I never knew how beneficial meditation could be—until I started performing my meditations high. Being one of those who has a hard time tuning the world out and directing my focus into one area, meditation often brought with it as much frustration as it did relief, which rather defeats the purpose. The beneficial effects were often lost on me since I could not achieve a good meditative state.

Being high in meditation, however, I was finally able to put all other thoughts and concerns aside and really focus. Deep meditative focus. Even deeper.

Now I use cannabis for powerful ritualized meditations. These are not my day-to-day meditations, but profound, life-changing meditations. Meditations that are set up in a ritualized, sacred manner, bringing a magical vibration to them by their very existence.

Why is meditating with weed so awe-inspiring? Because meditating with cannabis allows the user a more intense meditative energy throughout their session, providing for a more lucid and powerful experience.

When you take the lucid and powerful experience and give it a real purpose, meditative magic happens. Giving your meditation a purpose is called setting your intention.

Setting Your Intention
While there are times you will want your meditation to take you wherever it wants to go, in a ritualized meditation you want to set a focus or answer a question. It is your purpose. You set an intention. Perhaps your meditation is focusing on healing a certain physical or emotional injury. Perhaps you are meditating to send energy to a specific situation. Perhaps you are seeking the guidance of a specific deity or spirit.

All these types of meditations require the setting of a very specific intention. Setting this intention is the first and most important step in any working you perform. To create your "Intention Statement," ask yourself:

• What do you want?
• What do you need?
• Where do you plan to set your focus?

Answering these questions should always be your starting point.

Take the time to think about what you want your meditation to accomplish. Use your meditation journal to write down your thoughts, and then compact them into a sentence or two. When condensing your thoughts, remember to fully consider what it is you need, and what it is you need to do to get it. For example: If I am performing a healing meditation, I need to consider both what I want healed, and how I want it healed—will I be sending positive light, vibrations, visualize the damaged area growing stronger, or cells reproducing and healing tissue? Combinations of all the above? What will healing look like both during and after the meditation?

You can get very specific in both your method and projected outcome. In emotional issues, there can be many steps involved in reaching the outcome. Meditate on those as long as you need to but remember to give a more condensed version for your Intention Statement.

Intensify Your Intentions
Spells and meditations are similar in the way they both consist of highly focused intention and concentration. You can use different correspondences in your meditation session to intensify the energy surrounding your intention just as you would when casting a spell. From incense, to candles, oils, and even smokable herbs, there are many ways you can increase the concentration of energy in your meditation by bringing in correspondences in several different aspects. Use a correspondence guide, such as Llewellyn's Complete Book of Correspondences by Sandra Kynes, to discover what specific items you can add to intensify the power of you intention.

Begin with the most basic correspondence: color. How can you bring a corresponding color into your meditation? If we go with the healing example, a green candle fits the description. If you happen to have a candle made specifically for healing, all the better. If not, you can still add to your candle to increase its potency by dressing it in a corresponding oil. Tea tree is a healing oil, so for our running example, we can dress our green candle with it.

You can add color in other ways—in how you dress, pillow covers, any type of decorations, jewelry, blankets, veils, or scarves. Sitting in green grass. Be creative in how you can add to your setting with colors.

Boost your healing meditation by combing a blend of healing herbs together in a mortar with a pestle to create a ground incense to burn throughout the meditation on a charcoal tablet, or use a prepackaged incense used for healing or good health.

Intensify your intention by adding smokable herbs that correspond to your needs. Doing this takes research and preparation. First you must find corresponding herbs that are non-toxic when smoked. Then you must be sure to obtain them in a pure, organic, food-grade form. This is for more advanced users and again, it requires commitment to safety by ensuring a safe product is used, but it can also add a great deal to your practice. Each herb or spice you use will have a different effect on cannabis. Some increase the effects, some diminish them. Flavors help intensify your experience. Research is paramount to a positive relationship with herbal blending, but it is a scenic drive.

Crystals and stones add extra inspirations. The first, and most obvious, is to place crystals corresponding to your intention around or even on you. But imagine if you have a special ritual box in where you store your weed. You can "charge" your weed by placing corresponding crystals in the box with it. Bong users can prepare gem waters from water-safe crystals for special intention bong water. Finally, crystal and stone pipes and bowls exist. Having a variety of these in your collection can be beneficial.

The importance of what you use to consume should become truly important right about now. Don't use a dirty bowl, or something you use for daily consumption. Your pipe, bowl, bong, rig, whatever you use—it is a ritual tool. Treat it as such. Finances may limit your options, but at least have one piece reserved for ritual use. If you can afford different pieces for different types of workings, that is awesome. Treat these pieces with respect and honor. Consecrate them as you would any other tool. There are many beautiful choices that complement ritual work.

Whose help will you need along your journey? From whom do you seek guidance and assistance? Invite any guides, deities, animal spirits to work with you. Entice their presence by providing representations and offerings to them.

You can also use astrological or lunar patterns as a part of your meditation setting to empower your meditation even more. Cannabis placed in a sealed mason jar under a full moon can also bring in aspects of the full moon to your practice.

Document the steps you take in your meditation journal, including all of the correspondences you include. All these items are ritual components.

Setting Sacred Space
Cleanse the area you will be using for your meditation. Create an altar to use in your practice. Use this altar to set up your correspondences and any decorations you want to add. Make it appealing. It is a place for crystals, candles, oils, pictures, statutes, and most importantly your clean pipe, weed, and lighter (or whatever devices you are using). If you don't have much space, a breakfast tray works well as a portable altar.

This is where it is ideal to keep enough cannabis for your meditation in a small ritual box. As part of your preparations, place a corresponding stone into your box to charge the cannabis with the energy of the stone. With the healing example, a quartz would be placed in the ritual box.

When you are ready to perform a ritualized mediation, create sacred space in the area you are using. You may call quarters, create a circle, claim ground—however you define setting your space as sacred.

Repeat your intention statement as you bless and empower your cannabis, your pipe, your lighter with the energy of your intention. Prepare your bowl with reverence for the plant, and for your intention. Focus your attention as you light, inhale, hold, and exhale. Follow your guides and enjoy your ride.

The Glory of Ganja
Cannabis is an entheogen. It is a pathway to the Gods, the Universe, your inner-most self. It takes us to places we can't go alone, guiding us along the way. It is a sacred herb and while it can also be used for fun, when used in a sacred manner, it needs to be afforded honor and respect. Document memories, emotions, and revelations from your meditation. Close your session out with a few words of thanks to your assistants and to the plant itself.

Meditation with cannabis is nothing new. It has taken place world over, for thousands and thousands of years. We have lost this knowledge, but we can bring it back. We can once again normalize what generations before us have known for thousands of years. We can revive the use of this sacred and magical plant and allow it to open our minds and heal our souls.