The problem with a difficult conversation is almost never the content. You know what you want to say, you have known for weeks, and you have said it beautifully in the car on your own about eleven times.
The problem is the temperature. Amazonite is the stone people carry for that: the pale green one that goes in the pocket on the day you are going to try to say something without heat.
What amazonite means
It gets described as the stone of courage and truth, which is a fair summary of how it is used and slightly grander than the daily reality. In practice people reach for it when they want to be honest and calm at the same time, which is a harder combination than either on its own.
What it can do is stand for the version of the conversation you planned when you were not annoyed. That version exists, you wrote it on Sunday, and by Wednesday evening it is gone within a minute of the other person saying the thing they always say. An object in your hand is a way of getting back to it mid sentence.
What it cannot do is keep the conversation calm on its own, since half of the temperature belongs to somebody else. It cannot make a person reasonable, and it cannot make an unfair situation fair. All it holds is your half, which is the only half that was ever yours to hold.
How people use it
In the hand or the pocket during the conversation itself, which is the main use. When you notice your voice climbing, close your hand around it and finish the sentence more slowly, and let that be the whole technique.
On the phone it is easier still, since nobody can see you, and people who dread phone calls often find that something to hold does more for them than any amount of rehearsing.
Kept in the kitchen by people whose difficult conversations happen at home rather than at work, usually somewhere ordinary like the shelf above the kettle, so that it is in reach at the hour these things actually start.
The card it goes with
The Temperance card, a figure pouring between two cups with one foot on land and one in the water, doing something that requires attention and cannot be rushed. It is the card of the right proportion, and of mixing two things that do not naturally mix.
The intention for both: honest and warm at once, and slower than I want to be. Say it in the doorway before you go in.
Three minutes before the conversation
Say your point out loud in the plainest words you have. Then say it again with every apology taken out, and once more with the sentence about how you know they are busy taken out as well.
What is left is what you are going in with. Put the stone in your pocket and go, and if the temperature rises anyway, that is what the closed hand is for rather than a sign that you did it wrong.
Wear it
The Ella amazonite ring is the piece for this in the collection, pale green and quiet enough to wear to work without it being a statement. A ring earns its place here because your hands are visible to you during the conversation, and that is the moment the reminder has to arrive.
If the conversation keeps not happening
That is worth taking seriously rather than treating as a failure of nerve. Sometimes the reason it keeps not happening is that you already know how it goes, and the honest step is to write down what you would do if the answer were no.
Questions people ask
What is amazonite used for?
Mostly for conversations. People pick it up before the difficult one and use it to hold the calm they had while they were preparing, which tends to leave the room about four seconds after the other person starts talking.
Does it come from the Amazon?
No, and the name is a bit of a historical accident. It is a green feldspar found in Russia, Colorado, Madagascar and elsewhere, named after the river on a nineteenth century assumption that never really held up. Lovely stone, misleading label.
Can I use it with another stone?
You can, though two stones with two intentions usually means neither gets remembered. If you want a pair, give them different jobs at different times of day rather than carrying both and hoping one of them takes.