What is Reiki?

 

Reiki is a Japanese form of energy healing, where universal healing energy is transferred or directed through the palms of the practitioner to the body, chakras and energy meridians of the patient. 'Reiki’ is a Japanese word made up of two kanji or characters: 

 

Rei, meaning 'spiritual' or 'sacred' and Ki, meaning 'energy'.

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The Origins of Reiki

 

Dr. Mikao Usui was born on August 15, 1865 in the village of Yago in the Yamagata region of Japan, where his family had lived for 11 generations. At the age of 4, his family sent him to a Buddhist monastery.

 

Already a Buddhist priest, in 1914, he went on a meditation camp on Mount Kurama, where he began a period of intensive fasting, prayer and penance, in search of spiritual advancement.

 

On the 21st day, Usui had a moment of what can only be described as enlightenment or epiphany, during which, he said a powerful light entered his mind through the top of his head. Usui suddenly understood himself as being one with the energy and consciousness of the Universe and that the special state of enlightenment he had sought had been given to him as a gift.

 

In 1922, he built a Reiki treatment house in Harajuku, near Tokyo, becoming extremely famous all over Japan and receiving requests from all over the country to go and teach his healing methods. 

 

Dr. Chujiro Hayashi was one of Mikao Usui's first students and at his request, opened his own clinic in Tokyo. It was at this clinic that Hawayo Takata received Reiki for the first time when she fell ill on a family trip to Japan. She subsequently took it back to her native Hawaii, where she established her own clinic with the help of Dr. Hayashi in 1937 and so Reiki was introduced to the West.

 

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My Journey

 

I chose to study Reiki having had my own health scares (including a heart attack at age 39) and developing a few chronic conditions. At the same time, I finally faced the fact that I simply wasn’t built for the corporate world and as scary as it was, I had to set out on my own and discover my own path. However, I discovered that I wasn’t alone; Reiki reminded me that everything is made up of energy and everything - and everyone - is connected. 

 

I’ve always been quite ‘sensitive’ (see my biog page), but even so, I found some of my first experiences treating clients as unnerving as they were rewarding. Yes, I was sharing Reiki and helping people, but I was also seeing, feeling and experiencing events in my client’s lives and I didn’t understand why this was happening or how to protect myself. I asked my mentor (a well known psychic medium here in the UK) and her response still makes me laugh. She said “what did you expect? you’re going into their soul!”.

 

There are mixed opinions on Reiki in the global medical community today. Some just tag it and file it under 'supernatural' nonsense, but there is hope; hospitals in America are beginning to prescribe and offer Reiki, so it is slowly being taken more seriously. And the rest of the scientific community is catching up too; quantum physicists (who study matter and energy at the molecular, atomic, nuclear, and even smaller microscopic levels) are growing increasingly interested in Reiki and energy healing.

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I believe that we are living in incredibly exciting times; we're beginning to see a lot of the old ways, traditional practices and forgotten skills slowly resurfacing in mainstream society and take their rightful place hand-in-hand alongside 21st century medical practice.

 

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My Clients

 

You can see what my clients to date have to say about their experiences of Reiki on my testimonials page. For my part, I feel so incredibly honoured and privileged to have shared Reiki with clients, friends and family in person, but also with clients all across the globe through distant treatments. From my little home in Southeast England, I have treated clients from the West Coast of America to Eastern Europe and Australia. Every client, every treatment is an exciting new opportunity for me to learn, to share and to be reminded of how beautiful and connected the Universe truly is.