The next time you are peeling a bulb of garlic, don’t forget to save the skins!
This protective layer of garlic is rich in nutrients and is beneficial in its physical, metaphysical, and household uses.
Aside from providing a delicious flavor in your meals, Garlic and its skins provide a ton of benefits.
To begin, garlic is an amazing antioxidant, anti-fungal, and antimicrobial. The compounds of sulfur found in garlic are known to promote the dilation of the blood vessels. Healthy blood flow protects your organs, keeping them functioning at their best. This is especially true as far as heart and brain health is concerned with garlic, as it reduces bad cholesterol and lowers the lipids (fats) found in the blood.
Overall, your body receives the support it needs with garlic to boost your immune system by enhancing your resistance to viral infections and providing relief from symptoms for viruses such as the common cold. It also flushes out toxins and free radicals that are responsible for inflammation, and ultimately, ailments and diseases associated with inflammation.
It Gets Better…
Ridding the body of these free radicals helps to promote the youthful appearance of your skin. Your skin, hair and nails will also thank you for the increase in vitamin A, C and collagen.
In addition to ingesting a tea by steeping the skins, you can also topically apply a paste to your skin after grinding the garlic skins into a powder.
You can also use it on the scalp to help combat any itchiness and dryness, while promoting hair growth.
The herbal tea made of the skins can also be used to treat and soothe dry, itchy or inflamed skin and help promote healing fungi, such as athletes foot.
It is worth mentioning that onion peels provide many of the same benefits as well, and in tandem, increases the benefits explained.
Garlic and onion peels are rich in nutrients, such as:
- Vitamins A, C and E
- Potassium
- Calcium
- Phosphorus
- Antioxidants and flavonoids
- Quercetin
- Organosulfur compounds
- Allyl cysteine
- Alliin
- Allicin
- Allyl disulfide
Your plants will love you too!
Plants benefit from the same nutrients as well. You can lightly mulch the skins for your fertilizer or use a diluted solution of garlic peel infused water to spray your plants. This spray will not only provide them the same nutrients, but will act as a natural pesticide which most insects will avoid. So overall, you will have a healthy plant that’s far more resistant to disease and bug infestation.
So how do we use garlic to promote spiritual wellness?
We’ve all known Hollywood vampires to hate garlic? But why?
As explained earlier in this article, garlic promotes healthy blood flow and contains allicin which is a powerful antibiotic. It was believed that vampires were borne of a blood disease, thus garlic being an agent that will repel or kill.
One such blood disorder that may have given rise to the Hollywood's vampire iconography is porphyria. It is a rare disorder that occurs when there is an over accumulation of chemicals related to red blood cell proteins. This disorder is characterized by some of the tell tale signs of Hollywood's vampires such as pale skin, sensitivity to light which gives the sensation of burning, and stained brown/red teeth that gives the appearance of blood.
If we look further into history to find whether there is merit to this age old remedy for vampires, we see that indigenous peoples of the America’s used a garland of garlic to keep insects and bats away in addiction to their spiritual beliefs.
More than this, if we look past the depictions of Hollywood's vampires, spiritualists know that actual energetic vampires are real. These are entities and people that drain and absorb your energy.
Below you will find a few ways to energetically remove and repel negative vibrations and vampires from your life.
- Grind the peels into a powder that you can use to sprinkle or blow wherever you need to clear energy. This works best when mixed with Cascarilla (powdered eggshell) and sprinkled at the entrances and windows of your home.
- Burn the garlic peels to use it as a smudging agent. You can add it to resins you may already have, a mix of dried herbs, or as is.
- Add it to a mojo bag. Mojo bags are bags carried in your person that are infused with herbs and other materials fixed for a specific intention.
- Grind into a powder that you can use for dressing candles.
There are many ways to incorporate garlic and their peels into your spiritual practices. Some people also use garlic skins in money rituals, but I personally, only use it for banishing and protection rituals.
It should be noted that this article is all about the peels. The myriad of ways to use all parts of garlic medicinally and spiritually are endless.
This article is meant to give general information on the uses of garlic skins. This information should not be used to replace professional and/or medical advice. As always, consult with your medical practitioner, especially for those who have low blood pressure or take blood thinners.
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