I’ve always been a candle and incense burning kid. My parents regretted letting me get my first incense burner when I was just starting high school. Both of them are smoke and smell sensitive and I had to have windows open and not burn certain scents to make sure that I didn’t induce a bad cold or something from the smell. But I was glad they never took it away from me. I liked watching the smoke and seeing images or just being mesmerized by the movement. I liked the smell and found it calming. It was a sensory experience that made me happy and felt ritualistic for my comfort. When I was more dedicated to reading my Bible I used it to get me into the zone of study 9not that I was any good at it, I was really good at being distracted). Later I used it to enjoy any kind of reading I did, study or pleasure.
The moment I got my own apartment I was finally able to burn what I wanted to. Everything from candles and incense, to my pipe and (sometimes when I wasn’t paying attention) my food was sacrificed to fire, intentionally or not. Sometimes my flames made their way to my little porch as I sat in my hammock (since I couldn’t smoke in my apartment). Incense wasn’t forbidden in my building, and I took full advantage to take ownership of my own space.
My husband has always shared this affinity as well. Now we own a house together, and lately he’s been burning Myrrh in the basement. The sweet smell comes up through the registers and I get the light scent to touch my nose and lighten the feel of my home. Sometimes I taste it on his breath when he kisses me, and I find it once again comforting in association with our love. Even the burning of our passion.
When I was young, we did a sleep over with all the church youth group high school girls. We started having deep conversations around the beachside bonfire and talking about things that we regretted or said or did. The youth leader suggested we do a regret burning to help us let go of the things we’ve asked God to forgive us for. She got out a little spiral notebook and a handful of pens and we quietly sat and wrote out lists or situations that we regretted having been part of. We wrote out things that made us angry. Things that made us sad. All kinds of things. Those of us who were willing shared and those of us who weren’t just tossed their papers in the fire. It was a lovely bonding experience, and it made me see that fire could have a cleansing effect in my life outside of the incense.
Fire could be meaningful.
I journal a bit more now than I used to in my early adulthood. Something I’ve been working on to help with my mental health. I’ve found though, that if I journal about things that only get me going again and over excites me as I relive it, I’ve taken to writing those in a spiral notebook and tearing it out only to put it to the flame. It helps with the letting go, and perhaps there is a little malice involved when I’m angry at a person or thing, but the ritualistic burning of that which upsets me feels as if I’ve accomplished something to move through the feelings, or even past them. Not that it’s every case that I move past the feelings. Sometimes I have to burn the same narrative more than once to feel like I got through it. Sometimes I have new feelings about how something went down in the past, and I need to work through those too.
I know, it’s like the Mean Girls Burn Book.
I can’t say it doesn’t help, because it does usually. I don’t care if it comes across witchy or malicious. It’s there to help me process, and it’s something that I know a lot of people do. Sometimes it’s with their wishes, sometimes it’s with their sorrows and confessions, sometimes it’s with their anger. Whatever the case, the fire feels like a necessary part of the process of coping.
It feels final.
...Bag O' Magic Soup 