helping you banish stress and attract love, soothe you, or give you energy. They can bring your family closer together and let you adjust to the healing seasonal rhythms of the year. Above all, they can turn any space, however humble, into a soothing sanctuary – a place of renewal and happiness.
An Age-Old Tradition
Smudging’s are not newfangled ideas, nor are they airy-fairy new-age dribble. Native North American tradition dates back millenia, and most traditional cultures – from the Zulus to the Maoris, from the Chinese to the Balinese – have age-old forms of cleansing and blessing rituals. Even the West retains relics of them although we have long forgotten the true purpose behind many such rituals and ceremonies. Incense wafting through a church cleanses the atmosphere just as surely as the medicine man’s bowl of sacred smoke , or smudge. The bells that ring out on Sunday are intended to purify the whole parish and lead the community into worship, just as the shaman’s drum can lead us on sacred journeys to the spirit world.
The most important thing to remember is to approach smudging with a pure heart, an open-mind, and a sense of adventure .. it could change your entire life.