Last week I received a mala bracelet from mala collective as a gift. I am very grateful. In exchange, I wanted to share my experience with this very powerful piece of “jewlery” (can you call it jewlery?).

They told me to browse their website and look for a mala that resonated with me. It took me awhile to choose, but once I found the right one, I knew it immediately.

At first, I was drawn toward the I am confident mala bracelet. It was a beautiful blue colour and the website said that the Blue Agate stone that it was made of would help me to “cleanse and stabilize [my] aura, banishing negativity,” and that it would also allow me “to gain inspiration from spiritual worlds.” I consider myself a very spiritual person and accessing my more openly spiritual side was something that definitely peaked my interested. I also wanted to work on removing word combinations like “I can’t” or “I’m tired” or “I’m busy” from my vocabulary because I felt that this sort of language made me unappreciative for my life (even if a part of me was just saying it to fit in…).

However, I realized that although I certainly aspired to be confident in my daily life, it actually wasn’t the first thing that I wanted. I felt as though confidence was one of those things that I consistently felt like I lacked, but only because I wasn’t overly confident in grade school. I just hadn’t consciously changed my story yet, even though I feel different about myself now. I am confident in my ability to learn and to connect with people (one on one at least). I’m becoming confident in my body as I continue to practice yoga, and I feel confident in my resolve to and persistence to make my dreams a reality.

So, I kept looking. The next one I looked at was the I am resilient mala bracelet. This bracelet was made out of onyx, and it said that it helped the wearer to manage and “complete tasks with focus, will power, strength, confidence and discipline.” That definitely sounded interesting, but as a creative individual there was something I felt like I was missing. I wanted a bracelet that infused the confidence together with the commitment toward just “going for it” in my every day life. I’m a type A personality, so the I am resilient bracelet felt like it played toward some of my strengths. I wanted to find a bracelet mala that played toward some of my weaknesses.

And then I found it: The I am adventurous mala bracelet was a beautiful light blue color and made of Amazonite. Here’s the description that they provide on the website:

“I Am Adventurous. I seek the unknown. The thrill. The excitement. I am strong enough to take charge of my life, connect with my inner power, and overcome fears by following my dreams.”

In addition to this beautiful affirmation (which I intend to write and post somewhere on my wall… perhaps on a vision board?), the website also explained that the stones would help to heal the throat chakra and aid in communication. I was sold immediately. This was the one.

My relationship with my voice has always been a little bit shaky. I started going to voice lessons a year ago to help release some of my vocal power. I also recently discovered that I store an uncomfortable amount of tension in my neck. I recently sat down with a yoga teacher named Leah Emmott who said that, after realizing that she had an ovarian cyst the size of a grapefruit growing in her abdomen (she got it removed), she started doing focused meditations to understand why she was so disconnected with that area of her body.

Her story inspired me to start meditating on a problem area for me: my throat, neck and shoulders. Why do I store tension there? When do I store it? And how can I relax it? Leah referred to the cyst as a mask that was blocking her off from her creativity. I think of my tension as something that is blocking me off from my voice.

I hope that this mala will support me as I explore and meditate on that specific area of my body. For me, being adventurous means finding the courage to share my inner world and taking action to live a passionate and fulfilling life.

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Check out their website: malacollective.com It’s a fantastic company with affordable prices and a pretty impressive list of celebrities that are behind their name (Julia Roberts, Deepak Chopra, and Sting to name a few).

Which mala resonates with you?