How To Perform A Burn Ceremony With Your Own Candles?

What Is The Purpose Of Candles in Rituals?

Candles holds so many symbolic values. Candles, with their enchanting simplicity and mysterious beauty, have captivated people for centuries in  rituals, candles serve as more than just light sources; they embody the four elements. The flame represents Fire, the smoke and warm air symbolize Air, the liquid wax signifies Water, and the solid wax body stands for Earth. Lighting a candle is believed to connect the visible and invisible worlds, linking the physical and astral planes.The flame creates an invisible link to the divine power, as it constitutes the bridge to the invisible and visible. 

This explains why candles hold such importance in rituals. The flame, though delicate, shines steadily, symbolizing the light that guides and heals. Lighting a candle in a ritual is a simple yet powerful act, representing our spiritual journey and quest for divine connection. Interestingly, 96% of candles are purchased by women. This fact highlights the significant role candles play in creating serene and spiritual spaces.

What is a Ritual?

A ritual is a practice or routine. It's a ceremony with actions performed in a specific order or a type of behavior regularly followed by someone. While rituals might make you think of religious or spiritual practices, they can be totally secular and still offer real benefits. According to Scientific American, “even simple rituals can be extremely effective. Rituals appear to benefit even people who claim not to believe that rituals work.”

Why Do Rituals Work?

Positive thinking is powerful. Rituals are a great way to practice it and set your intentions. In this way, it is possible to make the rituals arbitrary and engage them in the fulfilling of different functions.

Rituals can be as simple as your morning routine: waking up happy, making coffee, taking a morning jog/walk, doing some exercise like yoga/stretching, taking some time to meditate, and savoring the coffee before beginning the day. You can also incorporate methods like spending 5 minutes in the morning writing a list of three things you are basically going to concentrate on in the day/ or blocking time to focus on you most critical delivery before checking email. 

You can create your own rituals to:

• Express gratitude
• Grieve the loss of loved ones
• Set goals and intentions
• Set affirmations
• Manifest what you want
• Focus on what’s important
• Release and let go of what no longer serves you

Psychology Today states, “Self-created ceremonies give meaning and order to our personal lives…Rituals are tools that give us the freedom to take responsibility for the direction and purpose of our lives…Rituals provide us with a sense of renewal. They offer us a time-out from our everyday routine, habitual existence. Essentially, and as the adage says, ‘a change is as good as a rest’, then perhaps in ontological terms, rituals are like oases break on the otherwise tremendously long and tortuous road that is life. So rituals preserve the evaluations made previously and enable individuals to state that the road chosen is the right one. ”

Recent investigations by psychologists have revealed intriguing new results demonstrating that rituals can have a causal impact on people’s thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. Scientific American highlights, “When we set aside the quality time and claim the psychic space for ceremony, when we assume the authority to do so, we are able to transform our perceptions, our perspectives, our experiences, and in the process, our reality.”

Candle Rituals

Thus, candles are an instrument of magic and as such have been employed in rituals for thousands of years from the Paleolithic period. Believe in the power of the candle, as like everything else, if you do not believe, it won’t work for you. With candle rituals, it is the same thing, as with how one makes a wish before the candles are blown out on a birthday cake; except instead of wishing, you tell your desire.

Burning a candle is a natural way to connect to something deeper. As a fire element, the flame represents the source of our creation and your inner light. It can be used to connect to our higher consciousness and heighten our spiritual awareness.

Candle Rituals in Ceremonial Contexts

Some of the uses of candles are in ceremonies. For instance, as a pastor or a religious leader, I’ve witnessed them during weddings, funerals and/or naming ceremonies. Thus, these rituals not only contribute the aspect of sacredness of the specific space but also have hidden significance behind religious connotations.

Weddings: Weddings: There is a unity of two lives whenever the bride and groom light the unity candle. The partners then each light a personal candle and they also light another bigger one termed as a unity candle. This act represents their union and commitment.

Funerals: This coincides with the Asian value of paying respect to the dead through use of candles. As for me, candles symbolize the human spirit and the light appeared in the lives of people who are left behind, so the image creates a calm and thoughtful mood.

Naming Ceremonies:  To the infants, candles are associated with the bringer of new light into the family and the general society. The thin that is lighted symbolizes hope and blessings for the new life of the child.

How to Perform a Candle Ritual

Here, I presented the structure based on which you can create your own candle ritual in case you wish to do it. Again, the form is rather flexible, and you can change  it as you wish, to suit your own customized needs. Perform candle rituals during different moon phases for added emphasis: the first phase it is the new moon which can benefit in making goals, the last phase is the full moon, beneficial in releasing anything which causes hindrance.

 

What You Need:

• Candle(s)
• Match or lighter
• Fire-safe area or container (fireplace, fire pit, empty planter, metal/ceramic bowl, empty sink, etc.)
• Small pieces of paper (small notebooks work great for this; if you don’t have one, tear sheets of paper into 4 pieces)
• Writing utensil
• Sage or palo santo (optional)
• Soft background music (optional)

Candle Ritual Steps

1. Cleansing & Opening Your Space

• Find a space where you can be alone and safely light small pieces of paper on fire.
• Sit in a comfortable chair or position on the floor.
• Smudge the ritual area by burning sage or palo santo (optional).
• Light the candle(s).
• Take a deep inhale and focus on the candlelight: let it illuminate the place and light you, this would pretty much make you lose all the weight you’ve had to put on in order to warm yourself with the outdoor lamp.
• When you breathe out, kindly shut your eyes and try to picture a white light around you and guarding you.

2. Set Your Intention

• If you choose to just have the ceremony, ask your spirit guides, guardian angels, the universe, and/or higher power to be with you during the ceremony (optional).
• Try sitting up straight and deepening your breaths for a moment to get grounded.

3. Burn Ceremony

• Continue breathing and take some time to focus your thoughts on the purpose of your ceremony: what exactly do you refer to as encyclopedias, websites, journals, papers, articles, messages, documents, or information that you are calling in, sending out, or releasing?
• When you’re ready, take a few more nice deep grounding breaths and when you feel ready, open your eyes.

4. Closing

• Take a few deep cleansing breaths and reflect on how you feel.
• Thank yourself for taking this time.
• Stay focus and grateful to the universe. 
• Blow out the candle(s) to close the ritual.

Key Takeaways

• Rituals provide structure and meaning to life.
• Candles are powerful tools in rituals, representing the four elements.
• Create rituals that resonate with your personal beliefs and needs.
• Candle rituals can be customized and performed during different moon phases for added impact.
• Incorporate intentional breathing, visualization, and affirmations in your rituals for a deeper experience.