This week we're going to talk about Inclusions in crystal, sometimes called Included quartz or Included crystals. This basically occurs when crystal is forming, and there are other substances present in the solution. These substances might be air bubbles or other minerals. They become trapped within the crystal during its growth. Air and moisture inclusions fall into the category of Fairy Frost, a non-mineral inclusion which we discussed a few weeks ago.
I have some pictures of Included quartz which I have adopted out through Arkansas Crystal Works, some of them from Arkansas, some from the Cascade Mountains in Washington. Crystal may be included with any number of minerals, some are more commonly found paired with quartz than others. The pictures I am going to share represent just a tiny percentage of the possible pairings. The inclusions may also appear in different forms, such as blobs, spots, specks, phantoms, whole minerals, needles, Rutile, etc. Here is a picture of Chlorite needles in quartz, (these crystals came from the Cascade Mountains in Washington State.)
This week we're going to discuss Imprints and Keys. Remember we talked about Growth Interference last week, and that it is caused by the introduction of another mineral to the crystal during its growth. Keys and Imprints are caused by crystals being in close proximity to one another as they grow.
A Key is created when a crystal pokes into another crystal during its growth. To the left is a visual example of how they are created: Take a crystal, and stab the top of the point into a cylinder of clay (surrogate for our crystal in this example) and then remove the crystal (pictured is actually a round object, but pretend it is a crystal). The impression left in the clay is the Key. Sometimes Keys have a pointy bottom and sometimes a flat bottom. Pictured to the right is an example of a pointy bottomed Key in a crystal. This would be caused by the tip end of another crystal penetrating the original crystal as it grew.
Today we're going to talk about Growth Interference which is a condition in which a crystal changes shapes as it grows due to the presence of another mineral which acts as an obstruction. These shapes might be squares and triangles, and more often than not, it looks like a buzz saw was taken to the crystal. Sometimes there is a little bit of mineral left in part of the crevasses.
Here are some crystals with the buzz-saw type of Growth Interference:
This week we're going to discuss Golden Healer quartz crystals.
They are quartz crystals that are partially or totally covered with a transparent golden-yellow mineral. The coating ranges from iridescent yellow to rusty dark orange, from total coverage to skippy, partial coverage. This coating doesn't come off in an acid bath. Often the lightly coated Golden Healers will have rainbow iridescence on the outer layer (like rainbows you see on oil slicks, also called "natural rainbow aura"). These points emit an especially high energy.
This week I decided to postpone the post about Golden Healers (til maybe late week?). Surprisingly (to me) there was a LOT of controversy about the post on Feminine, Masculine and Yin/Yang crystals... I thought it would be a good idea to revisit why we are going over these different names and what they really mean. I have already addressed this in an earlier post but I think it's sometimes a good idea to go back.
Without further ado, I'm just going to cut and paste the post I wrote on this topic from July 2013:
Today we'll be discussing Generator crystals. This is a configuration which falls under the categories of shape and terminations. Generator crystals are also sometimes called Merlin crystals.
Generator crystals have six equally sized faces and a centrally located tip. It is very unusual to find such a precise configuration. You may find a point with the energetic qualities of a Generator, but the physical description may not be textbook perfect (the tip may be centrally located but all the faces may not be equally sized and each might not reach the tip). We discussed in an earlier blog post that crystals are commonly polished into Generator points. Remember the energy might not be as focused as a naturally occurring Generator because the internal structure is different. Here are some Generator crystals with equally sized faces which each reach the termination:
Today we're going to be discussing whether a crystal is feminine, masculine or both (yin/yang). I want to be clear from the beginning, though, we're only discussing whether a crystal is any of these terms by features, not energy. I am calling this an "anatomy lesson" because basically we'll be discussing whether a crystal presents physically as masculine (has "man parts"), presents physically as feminine (has "lady parts") or presents physically as a mix of both.
Just as with humans, simply because a crystal presents as feminine or masculine in appearance anatomically, it absolutely DOES NOT mean that it will also be energetically feminine or masculine. This is an important point. Just as with humans, many crystals feminine in appearance have masculine energy and many crystals masculine in appearance have feminine energy.
Steven Posch
Your good will is a light to us all, Janet. Thanks.
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