got some black obsidian...is this feeling unusual??

[witch_wonder]

ok now I know that some stones work for some people and others dont.  Well i ordered a set of 5 small obsidian stones and a clear quartz crystal came with it.  well i got home and cleansed them all as well as my jade stone which doesnt seem to do too much for me but has some grooves in it so it works as a worry stone.  well i just got to my room and decided to test out the obsidian since its been a rough day and i thought some meditating would do me some good (i work at a daycare. lol. its always a rough day.). 
like i said, i'm aware that some stones just dont work for people, but can they have a negative affect on the person? it almost felt like physical pain in my hands when i was holding the one stone.  i tried the others and it felt the same way.  i dont even like touching them for too long!
i was just wondering if this was uncommon.  now the clear quartz feels nice.  its sitting on my chest while i'm typing this and i just feel positive enegry running all around it. 

i'm new to...well..."feeling" things like this.  I held a piece of Her....crud whats the stone? Hers***e diamond quartz? it comes from newyork? and felt the energy there but didnt own any.  i felt very little energy from my jade and marble that i have just lying around.  but these feelings were so powerful it was like a pain in my hands. that started in my palm and worked down to my fingers and wrists until i put them down.
 
kinda dissappointed if these stones just dont work for me.  i really like the look and physical feel of obsidian. just not the energy i'm getting.    

[Labrys]

Herkhimer diamond...pretty little double ended crystals.

I don't work with gems much, tho' I have jewelry that most consider kind of on the 'woo woo' scale.  I like big honking rocks and boulders better. 

Black stones (other than a strand of black beads sold to me as jade) do not do well with me.  They usually get lost on the first wearing.  Most green stones, other than jade and adventurine, likewise don't interest me.  The much recommended rose quartz makes me want to slap someone instead of calming me. 

I am left wondering if it is not a quality the stone itself has that makes it effective for whatever purpose, but what the color and texture speaks to psychologically.  For instance, the favorite stone (rutilated quartz) of a one time friend used to make me feel "jangly" and rattled.  Once the insidious secret parts of the relationship were revealed, and her machinations unveiled and she was out of our lives, the stone didn't bother me at all any more.

[witch_wonder]

thats very interesting. i guess its kind of hard to know for sure what causes us to have different reactions. i just thought it was unusual to actually feel physical pain in my hands when holding it.  it started out like a tingly like when your hands fall asleep, but it grew more and more and if you've ever had your leg fall completely asleep to the point where you cant move your toes and you try to stand on it...thats what my hands felt like.  its painful in a sense but its like a numb pain and a pain that you know you arent really physically feeling but whats in your mind (kinda like when you get a bad cut but it doesnt hurt until you look at it and see the blood).  i found it unusual and interesting as well.

[Still Kate]

I always find it better to hold the crystals before I buy them, that way the crystals can chose their owner and you should find one thats comfortable. 
I do sometimes order my crystals, only from one particular site who have always supplied me with happy stones and I've never had a problem.

Cleanse the stones again, in running water and then dry them in the sun. Perform a full cleansing ritual, in a sacred space with them and, hopefully, they should start to feel a bit better for you.

I have crystals that when I hold them in my hand, I get a tingle. Sometimes its so strong it sends shooting pains up my wrist but others have just a gentle tingle.

I always wear an Amethyst around my neck.  For years I have suffered with a small lump behind my front tooth, and, now and then, if I'm run down, it gets painful but not if I'm wearing this Amethyst. If I take the crystal off, within 2 days the lump is painful. The dentist says its a small cyst which he treats with antibiotics if need be. He also thinks I'm mad when I told him about the crystal but he can't dispute the fact that it works.

Try out different crsytals and see what works for you.
Blessings
Kate.   

[Brijrian]

I've been working with Anpu/Anubis lately, and in some reading I have done recently, obsidian and apache tears were mentioned as "His" stone.

I don't know if this will help you or not, but in the chapter on Anpu in "Circle of Isis" by Ellen Cannon Reed p 54/55 it reads:

"Obsidian will tell you the truth, always, and we are not always ready to face the truth..obsidian must be worked with carefully, and that not everyone is ready to work with it. Naturally, lots of people were absolutely sure that they were worthy and ready and mature...some of them were ready, but most of them weren't. How do I know that? I could see the effects. Because they weren't ready, they didn't believe the things that the stone had told them, and a lot of things happened in their lives to show that they were doing anything they could to ignore the truth."

I have not personally worked with obsidian and do not know if this relates to your situation at all, but I thought it might give you food for thought.

Did the cleansing make things better?

[witch_wonder]

i dont think there are any truths i'm not willing to face. idk.  its interesting though. 
the cleansing did ease it off a little but its still pretty intense. 

now my quartz crystal that used to send out a lot of positive energy doesnt do much for me anymore.  i've tried charging it.  but i have 2 questions:
how long does a stone need to charge in sunlight? and can it be in indirect sunlight (like on the dashboard of a car?)?
i've also begun experimenting around with the obsidian.  I found even after i cleanse them if i put them under my pillow i have nightmares every time and wake up with a headache.

[Still Kate]

If you are still having problems then I would put the stone away somewhere safe and work with other crystals for now. Maybe go back to it in the future.

Blessings
Kate. x

[Lark]

I've been working with Anpu/Anubis lately, and in some reading I have done recently, obsidian and apache tears were mentioned as "His" stone.

I don't know if this will help you or not, but in the chapter on Anpu in "Circle of Isis" by Ellen Cannon Reed p 54/55 it reads:

"Obsidian will tell you the truth, always, and we are not always ready to face the truth..obsidian must be worked with carefully, and that not everyone is ready to work with it. Naturally, lots of people were absolutely sure that they were worthy and ready and mature...some of them were ready, but most of them weren't. How do I know that? I could see the effects. Because they weren't ready, they didn't believe the things that the stone had told them, and a lot of things happened in their lives to show that they were doing anything they could to ignore the truth."

Interesting. I work with Anubis as well.  I am getting ready for an initiation and wanted to have a piece of obsidian as a symbol for the Element of Fire.  Looks like it is the right symbology for a variety of reasons now.

-Lark-

[Brijrian]

Just for the record: if there are truths you are not willing to face, you probably aren't going to realize it--because you aren't ready to face them! We have an amazing capability to tell ourselves stories, and it's been my experience that I usually don't notice what I've avoiding unless I get hit over the head first! (Happened earlier this year, actually!)

Interestingly, the first two nights when I started working with Anpu, I would basically invite him into my dreams. As I breathed in to a count of 4 I would mantra, "O Lord Anpu", and as I breathed out I would mantra, "Teach Me Of Thee". (I got this from the Circle of Isis book I mentioned before). Both nights I had awful nightmares, and one night I woke up sobbing in the middle of the night.

I was happy that I was effective in my call, but decided I'm not quite ready for that yet! So I'm working with him in other ways...guided meditations, etc.

I'll second Kate--you probably will have to put the obsidian aside for awhile, or try to work with it in a completely different manner. It's ok if you need to put it aside! No shame. Maybe you aren't ready for what it can teach you until you learn some other stuff, I don't know. But we are all different with different skills and lessons.

[Jennie]

Obsidian is a volcanic glass. As a glass, it is not actually crystalline, but amorphous, like any other glass - it is actually an extremely viscous fluid. It is a metamorphic rock - one that used to be something else before its deepest structure was violently transformed through fire. It carries the energies of death, transformation,and rebirth, which are not easy or light energies to work with. It is excellent for clearing away old, unneeded, or toxic patterns to make room for new development, but it doesn't necessarily do so gently.

If you are having difficulties dealing with the intensity of obsidian, you might find that it is good to work with black obsidian in combination with other stones, like scolecite or apophylite, that are also volcanic but have a more defined structure and more energizing,light-collecting properties, so that the somewhat disorienting strong dispersing and transformative aspects of obsidian are balanced by their clarity and gentler, more soothing qualities. Lapis lazuli is another stone that works well in combination with obsidian, but it is not a "sweet" energy either, and that may be what you are looking for.

Sometimes people aren't ready for the lessons or the associations that certain stones bring, and that it okay - you may have different things you need to work on before you will be ready for this.

[serenade]

Personally I've never had a problem with obsidian. It's not my favorite thing to work with, but I haven't had a really awful experience either.

I agree with what Jennie said about the lapis lazuli. That's one I haven't worked with at all (sad, because I love it) but it always seemed like it might have some of the same energy as obsidian, only maybe less intense.