The Magic of Trees: A Guide to Their Sacred Wisdom & Metaphysical Properties - Tess Whitehurst 2017

Sandalwood
The Trees

Equal parts heavenly and earthly, the fragrance of sandalwood (Santalum album) has been considered sacred for thousands of years. Even today the tree’s numerous magical, medicinal, and aromatherapeutic benefits make her extremely popular with modern spiritual people and holistic health practitioners in the form of incense, oil, powder, and beads. Not to mention, inhaling the scent relaxes the body and kindles sensual pleasure.

Unfortunately, the wood of the Indian sandalwood tree has been so beloved for so long that it is now endangered in many of the areas where it once grew abundantly in the wild. Where sustainability is concerned, it’s best to seek out sandalwood imported from Australia.

Magical Uses

Blessings

No magical ingredient unites form and spirit, or opens our awareness to the Infinite Oneness of Everything, quite like the scent of sandalwood, which makes it perfect for blessings of all varieties. It’s also excellent for prayer and meditation.

To bless anything, anoint the person, place, or object with a small amount of essential oil of sandalwood or smudge with sandalwood incense. If you have the privilege of spending time with an actual sandalwood tree, place your hands on the trunk and feel yourself aligning with the Divine and activating blessings. Anointing a magical object of any sort (such as a wand or a charm) with sandalwood is an excellent way to align it with divine energies and give it a magical boost.

Add sandalwood powder or oil to bathwater to bless, align with the Divine, and cleanse your energy field. To intensely bless yourself and stimulate more blessings to flow in your life, you might work with a sandalwood mala (a specific type of prayer beads with exactly 108 beads, available at many spiritual supply stores). For exactly forty days, sit comfortably and speak or think one positive mantra or affirmation for each of the 108 beads, holding each one briefly in your hands as you do so. After the forty days, wear the mala to align deeply with the blessings you’ve magically set in motion.

Healing

Herbal healers employ sandalwood for skin issues, colds, respiratory ailments, intestinal and genitourinary conditions, stress and anxiety, and a number of other challenges. (For uses that go beyond aromatherapy, I suggest consulting a professional.)

Love

Sandalwood is extremely sensualizing and gets us right into our bodies by activating our lower chakras while simultaneously opening us up to the realm of Spirit. And since roses open and activate the upper chakras and are the energy of pure and potent love, sandalwood and rose are an irresistible one-two punch when it comes to love magic.

SIMPLE SANDALWOOD AND ROSE LOVE SPELL

On a Friday when the moon is waxing, wake up before sunrise and go outside. As the sun rises, anoint your heart, belly, third eye, and both palms with a mixture of rose absolute and sandalwood essential oil in a little bit of sweet almond oil. Stand facing east with your arms at your sides and your palms open to the sun. Relax as the sun continues to rise, and say:

I now draw beautiful love into my life.

I am irresistible to this love

And it nourishes my heart, mind, body, and spirit in every way.

Love, come to me now.

Love, come to me now.

Love, come to me now.

Thank you.

Past Life Healing

When doing past life work, the scent of sandalwood can facilitate memory of prior lives while simultaneously supporting a deep healing and release.

Protection

Sandalwood’s extreme positivity and divine alignment helps banish and dissuade anything or anyone with negative energy or ill intent. Try sprinkling sandalwood powder over thresholds or smudging around the perimeter of the space (inside, outside, or both) with incense.

Sensuality

The scent of sandalwood is amazing for releasing excess thought, activating our senses, and helping us feel comfortably luxurious in our bodies and in the world. Try inhaling it and see why sandalwood has been employed as an aphrodisiac for centuries (if not millennia).

And for those times when you feel flighty, anxious, frenetic, or generally ungrounded, sandalwood can dial you right back in to the pleasure and comforts of the earth and physical world. Try diffusing the essential oil, wearing the perfume, or burning the incense for this purpose.

Magical Correspondences

Element: Spirit

Gender: Feminine

Planet: Ceres