Witchbust #3 - The Moldy Lemon Test
My first encounter: I saw this circulating on Facebook around a year ago and I was just as skeptical then as I am now. I started seeing it make rounds again at the end of last month. ✨ Note: While the following post doesn’t specifically mention cutting the lemons, the photos show them cut. The bottom two photos also show them structurally cut into bloom-quarters (still attached at the base), which is the cut that commonly shows up in spellwork using a lemon to clear and protect.
To be clear: I am not contesting that lemons can be used to remove negative energy. I also fully support using them for protecting and cleansing space. What I am questioning is the idea of placing lemons around your home and using the spread of mold and level of deterioration to gauge the how much negative energy exists in that area. Why? Because science has already been down this road and the idea that positive or negative energy can affect mold growth has been disproven. What? Yeah. You may or may not have heard of Dr. Masaru Emoto. If you haven’t, here’s the TL/DR version: Dr. Emoto is famous for his study of water consciousness, where he exposed water to various words and music that had negative or positive connotations. By his observation, water exposed to “positive” affirmation created more geometrically appealing ice crystals. He also did this with jars of cooked rice -- which by default contains water -- and measured mold growth. The problem is, not only is it easy to logically poke holes in many of his assertions, his experiments have never been able to be replicated, especially with larger sample sizes. Therefore, his experiment is widely held as disproven, with a side of biased results. I’m not going to go into it any further, because Emoto deserve his own Witchbust (stay tuned). What does this have to do with lemons? This lemon test is the same concept -- instead of water and rice, we’re using lemons. As far as I’m concerned, this concept is already dead in the water. But, this wouldn’t be a proper Witchbust if I didn’t follow the breadcrumbs, so let’s go! After thinking of Emoto’s study, my second thought was that there are already too many variables that affect mold growth in general for the average person to be able to judge, for 100% certain, that the varying levels of mold are solely being caused by negative energy. Unfortunately, people will believe what they are told without giving the concept a second thought. As I’m thinking of these variables, I started to wonder where the hell people were getting this from. As I started searching, first I found ton of spells and rituals for using lemons to cleanse, protect, and attract. I even saved a few to use. The first article I found corroborating the detection method was this one: https://psychicblaze.com/how-to-detect-a-negative-energy-with-a-lemon/ “Studies show that lemons have several health benefits, but not many know that they can also be used for spiritual practices. To detect signs of negative energy, place lemons in different areas of the house that you suspect reeks with negative energy and leave them there for seven to nine days. How moldy the lemons get (i.e., if it dries like usual or turns black) will tell you how much negative energy a specific area holds.” There was no mention of cutting the lemons. I didn’t find any leading clues to guide my search, either. So I turned again to prior knowledge. I knew that drinking lemon water to remove toxins and boost metabolism is from Ayurveda, originating out of India. I also knew that citrus fruits also originated from around there. I made a mental note to keep an eye out for Asian and Indian sources. Discouraged by only finding one article about detection, from a questionable source at best, I diverted to reading up on factors that attribute to mold growth ... until I decided to turn to YouTube. Again, at first, lots of spell work involving lemons, but no detection, until I found this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUfmQdL_NCM Notes as I watched: ✨ Uses whole lemons ✨They mention to place the lemons where you already think the bad energy is, so the person laying them out already has a predisposition to thinking negative energy is there, which one could argue is already biased. ✨Suggests to leave them out for “a few weeks” ✨Also asserts that mold is the key factor for detecting negativity ✨If they are soft & squishy, that means the area is simply damp ... but why wouldn’t mold also indicate this? They mention that the squishy lemons were placed in an area that is frequently exposed to steam. Specifically mentions that these are to be interpreted as “good”. I went back to searching for articles: ✨An inquiry on Quora about removing negative energy that was answered by a Pranic Healer, who asserted that lemons will remove negative energy from a person when consumed. ✨An article from the Times of India that highlights how hanging lemons, and storing lemons in a jar of water, are used to repel and remove negative energy from spaces. I cringed a bit when I noticed Tiktok had now popped up in the search. While I avoid WitchTok like the plague, I can’t leave it out when tracing online trends, so ... https://www.tiktok.com/discover/clearing-negative-energy-lemons Out of the ten videos provided, only one covered the detection method: https://www.tiktok.com/@divinelytimedesigns/video/6993066894378929414?is_from_webapp=v1&item_id=6993066894378929414 Notes from the video: ✨Cuts into wedges ✨No presence of mold ✨Gauges level of negativity on structural integrity of dried fruit ✨ Uses this method to absorb initially, and then judges how much negativity was already removed from the area I noticed that Tiktok automatically searched “clearing negative energy lemons”. I swapped “clearing” for “detecting” and it only came up with removing or just “negative energy lemons”. I checked both. Lo, and behold:
Let’s watch, shall we? Oh, nevermind, it’s literally the Facebook post re-posted on Tiktok, fall leaf emojis and everything. The body of the post is the description of the video. Notes from the conversation in the comments: ✨Creator responds to a question stating that it’s for removing energy ✨ Also states that black spots mean negative energy Next video, where a Creator goes around checking her lemons: ✨Cuts lemons ✨She salted them, which salt, when exposed to moisture, can inhibit mold growth ✨Salt is also a natural preservative that draws in moisture ✨No mold found No other videos found. I noticed people were tagging feng shui on these videos so I added that to my keywords. While of course I found articles tying the use of lemons to create positive energy to asian cultures, no detection methods. I turned once again to YouTube and found my last, but not least, detection method source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRGw-jhwvN8 Notes: ✨He’s a reiki practitioner, he’s drinking lemon water ... we already can see where the influence is coming from: Indian / South Asian practices. ✨Shows a whole lemon ✨States that the proof lies in the fact that negative energy was previously felt in the area Okay. Let’s talk about lemons and mold: ✨The shelf-life of anything is varied by how it’s stored ✨Heat is bad ✨Room temperature is slightly less bad, but stored on the counter is not recommended ✨A cool, dark pantry is better, but the fridge is best ✨Cut lemons are even worse and “are highly prone to mold and organic growth” 💭So then randomly around the house would not be considered ideal conditions for shelf-life, especially cut lemons (Source) ✨Citrus attracts bugs and fungi ✨Organic lemons perish faster (Source) ✨ How long your lemons are good for also depend on when they were picked and how long they sat in the store before purchased ✨Exposure to mold spores can come from anywhere down the supply chain (Source) But lemons are anti-bacterial ... To an extent. Lemon juice will stymie some forms of bacteria in high concentrations and when used as a cleaner is recommended to be mixed with a household disinfectant, like vinegar. They’re also not anti-fungal, which is what mold is -- A fungus. My take-away: It seems like this method has been inspired by the positive principles of lemons from Ayurvedic medicine as well as the attractive qualities used in Indian and Asian folklore. New Age philosophy has a nasty habit of taking something from another culture, twisting the original meaning or ignoring it, and pretending they discovered something new. Most importantly, science has disproved the idea that mold growth is affected by perceived negative or positive energies. While I did delight in finding some lemon-themed clearing and abundance spells, using lemons as a detection method holds no weight and seems to be another empty internet trend. Despite science already disproving the idea, there were also too many unmeasured potential environmental factors that could have attributed to mold growth on the whole lemons. Cutting the lemons open makes them rot faster by exposing the insides to the open air, and no one that cut their lemons open found them molded. Granted, small sample size to be sure, but I’m still not buying this one. The Lemon Energy Detection Test Status: Witchbusted AWTW ✨🖤🌙