Last Updated on December 11, 2011
Smudging is a practice that has been used in many cultures around the world.
The form of smudging that we use in MKP has been inherited from our Native North American ancestors.
We use white sage for the smudging process. Sweat grass can also be used in the process — after the sage — in order to bring in a positive energy.
In some ways, smudging is a very crude form of incense. Where it differs though is that smudging is generally used in very specific application as opposed to incense which is generally used to produce ambient smoke in a room.
Smudging with certain herbs acknowledges that all things are energy. My body, my mind, my emotions, my aura, my feelings, my spirit, the room, the air, etcetera, are all composed on energy. Energy is fluid in nature and it’s quality is determined by frequency, vibration, resonance, and any harmonics or disharmonies/discordance that might except between these.
Every substance carries a particular resonance. Some substances — such as White Sage — have traditionally been recognised for their particular energy and their ability to shift, clear or change the energy of something else.
Every emotion carries a particular frequency.
Let us take look at an example. A man — let’s call him Jim — gets home from work, after driving for an hour in slow traffic etc. He feels drained, reactive, and irritable. His mood and energy are relatively "low" and "heavy". The children running around the house and playing might really get on his nerves and result in him feeling really fucked off. He reacts and goes into a rage. Then after that he feels down, sad and depressed. In that rage he further qualified his already messy energy state with further discordance. He experiences that discordance through a depressed feeling. His energy has quite literally become denser and hence more compressed or "depressed".
In walks White Sage.
White Sage has a very purifying energy about it. Not too dissimilar to how UV lamps have a purifying quality and will purify drinking water. White Sage, the great master that she is, has an uplifting energy too. She is expansive in her nature. She is loving and supportive of clarity and puts and end to all dross. When we burn White Sage the smoke carries these qualities into the physical and etheric (pranic / metaphysical / subtle) levels within a room, within a person’s aura or personal energy field, etc.
Now getting back to Jim, when he gets home he could check his own energy and allow himself to be aware of how he is feeling. In doing that — which is VITAL if he wishes to remain in his integrity with Self and with Life — he notes that his energy is pretty messy and discordant. Rather than being victim to that he could take himself to a quite place — outside in nature, a quite room, an alter, or whatever works for him — and have a meeting with madame White Sage. Smudging will help clear the dross in his energy field. Yet more than this — the act of bringing into his world the intention to "clear away discordant energy and come back into a place of clarity" will also play a big part in his energy re-qualifying itself into a state that is much more concordant with the Love that is innate to all Life.
Even without White Sage, it is possible to hold the clear intent to re-qualify your energy. Picking a "Sacred" place to do this — some place that holds a clear, loving and sacred energy for you — will further aid the process. This is a key aspect of the power of ritual. This, to me, is a major reason why it’s important that Men are being reintroduced to ritual through the MKP process.
Reflecting on the ritual of being smudged before stepping into an I-Group meeting, I would say that this twofold process comes into effect.
1) We get to experience the physical and metaphysical cleansing properties of White Sage.
2) We come into a place of focused intention. The intention being that "Now I let go of the world I have just walked through, I release whatever dross I am carrying around, and I am now stepping into a sacred space with my fellow Men".
Well, that’s about all I feel to write on this for now. I think I’ve said enough.
With my love and many blessings,
Jonathan
PS. The other — and perhaps longing standing — name for Smudging is "sacred smoke bowel blessing". It was often performed with a bowel containing some hot coals. It’s also very common to keep the smudge bundle in a bowel, with some sand in it to help with putting it out without wasting it.
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