Meditation incense blends

Meditation incense blends

If I am sitting down for a long meditation session or with a specific meditation journey in mind I often make a loose incense blend to burn to help me, there are lots of lovely incense ingredients that are good for incense blends, I have listed some suggestions below but go with what works for you and experiment with your own blends.  Ingredients don’t need to be expensive either as I mentioned my post on herbal teas there are lots of places to source them cheaply.  You don’t need to use fancy ingredients, pretty much all herbs and spices burn well as do dried flower heads I believe in using what I have to hand and not spending huge amounts of money sourcing a rare organic root from the other side of the planet when I have a cupboard full of herbs and spices that cost me very little.  Just test them first because not all herbs, spices, roots and flowers actually smell nice once they hit the charcoal…

Herbs

In addition to the tea blend herbs suggested on my previous blog post, all of which can be used in incense blends here are some more suggested herbs and plants to use in meditation incense blends:

Benzoin – Calm, purification and love.

Frankincense – Purification, spirituality, relaxation, focus and love.

Honeysuckle – Psychic powers, balance, memory and meditation.

Mace – Purification and psychic powers.

Meadowsweet – Peace, happiness and love.

Myrrh – Purification, healing and the Underworld.

Passion flower – Love, calm, peace and sleep.

Patchouli – Grounding, balance and calm.

Pennyroyal – Peace

Sage – Wisdom, purification, stimulation and intuition.

Red Sandalwood – Meditation and love

White Sandalwood – Purification and psychic powers.

Thyme – Healing, peace, psychic powers, love, purification, sleep and release.

Vervain – Love, purification, peace, sleep, inspiration and shape shifting.

Violet – Love, peace, healing and rebirth.

Yarrow – Psychic powers, love, dreams, peace and happiness.

Creating

When I create a loose incense blend I always start with a resin as this helps the mix to burn for longer and also add in something woody again to help it burn for longer.  If you just chuck a handful of dried herbs onto a charcoal disc it will be burnt out in seconds.  Be warned though…resin especially makes a lot of smoke!  It is personal preference as to whether you keep the herbs, spices and resins whole or slightly crushed or if you prefer to grind them to a powder in a pestle and mortar (or the end of a rolling pin in a small bowl).  Don’t forget that you can use the stalks of the herbs as well, rosemary especially is very woody so it helps the incense blend to burn for longer.

You can also theme your incense blends if the intention of your meditation is to connect with a certain deity, totem animal or place you can tailor the ingredients to suit.

Meditation Incense #1

3 parts benzoin

2 parts lavender

1 pinch mugwort

Meditation Incense #2

3 parts sandalwood

3 parts benzoin

1 part mugwort

Meditation Incense #3

2 parts sandalwood

1 part dried orange peel

1 part mace

1 part cinnamon

Meditation Incense #4

2 parts sandalwood

1 part rose petals

1 part myrrh

1 part jasmine

Meditation Incense #5

2 parts frankincense

2 parts juniper

1 part sandalwood

1 part cinnamon

3 drops patchouli oil

Meditation Incense #6

2 parts copal

1 part jasmine

1 part chamomile

1 part passion flower

1 part lavender

Meditation Incense #7

2 parts frankincense

1 part clove

1 part orange peel

1 part lavender

Meditation Incense #8

1 part frankincense

1 part rosemary

1 part sage

1 part cinnamon

Taken from Pagan Portals Meditation