Gemstones have been used for centuries as aids to meditation and magical foci; each stone has specific healing and spiritual properties. Although many lists of stones and properties exist, I have found that those of Scott Cunningham, Diane Stein, and personal experience are the most valid, with personal experience being the most important.
That said, the following is a list from my Book of Shadows. Although this list is by no means complete, it can get you started on the journey:
Agate:
Many stones are in this family, and Moss Agates are one of the most powerful. Agates aid in the restoration of energy. They are used in healing and bring the wearer happiness, wealth, health, and long life. They increase the ability to ward off self-induced anger and inner bitterness, enhance truth and understanding, tone and strengthen the mind and body, and promote a feeling of strength and courage. It is useful in removing envious thoughts and spite and for help in easing stressful situations. Can also attract true and loyal friendships.
Carried while gardening, this stone increases the fertility and health of your garden. Agate helps in healing, especially blood, skin, and intestinal conditions. Agate, especially banded agate, is also a good meditation stone. One of my favorite stones.
* Blue lace: gives tranquility. Wear or carry this stone for peace and happiness. Very effective for reducing household and/or family quarrels. Useful in reducing stress when held in the hand. Good for promoting caring and tenderness.
* Black: Good for guarding against physical dangers. Especially useful in protection after dark. This stone represents quiet power, and helps to combine and balance the physical with the spiritual.
* Leopard Skin -- Very protective, especially against sorcery and possession. Increases courage and strength. Use when contacting your animal spirits. Can be helpful in healing.
* Moss green: balances emotional energy. A wonderful stone to wear to draw new friends. Called the "gardener's talisman." It can be used to relieve exhaustion and to heal problems with the neck and back, as well as in money and happiness spells.
Amber:
A powerful healing stone with a large amount of organic energy, amber is actually fossilized tree resin. This stone is cheering and joyful, and is a powerful healer. Amber will hold a static electrical charge when rubbed. Filters germs and infections and has the power to cleanse. Worn around the neck, amber helps fight infection and respiratory diseases.
Excellent for use in rituals for enhancing your beauty and attractiveness. Helps to attract love and stimulates happiness and pleasure. Amber is used as both a good luck and protective amulet, and is extremely protective against negative magick which has been directed against you. When placed on the altar, it can increase the effectiveness of your spells. Amber is said to increase strength while relieving or curing health conditions. Amber is also very useful in protecting children.
Tradition says that when it is worn with Jet in a necklace, it indicates a High Priestess. A new favorite, I find this stone to be a wonderful magical energy channel.
Amethyst:
Increases spiritual awareness; has a calming and soothing influence; can transmute negative into positive; a very effective healing stone. Warmed in the hand and placed on the forehead and temples, it is good for easing headaches. Can filter forces directed towards the body and repel vibrations which the body doesn't need, thus releasing only the energy patterns beneficial to the body. In healing, it is best worn near the heart center. Opens up spiritual and psychic centers.
Amethyst helps to calm fears, reduces stress, dispels doubts and negativity, and can relieve depression and promote good judgment. Amethyst induces vivid dreams, increases mental powers, and is useful in psychic works. Said to be useful in drawing pure, true, emotional love. Can enhance meditation and psychic abilities. Helps insomnia. Prevents drunkenness, according to ancient writings (no personal experience with this aspect).
Aquamarine:
Calms nervous tension by connecting with the calm ocean. (Do not use while an ocean storm is happening nearby.) Used to help banish fears and phobias. Soothing and cleansing, it enhances the utilization of psychic powers and makes the mind more alert. Excellent for cleansing and purifying. Aquamarine can be used in rituals to ensure good health. It soothes and calms emotional problems and promotes peace, happiness, and joy as it halts fear.
Aventurine:
Increases perception and creative insight. Stimulates opportunity and motivation. Helps to release stress and anxiety and helps with problems arising from these energies; strengthens blood and aids in cleansing. This is an excellent good luck stone. It is useful in spells involving money, gambling, and business success. Can calm troubled emotions and speed general healing. This stone increases perception and intelligence while it stimulates creativity.
* The green form is an excellent substitute for malachite in many workings.
* The blue form is good for reducing or eliminating negative emotions. Lends itself well to healing. A great stone for purification and peace. When held, this stone can reduce or completely cleanse the body of pain.
A soothing stone, cool to the touch no matter how long it is held. Makes an excellent ‘worry stone.’
Azurite:
Powerful healing stone, invokes spiritual guidance, opens psychic eye. Good for dreams and improving psychic ability. can heal emotional trauma, confusion, blocks, and negativity. This stone is also useful in working with spirit guides, animal guides, and the Goddess. It is also said to increase psychic healing ability and aid in visualization.
Bloodstone:
A warrior’s stone. A very powerful stone that can assist with blood clotting; oxygenates blood; stimulates flow of energy for healing blood circulation, and stop hemorrhaging. Removes emotional blockages. Increases physical strength and promotes courage. It is helpful in business and legal matters. Bloodstone can increase the effectiveness of spells. When worn, this stone may increase longevity. Can be used to avoid attracting attention to yourself.
Carnelian:
Aids tissue regeneration and helps to find one's true self. This stone is excellent for increasing courage, especially in the shy. Helps to promote self-confidence while inducing peace. Offsets doubt and negativity. Carnelian is excellent for increasing sexual desires and is very useful in spells relating to lust. Very helpful in all forms of healing. Can also be used to guard against people who try to read your thoughts. In its more yellow shades, Heightens visualization and communication abilities. Great for use in writing or public speaking. Travel related spells are enhanced by the presence of yellow carnelian. A protective stone, and good for healing, especially disorders of the stomach, nervous system, and skin.
Citrine:
Stimulates openness and accelerates the awakening of the mind. Helps to realize cloudy thoughts and to take control of your emotional life. Brings joy and happiness. Dispels anxieties and fears. An aid to the digestive system. Helps eliminate toxins. Encourages tremendous healing on the emotional and mental levels, helps unblock subconscious fears, and serves as a natural relaxant. Wear this stone at night to help prevent nightmares and to have a good night's sleep. Helps to tap into user's power to give energy to magick. Can be used as a good luck stone. Helps to increase self-esteem. An excellent stone to use for promoting creativity. I find this stone to be particularly powerful, and it can be too much for some workings. Needs to be cleansed regularly if it is worn as jewelry.
Emerald:
Promotes creativity, stimulates perception and insight, and strengthen memory. Has a beneficial effect on the eyes.
Flourite:
Opens and softens the way for the use of other stones. Unveils subconscious blocks and enhances creativity. Energies of purple (mind) and green (body) helps to bring both together. Excellent when used in aquariums (provides needed minerals). Works well to strengthen the power of all other stones. It helps to straighten out the thoughts, and has the ability to reduce the level of emotions in any situation, so that a more accurate, logical perspective can be had. It also heightens analytical abilities, and effectively lowers anger, depression, and desperation.
Garnet:
Balances hormones. Good for mental depression, enhancing self-esteem, alleviating bad dreams, and encouraging success in business. It may assist in seeing past incarnations. Enhances the imagination and protects from depression and fear while providing strength and courage. Garnet is a highly protective stone, in that it provides a barrier of charged vibrations which repel negative energies on contact. It is also useful for protection after dark. It can be used to strengthen the aura, and is great for lending extra energy to rituals. It is also useful in enhancing bodily strength and endurance.
Hematite:
Calming to the emotions, and grounding to the physical body, this stone can be a powerful balancer when under a lot of stress. It may be worn as an amulet to confer strength and procure favorable legal judgment. Increases energy and vitality, strengthens the heart and kidneys, it is useful in healing, especially when worn in the form of a necklace. It seems to draw illness out of the body. Its silvery, mirror-like surface is good for divination, especially scrying.
Iolite:
This is an indigo colored stone which is useful in working with the third eye chakra. It can help to open and expand psychic abilities, encourage psychic exploration, enhance curiosity, and guide you through spiritual beginnings and growth.
Ivory:
Spiritual protection. (No personal experience with this stone.)
Jade:
Stimulates practicality, wisdom, and universal attunement. Thought to provide a link between the spiritual and the mundane. The Chinese believe it grants wisdom when placed against the third eye chakra. Attracts love, and is useful for protection. This gem can actually help the body to heal itself. It is used to help treat heart, kidney, and stomach disorders.
Jasper:
Wonderful for balancing of emotions and stress. This grounding stone helps with liver, gallstones and kidney problems. Promotes an unselfish attitude. Promotes beauty and grace. Said to ease the pain of childbirth. Protective and especially useful in defensive magick (I recommend using this stone to send negativity directed at you back to the original sender). Increases mental processes and forms a barrier against dangerous desires and whims. A great all-around good luck stone.
Labradorite:
An opaque smoky quartz color, but when rotated in sunlight has flashes of vivid green, blue, red, yellow, orange, and gold. This stone carries some of the properties from both the moon and the sun. Helps in opening the heart chakra in order to more readily receive love. Increases inner strength and convictions, as well as promoting courage. Draws success to one’s life. Greatly enhances dreaming, and the ability to remember the content of the dreams during the waking hours. Also helps to enhance all forms of perception during the day. The stone may be more powerful in one area than another, dependant upon what color the "flash" is.
Lapis Lazuli:
Used by the Egyptians to bring peace, self awareness and clarity. Aids creative expression and enhances intuition. Stimulates wisdom, truthfulness, and psychic experiences, healing and strengthening when worn next to the skin. Strengthens mind and body to spiritual awareness. Improves emotional, physical, spiritual and psychic conditions. Relieves depression while promoting inner peace. Excellent for use in divination. Lapis is very protective and promotes courage. One of my favorite stones.
Malachite:
Often used as a child's talisman to sleep soundly and protect from bad dreams. Stimulates clear vision and insight, represents hope and inner peace, believed to protect from danger. Increases abundance in all areas of life. Guards against negativity and depression, calms and soothes. Enhances the ability to give and receive love. Increases business success. Promotes sleep. Very protective against physical dangers. This is a wonderful stone to use in the protection of children, as well as protection during travel. Place one on your altar to lend extra energy to magickal spells. Another of my favorite stones.
Moonstone:
Brings good fortune. Promotes unselfishness. Great for divination and increasing one’s psychic ability. Helpful in dieting and maintaining a youthful appearance. The moonstone is love drawing and helpful for reconciliation. It is a gently protective stone, and is extremely useful in protection while traveling by water. Opens the heart to humanitarian love and hope. Gives clarity to spiritual understanding. Can be useful for easing pre-menstrual symptoms and balancing to the reproductive system; used to ease childbirth; can balance female hormones. Specifically aids men in balancing the male/female energies. Sacred to the Goddess.
Onyx:
Great for defense against negativity. Can be used to reduce sexual desires. An extremely potent protective stone, widely known for its ability to protect against psychic attacks and hexes.
Pearl:
Stimulates feminine qualities, used to focus attention, helps pull together mental and spiritual forces and promote peace of mind. Represents purity, modesty, and gentleness.
Peridot:
Dispels fears, guilt, and depression. Used to counteract negative emotions and healing of the spirit. Seems to have a positive affects on the upper chakras. Once worn as a means of gaining foresight and divine inspiration. Reduces stress and stimulates the mind. Promotes personal growth and awareness. Guards against illusions, enchantments, and nightmares. If anger is a problem for you, try using this gemstone as it is known to calm even the most raging anger. Can calms nervousness and banishes negative emotions. Good for general healing, promoting sleep, and attracting money.
Quartz:
Amplifies the healing energy of the one using it. Can be used to help draw out pain. Excellent for meditation and connection to spirit guides. Amplifies energy and dispels negativity. Helps to balance emotions and tap into the energies of the universe. A good stone for meditating on. To be able to tune into the quartz promotes clarity while concentrating on it. Very potent and often worn to protect from negative vibrations. Great for psychic work and as a general magickal power amplifier. Can be used to relieve headaches, reduce fevers and calm toothaches. Great for use in building a magick circle.
* Rutilated: utile needles help focus attention. Much stronger than clear quartz, enhances life force and increases clairvoyance
* Smoky: good for calming the mind. Enhances dream awareness and dispels negativity. Aids channeling. A wonderful stone to use for grounding and centering. This stone can also be used to help overcome depression and other negative emotions. It is also an excellent mood elevator.
One of the most powerful aspects of this stone is that it has the ability to be programmed with the powers of any other stone, and then substituted for that stone. Cleanse regularly.
Rose Quartz:
Produces vibrations of universal love and inner serenity. love stone, brings love and peace to the wearer. Can enhance one’s appreciation of music, poetry and art. Reduces stress and guilty feelings. “The” stone for love rituals, it is wonderful for opening the heart chakra. It is extremely love attracting. It also promotes peace, happiness, and fidelity in established relationships.
Ruby:
Increases vigor, renews vitality and cleanses the blood. Called the stone of courage. With its beautiful red color, the ruby is quite useful in love magick, especially for spells involving sexual love (increasing one's desire, etc.) and lust. Rubies are also useful in promoting courage and increasing energy.
Sodalite:
Enhances communication and calms and clears the mind. Very similar to Lapis Lazuli but gentler. A wonderful stone to draw wisdom. It can be held in the hand to help still the mind and relax the body. A wonderful meditation stone, and superb at healing emotionally related disorders (those caused by stress, anger, fear, or nervousness). Useful in dispelling guilt and fear.
Tiger Eye:
This stone provides very powerful protection. It enhances clarity of thought and helps you to recognize your own faults and deal with them. Softens stubbornness and brings clear insight. Useful in divination and as a tool to delve into past lives. Promotes wealth and prosperity. Increases energy flow through the body, and is therefore useful during illness. Tiger Eye can strengthen your convictions and create courage and confidence.
Topaz:
Calms emotions, protects against external stressors. Restores physical energy and a quiet emotional nature. Use this gem in purification rituals. Great at promoting peace, while calming emotions. Useful in removing pain from the body. Placed by the bed at night, this stone is useful in preventing or halting nightmares and ensuring a good night's sleep.
Tourmaline:
Each person has a different response to this stone. In general, causes the wearer to be more flexible, more understanding and more objective in purpose and reason. Calming. Causes a reaction in the intestinal tract.
Turquoise:
Produces calming radiations, protective, restores a healthy mental attitude. Called the stone of friendship. Balancing and healing, provides strength and vitality. Eventually takes on the characteristics of the wearer. A wonderful all-around stone, useful in drawing love, money, health and beauty. A very protective stone. Use in rituals to attract new friends or lovers. Promotes joy. A wonderful gift, as it is said to grant the receiver wealth and happiness. Will absorb and protect the wearer from psychic attack, brings peace of mind and promotes creative expression.
~From Maat's Book of Shadows