How to make a honey jar (with pictures!!!)

Dear Miracles,

Life is sweet but sometimes it needs to be a little sweeter, yes? So it is that honey jars were born and have become one of the most popular and well-known techniques in folk magic. Today I want to share with you, in words and in pictures, how to put one together.

As it turns out, honey jars are not just for tea and biscuits. There is a long history of folk magic traditions working with sugar, honey, maple syrup, molasses, simple syrup and other sweeteners to promote love, kindness, joy, harmony, goodwill and favored status. The theory is simple and a fine example of sympathetic and contagious magic: because the primary medium is a sweetener, used in a directed way toward a specific person, the intention is that the person becomes sweeter. More kind, more tender, more loving, more harmonious.

Why I work with sugar instead of honey

Although honey jar is the preferred term, I actually use Whole Foods’ vegan sugar in mine. Sugar is less messy than honey. It is easy to take petition papers out and add new ones if the need arises. And it is less expensive.

I use vegan sugar, which might seem strange until you understand that most sugar is processed through filters made of animal bones, because of the high heat required during refining. Vegan sugar is not.

You will also hear this working called a sweetening jar, and honestly that is the more accurate name. The sweetener is the point. The container is just a container.

What People Make Them For

Honey jars and sweetening bottles are made for all kinds of reasons.

Some people make a jar that represents themselves, so that they will be kinder and more loving to everyone in their lives. Others create one to mark a marriage or an anniversary, to bless a couple with years of tenderness. In other cases they are used in a more compelling manner: to make a difficult boss warm to you, to encourage a judge or a jury to find in your favor, to persuade students or clients to follow your lead.

They are relatively easy to make, which is part of why they have become so popular, and because of the materials involved you can get very creative or stay very simple.

A word about influence

Sometimes people ask me whether it is right to sweeten someone who has not asked for it, and it is a fair question that deserves a plain answer.

A honey jar is not a leash. It does not override anyone’s will. What it does is soften the ground between you and another person, and softened ground still has to be walked on by both of you. If a thing is finished, sweetening will not bring it back from the dead. If a judge is wrong about the law, sweetening will not make her right. What sweetening removes is the needless harshness. The reflexive no. The hardness that has nothing to do with the merits of the thing.

That is different from work made to leave someone unable to rest, unable to think of anyone else, unable to leave. That is a different kind of working entirely.

How to Make A Sugar Jar

First, write a petition.

The petition for a honey jar tends to follow a specific format. First write the name of your target, the person you would like the jar to affect. Then turn the paper ninety degrees and write your own name on top of theirs.

If you are making a honey jar for yourself, you skip that second step and write only your own name.

Some people like to use pencil for the target’s name and pen or permanent marker for their own, the idea being that permanent ink is stronger than a pencil, which can be erased, and therefore exerts more influence. I personally like a strong ink I can see well for both names.

Then draw the circle

Once the names are inscribed it is time to create a magical circle around them.

While you write the circle the pen cannot leave the paper, which is why it makes sense to use a short and sweet prayer. In this demonstration I used love and blessings, over and over again.

Embellishing is optional and fun

Filling the jar

Add your sweetening agent, sugar or honey, and then add roots, herbs and curios appropriate to whatever situation you are working on.

What goes in, by what you are asking for

I always recommend that you begin by thinking about what YOU associate with love, or success, or peace. What scents? What colors? What herbs, roots, flowers, and curios? The best place to start is with your own personal associations – not a book, list, or chart. That said, sometimes we need a little help to get started and that is what the chart below is designed to help you do.

Once you have added what you want, the jar will look beautiful and you can tuck the petition right in. Make sure the petition is completely covered by the contents of the jar.

Can you eat the sugar?

People ask this and the answer is: it depends on what you put in it.

Obviously if you used toxic roots or herbs you cannot consume the sugar, syrup or honey. But if you used edible plants, of which there are many, you can eat the sweetener and you can use it in baking, cooking and beverages.

In fact one very simple, stripped-down honey jar involves putting a whole vanilla bean into the family sugar canister. It is believed to make for a happy and peaceful home. The sugar is used in the day to day doings of the family, and its magic extends through use.

The Candle

At this point you could stop. A lot of people make sugar jars and then work them by praying over them, stating their desires, and shaking them rhythmically.

But some of the oldest honey jar workings center on a candle, and adding one is a wonderful way to bring the magic of fire into the work. It also gives you a focal point while you pray.

Choose a candle that resonates with you. Many people like to work with specific colors. For this demonstration I used blue and yellow, since the jar was made for love, communication and healing.

Anoint the candle with a ritual oil appropriate to your situation. Hold it at heart level and draw the oil from the base of the candle toward your body. You may also want to dress it with ground herbs, with herbs and magical sachet powder, and of course with glitter.

Set the candle on top of the jar and light it.

Making one for yourself

Most of the time when people look up how to make a honey jar or a sugar jar, they want one for a situation. A relationship, a work problem, a legal proceeding, a business endeavor.

But one of my favorite kinds of sugar jar is the one you make for yourself.

When you make a sugar jar for yourself, you put yourself in it. Your hair, your nail clippings, your signature or photo. The goal is to make yourself sweet. Kinder, more generous, more thoughtful.

And the goal can be reflexive. You can petition that as you become kinder, you draw kind people into your life. As you become more generous, generosity comes toward you. The jar works in both directions at once.

The Golden Rep

This is a version I make for clients in the corporate world all the time.

The goal is to make them shine. To stand out and be noticed as the people they actually are, while keeping their reputation golden and keeping them both loving and beloved by everyone.

Adding sweetness to the world, starting with yourself, is always a good idea.

Working the jar

I consider honey jars an endurance type of ritual work. They are typically made with the intention of being worked a long time, at least several months and often for years.

The jars are usually set up on an altar or a dedicated working space. Candles can be burned on them. They can be prayed over and put to work every day, two or three times a week, or once a month.

How do you know it is working?

This is the question I am asked most, and most of what is written about it is either vague or dishonest, so here is a plain answer.

Signs in the work itself. Pay attention to how the wax melts and how the flame burns. A tall, steady, clean-burning flame is one thing. A flame that gutters, spits or goes out is telling you something else, usually that there is more to clear before sweetening can land.

Read the wax the candle leaves behind. This process of reading wax is called ceromancy, and anyone can do it. You are looking for shapes and symbols that carry meaning for you and for the situation you are working on. If you see the shape of an anchor in the wax, and your ex-boyfriend gave you a charm bracelet with an anchor on it for your six-month anniversary, that means something and I would pay attention to it. On the other hand, if you are working on a colleague who you feel is dragging you down, and you see an anchor, that could indicate things are blocked and you may need to do some cleansing and clearing alongside the sweetening work.

Signs in the world. The reflexive no becomes a maybe. A conversation that always went badly goes a little less badly. They reach out first. The thing you were braced for does not happen. The court case starts to go in your favor.

This is your situation responding to the work, and it usually begins subtly. Pay attention to the small shifts.

How long does it take?

There is an informal rule in spiritual work known as the rule of three. Three days to see a sign that the work is going in your favor, three weeks to see practical movement, three months to see a complete result.

The rule of three is a loose guideline at best. A reconciliation case for a couple who were together three years and have been apart one year is probably not resolving in three months.

That is especially true of this kind of working. A honey jar is a Sacred Vessel, and so is a salt jar. Vessels are worked over months, sometimes years. Sweetening is not a lightning strike. It is a long steady warming, and the working that lasts is the one you tend.

The beauty of choosing a jar over something like a candle ceremony is that a jar is a long-distance runner. Some situations are not going to resolve quickly. You know that going in, and that is exactly where this kind of working thrives.

When you need another set of Hands

A honey jar you make yourself is good work and I hope you make one.

But some situations are too tender, too tangled, or too important to hand to a beginner’s hands, including your own. If that is where you are, I build custom sacred vessels and I tend them for as long as they need tending.

Order a Honey Jar today.