I'm a science-minded sort of person, so when I started looking up the acclaimed and various healing properties of all sorts of precious and semi-precious stones, I began to wonder how this all got decided. Especially since a host of websites and resources out there often provide contradictory information, or make it look like all stones are good for all things!

Since that didn't make a lot of sense (at least in my world!), here's a little look at what I found after devoting many many hours of my time to figure it out. 

 

Vibrational Frequency - The Universal Law states that everything in the universe moves or vibrates. How fast an object or substance vibrates is known as its frequency. Crystals (stones) vibrate at different frequencies depending on their molecular composition (what they're made of) and size. (Some say their color is a factor as well, but the color depends on the molecular composition also, sooo ... there's that.) 

How fast a substance vibrates determines its form - is it matter, or light, or...? Slower vibrating substances are matter, faster are light or other forms. All matter (that we're concerned with here) such as body organs or stones vibrates, and the way we describe this vibration is to talk about the frequency. Vibration = Frequency!

 

Electromagnetic Frequency = Light. Color, also referred to as "light frequency", is really electromagnetic energy interacting with a particular type of matter.

Each visible color is defined by a specific wavelength, a certain frequency, and a particular amount of energy in that wavelength.  The visible spectrum of light occurs at wavelengths between 380 and 780 nm. There are a number of units of measurement for light. 

 

Units of Measurement for Light:

Frequency is generally expressed in hertz (Hz), or cycles per second. 

Wavelength is measured in both nanometers (nm) and ...ngstroms.

Energy is usually measured in electron/volts (eV), since Joules are too large to be practical. 

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Vibrational Numbers of Stones - Some websites or book references give a specific vibrational number for a certain type of stone, such as giving a 7 for amethyst. They don't give a unit of measurement, so this is suspect in my mind. In order to determine the frequency (vibration) of a particular object, you have to know the molecular composition, and thus what type of stone/rock you are looking at.

Without getting into the vast field of geology too much, a generally accepted definition of a rock or stone is a solid mass comprised of at least 2 minerals. Identification of stones is done by common field testing methods - if you want a pretty comprehensive description of these you can click here. 

Here's the interesting part - if we look at the vibrational numbers for all sorts of inorganic solid masses (rocks!) - they vary only a tiny amount between different types of rocks! What varies more (in comparison) is the vibrational frequency of the light when it interacts with the rock. Another way of saying this would be - you don't really need the vibration of the specific rock, you just need to see what color(s) it is, and you'll know enough to move forward. 

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How do I know which stone vibrates at a frequency that will help my particular problem? (I need a stone that resonates at the correct frequency to match whatever I'm trying to achieve.)