The Meaning Of Opal
The name Opal is from the Sanskrit upala, which means jewel.
There are hundreds of color varieties of this stone, and there are two types of Opal; the Common Opal and the Precious or Gem, Opal.
The Common Opal is characterized by its translucence and its palette of colors that include red, green, blue, and orange. It is also known for its dendritic inclusions.
The Precious Opal displays different flashing colors called opalescence against white, dark brown, or black backgrounds.
The opalescence appears as vivid colors that seem to float on the background, and it often has a blue or purple overall tone.
Australia is the leading source of Opal stones, but they can also be found in countries like the USA, Peru, Mexico, and Brazil.
The Properties Of Opal
Physical Properties Of Opal
Opal is a mineraloid or crystalline form of silica. It is colorless when pure.
The Precious forms of Opal occur in a wide variety of colors, including white, yellow, red, orange, green, black, and blue.
Raw stones have a waxy, dull luster that polishes to a vibrant shine.
Opals are translucent or transparent and measure between 5 and 6 on the Mohs scale of hardness.
The chemical formula of Opal is Si02 nH20.
Metaphysical Properties Of Opal
Opal is a delicate stone with a subtle vibrational energy. Opal is believed to enhance your cosmic consciousness and strengthen your mystical and psychic visions.
It will inspire originality and boost creativity. It will get the creative juices flowing, and it will give you energy every time you need that extra boost.
The energies of this stone will also encourage you to express your true self. You will feel confident and comfortable in your own skin, and this will radiate in your words, thoughts, and actions.
Opal is a highly absorbent and reflective stone. It will pick up on your thoughts and emotions, magnify them, and send them back to you.
It will also absorb the energies and vibrations of people around you, including negative or harmful ones, and reflect them back to their source. In this way, it is a highly protective stone.
Opal is also known as a karmic stone, serving to remind us of the Law of Attraction.
Whatever we send out returns to us, so if we want hope, love, understanding, compassion, friendship, and so on, we need to make sure that we act in a congruent way with this desire.
Varieties Of Opal
Opals are separated into two groups, common Opal (also known as potch) and precious Opal (also known as noble Opal).
Opal can be found all over the world from Cornwall to Canada, Australia to Siberia, Ethiopia, Madagascar, and many other locations.
Precious Opal shows a play of spectral colors through the stone, whereas common Opal does not. Common Opal is usually opaque to translucent and brownish-orange in color; however, it can come in any color, some of which are quite attractive.
The main varieties of common Opal are Agate Opal and Moss or Dendritic Opal.
These moss-like (dendritic) inclusions are formed of different iron minerals encased by the Opal producing these aesthetic designs.
Other names include ‘landscape’ Opal, in which the branch-like structures of the iron minerals resemble that of a woodland landscape.
Some of the more sought after common Opal comes from Peru. Beautiful blues, pinks, and bluish greens can be found there.
These come from the two main provinces: Ica and Caraveli. The best blues come from Caraveli and are known as Andean Opal. Ica produces better pinks, but both mines produce both colors.
Using Opal
Opal is often used in spiritual work such as shamanic journeying and dream recall.
It is a helpful companion if you are involved in past life regression work and is strongly protective in nature.
Opal is believed to be a seductive stone by many and amplifies feelings of emotional attachment and releases inhibitions.
How Best To Use Opal
Wear Opal jewelry, such as a necklace or a pendant, and place it near your heart. The energies of this stone will make you feel light and free so that you can release your pent-up emotions.
You can carry it around with you wherever you go for increased protection, mental clarity, energy, or luck.
You can also use Opal as part of your healing or manifestation grid. Opal makes a good aura cleansing stone, especially if you wish to bolster your energetic protection and encourage only loving energies into your electromagnetic field.
The Benefits Of Opal
Opal has many benefits, both physical and metaphysical.
It can be used to heal the earth by placing it in an Earth Chakra grid and focusing its power into the earth.
Opal can help you make sense of your past experiences and integrate them into your present life to serve you rather than hinder your progress.
Physically it can benefit the eyes, kidneys, and adrenal glands.
The Powers Of Opal
Emotional Healing Powers
Emotionally, Opal has strong associations with love and passion, desire, and eroticism.
It can amplify emotions but may need to be tempered with another, more grounding stone if the user is not centered.
It can help you to explore your hidden emotions, identify your true desires, and lead you towards a path of self-love and happiness.
Opal is a stone of balance and can help you regulate and balance your emotions and moods, especially if your mood changes are due to mental health or hormonal issues. It is also an excellent stone for promoting self-awareness and enabling you to let go of regrets about the past.
Opal promotes happiness and creativity, so if you feel a little low in spirits, tap into your creative side by using an Opal to give you a kick start.
Sometimes we lack motivation, and this leads to feeling morose and apathetic. The best cure for this state of mind is to do something creative.
You may have a particular creative talent, such as writing or painting, or you may be creative in the kitchen or garden. Whatever project you want to begin, take a few moments to sit with an Opal in your hand, and focus your intentions on the stone.
The next step is to simply begin!
Opal offers emotional protection and support. It can transmute negativity and promote positive energies so that your aura and electromagnetic field are functioning as they should.
Ask Opal to form a protective shield around you, allowing only benevolent energies to pass through to you and repelling anything harsh or negative.
Wearing Opal also helps you to be more in control of your feelings and to handle regrets or trauma from the past.
Physical Healing Powers
Opal can help with a variety of physical conditions, including the regulation of insulin within the body.
It is believed to be beneficial in treating infections and fevers and supporting the liver’s healthy functioning.
Feelings of congestion or restriction within the chest can be alleviated with Opal, and it is also said to assist with the pains of childbirth and the symptoms of PMS.
Used as an elixir, Opal is said to be very beneficial for the eyes.
Opal is said by many to be a supportive stone for the immune system and for anyone recovering from a long period of illness.
Other physical applications of Opal include skin regeneration and cleansing, strengthening the nails, hair, and eyes, reducing fevers or hot sweats, and easing water retention.
Opal, Money And Wealth
White Opal, much like Pearl, has been seen as a symbol of wealth and status for centuries.
The relative rarity of the stones, along with their unique individuality, has contributed to the perception of Opal being a stone of opulence, luxury, and high social status in times past.
These days, the crystals’ beauty and their undeniable attractiveness mean that wearing Opal is bound to get you noticed.
If you are looking to make an impression on a new client or business partner, this stone may well be for you. Opal also has the reputation of helping us to be in the right place at the right time and in enhancing our abilities to see opportunities where others cannot.
Opal helps us manifest our desires, and if these are of a financial nature, Opal helps keep our motivation high, our energy in balance, and our willingness to work hard for what we want very strong.
Opal is credited with the power to bring the energies of change and progress into our financial lives and act as an amplifier and protector by removing the negative energies that may hamper us in our quest for wealth.
Opal is a stone of good fortune and luck, bringing an abundance of wealth, health, and happiness to anyone who chooses to harness its power.
Opal will also strengthen your survival instincts and let you know when to remove yourself from a business or financial situation if it is not right for you at the time.
Opal For Love And Relationships
Opal has been connected to love and passion throughout human history, as well as desire, lust, sexuality, and eroticism.
If you want to have these things in your life, you should start wearing Opal stones or carrying them around with you wherever you go.
Many claims are made for this crystal in the area of love, sexuality, and passion. It’s a highly seductive stone that will intensify your emotional state and encourage you to let go of your inhibitions.
It will invite you to try new things that will please both you and your partner. Opal will unleash the adventurous and wild side of you. It will encourage you to live a little and take more risks, primarily if they can spice things up in your relationship!
Opal will also work as an emotional stabilizer. It will show you how you are doing emotionally, and it will teach you how you can be emotionally responsible and mature. It can also teach you how you can better handle your reactions. It will show you how you can respond without looking defensive.
Opal reminds you to take responsibility for your own emotional state and own any feelings that may prevent you from interacting fully with another person. In this way, it helps us communicate honestly and openly with our loved ones and recognize our own shortcomings.
It will remind you to do what must be done to repair the damage that your emotions may have caused to your partner or your relationship. That said, your emotions are always perfectly valid, and sometimes you need to express your feelings, opinions, and desires in order to remain true to yourself.
Opal can help you recognize (and admit) that sometimes your way of expressing these emotions is less than helpful, both to you and to others.
Opal will encourage you to give out positivity. It will promote kindness, love, compassion, and generosity. Opal helps us to focus on the things that make us better people and encourages us to surround ourselves with people who bring out the best in us.
It is a cleansing and revitalizing stone that will help you in your emotional recovery after a major heartbreak. It will also work on ailing relationships by bringing the fire and passion back. Opal helps to ease the pain and sadness.
It will also give you emotional support and physical, mental, and spiritual encouragement.
Opal will work on your relationship by bringing energies of spontaneity. It will remind you to let loose, kick back, and relax with the person you love.
A relationship that is too serious will feel old sooner or later, so learn to have fun. Be silly and ridiculous, and do things with your partner just because you feel like doing them.
Opal is an excellent stone to have near you at times like these, to act as a reminder that life does not always have to be serious, and it is OK to have fun at times!
The energies of Opal will show you that relationships need not be too rigid or somber. When there are fun and playfulness in your relationship, you will be able to let off steam and get rid of the stress.
Opal will infuse your relationship with vibrations of loyalty and faithfulness. It will help strengthen your promise to each other that you will always look out for and support each other. This stone promotes unconditional love. It will also encourage emotional awareness.
While all kinds of Opal will help you here, the Green Opal is the one that lovers reach for in times of hardship or crisis. This is because the heart chakra is associated with the color green, and so you can immediately see why these connections can help you.
If you couple this stone with a pink crystal, like Rose Quartz or Pink Kunzite, you can effect a powerful cleansing and opening of your heart chakra, enabling you to both give and receive love in a healthy way.
The powers and energies of Opals of all colors, though, will help you to take a step outside of the emotional attachments within a given relationship and more rationally find out where recurring problems are stemming from.
Opal will help you to recognize that every relationship is unique, and every person is different. What works for one couple may not work with you, and vice versa. Use Opal to reaffirm your own beliefs and reclaim your power, acknowledging that everyone is different and our own needs are just as important or valid as the next person’s.
Opal will also work with you in letting go of past emotional traumas. It will ease your grief and your sense of loss, and it will help you achieve healing in heart and mind. It will give you a new perspective on life and love, and it will help with feelings of disorientation if you find yourself in a complicated situation.
If you are still haunted by feelings of betrayal or hurt from a previous relationship, use Opal in meditation to really let go of those feelings. You may feel scared or angry and resentful regarding how you perceive yourself to have been treated in the past.
Opal will help you if you actively engage with its energies, let go of all feelings that damage your emotional health and encourage and support you in moving forward in a new relationship.
Opal will remind you that love is a beautiful thing and that being with the right person will allow you to experience it in a way that is beneficial to all concerned.
Opal can remind us that we are only responsible for our own feelings and reactions. We cannot control others, nor should we seek to. If you feel love, express it, and do not worry about the outcome!
Chakras And Opal
Because Opals occur in so many colors, they have acquired the reputation of being all-purpose crystals when it comes to chakra work.
Opal is indeed a wonderful stone to work with when you perform a chakra balance, but it is worth considering that your intention is more important than the color of the stone you are using.
While some crystals have a definite vibration that aligns them with a specific chakra quite naturally, Opal seems to carry all of the chakras’ vibrations depending on the color of the stone you choose.
The most desirable opals consist of many colors, making them ideal for chakra work, especially if you wish to perform a chakra balance on all of the main seven chakras.
However, suppose you wish to concentrate on a particular chakra. In that case, you may be wise to choose a crystal or variety of Opal that corresponds with the accepted color designation for that chakra.
For example, if you know that you want to cleanse and clear your Throat chakra, choose crystals in varying shades of pale blue or turquoise.
As mentioned above, your intention is more important than the crystal you use, but it is worth considering the vibration and power of your chosen stone before you begin.
Generally speaking, the lighter shades of Opal are good choices for use on the higher chakras, with the palest being most closely aligned with the Crown. Darker shades are best for the lower chakras, with black or red being the best choice for the Base chakra.
The following guide can be used to good effect if you know what you want to achieve with regard to your physical health:
- Black/Boulder Opals – Root Chakra – Enhances feelings of security and confidence
- Fire Opals – Sacral Chakra – Boosts sexuality and fertility
- Mostly Yellow Opals – Solar Plexus Chakra – Treats liver, stomach, and gallbladder issues
- Mostly Green or Pink Opals – Heart Chakra – Eases jealousy and grudges
- Mostly Blue Opals – Throat Chakra – Improves communication and throat and thyroid issues
- Mostly Violet Opals – Third Eye Chakra – Increases decisiveness and faith
- White Opals – Crown Chakra – Cures headaches and migraines
The Best Crystals To Combine And Use With Opal
Opal is a versatile crystal and can be usefully combined with many other stones.
The vibrations of Opal are mostly supportive and protective, so if you are looking for a motivational outcome, you may wish to cast your net further afield.
That said, Opal can help with your own intentions as long as you are clear about what you want to manifest or achieve.
Chakra Crystal Combinations
Use darker shades of Opal with Black Obsidian and Hematite if you want to feel more grounded and in touch with your gut instincts.
If you feel uncertain or worried that your material needs may not be met, use Opal to work on your Base chakra along with Black Tourmaline or Red Jasper.
Use the yellow and orange shades of Opal to balance and cleanse your Sacral and Solar Plexus chakras, along with Carnelian and Sunstone.
Opal’s blue and white shades can be combined with Sodalite, Sapphire, Diamond, Quartz, and Blue Lace Agate to help with cleansing and clearing the Throat, Third Eye, and Crown chakras.
Other Crystal Combinations
Suppose you wish to create a healing grid or mandala for a specific purpose. In that case, Opal stones can be handy as they amplify the energies of many other crystals and, more significantly, absorb the user’s intentions and wishes to a great extent.
Combine Opals with Obsidian if you need to let go of negative thoughts or behaviors. You may need to be reminded that focusing on the things that are not good for you will only amplify their attraction and effect!
Make a conscious decision to let go of all negative or harmful behaviors and thoughts and allow Opal to absorb, transmute, and release them so that they can be transmuted into harmless energies.
Opal is a karmic stone that will show you that everything you put out there in the universe has a way of coming back to you.
When you give negativity, only negativity will come back to you. When you shower the world with love, love will also come back and find you!
Opal is also a highly protective stone. When you program this stone accurately, you will be able to ward off negative energies and unwanted attention. When you do this and pair it with Garnet, the effects are magnified even more.
This stone will bring any traits and characteristics that need to be overhauled up to the surface so that you can choose to work on them for your own benefit. If you use it with Lepidocrosite, it will help you work on your perceived flaws so that you can turn them into strengths.
Opal will make you see your full potential. It will strengthen your motivation to succeed. This stone will encourage inner growth.
It will bring about meaningful transitions that can give your life more meaning. Most importantly, it will strengthen your will to live.
When, Why, And How To Cleanse And Charge Opal
Opals are almost unique in the crystal world because they are formed in water.
The best way to store an Opal bracelet, for example, is to place it in a waterproof bag with moistened tissue.
For this reason, it is vital to be aware that Opals should not be cleansed by leaving them in water for any length of time. They are not robust crystals and should be treated with care.
Charge your Opal with intention by leaving it in the moonlight and clean it by holding it under clean, running water for a few seconds before drying it on a soft cloth.
Opal As A Birthstone
Opal is the birthstone for people born in October and is one of the stones associated with Libra’s zodiac sign (Sept 21 to Oct 22).
Libras are usually cooperative, diplomatic people who tend to be very fair-minded and socially responsible.
Opal can help to amplify these strengths in Librans and also to mitigate tendencies towards self-pity and indecisiveness in people born under this star sign.
Opal In Legends And History
Writers have compared Opals to volcanoes, galaxies, and fireworks. Admirers gave extraordinary opals poetic names like Pandora, Light of the World, and Empress.
In ancient Rome, this gem symbolized love and hope. The Romans gave it a name — opalus — that was synonymous with “precious stone.”
In 75 AD, the Roman scholar Pliny observed, “Some opali carry such a play within them that they equal the deepest and richest colors of painters. Others…simulate the flaming fire of burning sulfur and even the bright blaze of burning oil.”
He marveled that this kaleidoscopic gem encompassed the red of ruby, the green of Emerald, the yellow of Topaz, the blue of Sapphire, and the purple of Amethyst.
Many cultures have credited Opal with supernatural origins and powers. Arabic legends say it falls from the heavens in flashes of lightning.
The ancient Greeks believed Opals gave their owners the gift of prophecy and guarded them against disease. Europeans have long considered the gem a symbol of hope, purity, and truth.
Can You Get Opal As A Bracelet?
Yes, you can. And an Opal bracelet is a great and fashionable way you can spruce up an outfit.
Make sure that you choose bold and bright Opal stones to create a look that’s uniquely you. An Opal bracelet is a timeless piece of jewelry that will be a lovely addition to any jewelry collection.
Because there are no two Opals that are exactly alike, you will be guaranteed that your Opal bracelet will truly be uniquely yours.
Opal bracelets can be worn for every day or for special occasions. White Opals that have a silver setting will be perfect for everyday wear.
Just go with the design, cut, color, and size that best represent your personal style. You can go for a bigger and bolder piece if you want an accent jewelry that will stand out from the crowd.
Whatever your style, you’re sure to make a bold statement with your beautiful Opal bracelet.
Opal is a soft stone. Because of this, you need to treat your Opal bracelet more carefully so that you don’t cause damage to it.
It’s best to take it off when you’re engaging in rough physical activities or outdoor work.
It’s also recommended that you don’t expose your Opal bracelet to high or extreme temperatures because it can damage or break it.
If your Opal bracelet starts to lose its shine or shows signs of scratches, you can bring it to an Opal cutter.
Scuff marks and scratches can make an Opal bracelet look old and dull. But this can be easily remedied with some professional polishing.
This can give your Opal bracelet a makeover and make it look brand new again.
When you bring it to a professional, they can also check for damage in the claw and make sure that it’s sturdy and secure enough.
If you’re not going to wear your Opal bracelet, make sure that you keep it in a cloth bag first before storing it in your drawer or jewelry box.
If you will be storing it for a longer period, put your Opal bracelet in cotton wool. Add a few drops of water and then put it in a sealed plastic bag.
This will help in preventing water from coming out of your Opal bracelet during very hot or humid weather.
Opal bracelets are gorgeous, unique, and unusual. You will have a wonderful time moving your wrist around and watching the Opals catch and reflect light.
The effect is really quite stunning, and they are sure to catch the attention of people!
My Final Thoughts On The Power Of Opal
Opal will fill you with the desire to live a joyful, peaceful, and loving life.
It will help you achieve a cheerful disposition by reducing or removing stress and anxieties in ways that are very similar to Amethyst’s healing effects.
The energies of this stone will help you accept your life’s challenges and overcome your difficult circumstances. It’s an emotional and mental soother that will realign you to your life’s purpose.
Opal will enhance your moods and liberate your emotions. It will help you discover and manifest your life purpose. Its energies will awaken your spirit and find your own life path.
It is a stone of compassion and sympathy, of confidence and pure thoughts. Opal is a stone with powerful energies that you can benefit from in many ways.
Diana Houston
Diana Houston is a respected crystal expert and the author of 'A Beginner's Guide to Healing Crystals: Getting Started With Crystal Healing – A Complete Guide.' Her passion for crystals and their healing properties made her a leading authority on the subject.
Diana's expertise and passion for crystals have inspired countless readers and practitioners, and her book has received rave reviews on Amazon. With her clear and insightful guidance, Diana is a trusted guide for anyone seeking to unlock the transformative power of crystals.
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