So what actually is Reiki?
Reiki is one of the most popular energy-healing systems in the world. Founded in Japan in the early 20th century, it is simple to learn and everyone who has been attuned to it can use it. It’s truly mind-boggling: you book on a Reiki course and hours later walk home with ‘healing hands’, the trademark feature of Reiki.
Reiki is easy to learn – but also easily misunderstood. Beyond the simplicity of its methods lies enormous depth. If we want to understand it properly, we need to look at it as both an alternative therapy and a spiritual path. Even if we concentrate on one, the other is always present. What makes Reiki so unique is that the two are closely interwoven: healing and personal development cannot be separated.
And indeed, this is how it all started: with the spiritual development of one person, a Japanese man called Mikao Usui, who, to his own surprise, eventually found himself with healing hands. But, rather than styling himself as a super healer, he thought: If I can do it, others should be able to as well. After all, the entire world needs healing! So he created a system that could be learned by absolutely everyone. One could say that he democratized palm healing. It isn’t exclusive to saints and shamans any more – it’s open to you and me. (And if you are a saint, you’ll still benefit from it.)
And yet when it comes to explaining exactly what Reiki is and how it works, most people are at a loss. Practitioners normally feel a physical sensation in their hands and recipients often experience strong sensations of warmth or energy movement, but there can be a confusing variety of results.
For Dad, Reiki brought physical healing. But it didn’t stop there. His thoughts soon moved from I’ve survived! to Why have I survived? What am I supposed to learn from this? What am I supposed to change? While waiting for the car to take him home from hospital, he phoned me and said, ‘I definitely won’t carry on living as I have before. There’s so much I’ve started to understand now…’
Sometimes, though, the effects are very simple. My student Anthony, for instance, had a son with sleeping problems. For the whole nine years of his life the boy had been waking Anthony and his wife at least once every night: ‘Mum, Dad, I can’t sleep!’ After his first Reiki course, Anthony started to give him Reiki just before bedtime. He now sleeps through the night!
Indeed, Reiki is often described as a method for relaxation and stress reduction. But there is more to it than that.
Patty, a primary school teacher, was in charge of the school playground when a little girl fell and cut her chin. Taking her to the first-aid room, she decided to place her hand near her face and give her Reiki. When they met the first-aider, they were greeted with puzzlement. Why all the fuss? And indeed, the bleeding had stopped and the cut had already half healed. I just love hearing stories like this at my monthly Reiki Shares.
Unsurprisingly, Reiki is now used in many hospitals and even recommended to reduce the side effects of cancer treatments. But there is still more.
A lady joined one of my courses after she’d had a beauty treatment. Apparently she’d looked so tired and sad that the beautician had decided creams and make-up wouldn’t be enough. As a trained Reiki practitioner, she’d asked whether she could add a few minutes of Reiki to the end of the session. Her client was gobsmacked by what followed: closing her eyes, she saw different colours, felt warm and relaxed – and found a wave of love washing over her. A few weeks later she joined the Reiki course and started to deal with a recent bereavement and decades of trauma. I’d never seen such a stark change in facial expression over the course of a single weekend before. She arrived looking as though she’d given up on life and left radiating relaxation and happiness and with an almost constant smile. A few weeks later, she mentioned that her husband simply couldn’t believe how much she’d changed.
And yet we can go still further. If you’re already used to Reiki, you may not even be surprised by the story a lady told me about her first Reiki treatment. Lying on the treatment couch, she suddenly felt the presence of her mother, who had passed away a few years before. They had a long conversation and the mother gave a detailed message for the lady’s brother: he should be careful at a place called Golden Oak. The lady duly passed this information on, but her brother, a policeman, only knew of a pub of that name, and it wasn’t one he’d go in anyway. However, a few weeks later he was called to a house in Golden Oak Avenue, where a schizophrenic man was causing trouble. As he approached the man, he remembered the warning and slowed down – at which point the man suddenly produced a knife and tried to stab him. Without the warning, he would have been severely injured at least.
For another lady, the most exciting experience after her first Reiki course was comparatively simple: an encounter with a bumblebee. Lying on its back, it appeared more dead than alive. Gently turning it over, my student placed her hand over it and gave it a few minutes of Reiki, after which it happily flew off.
Reiki works in a myriad ways. No wonder it can be confusing! Why does one person find it helps to reconcile them with their partner and another person find it gives them the strength to divorce? Why do the results differ from person to person? Why does it work for so many different problems? And, question of questions, how does it technically work?
I’ve met quite a few people who’ve found this so challenging that they’ve actually walked away from it. And frankly, I almost did this myself. My intellect was asking, ‘How can I use something I cannot explain?’ But my heart was saying, ‘It simply feels right.’ And I couldn’t deny the physical sensation – and the results.
This is what Reiki is famous for. It’s not about theory, it’s about tangible results. It’s not about belief, it’s about proof.
And I would like to add that we can reconcile our heart and our intellect.
If we want to understand a tradition, the natural starting-point is its historical beginnings. With Reiki, though, this used to be a tricky endeavour. For over half a century its history was shrouded in mystery. As it was taught as an oral tradition, little of it was historically verifiable. Over time, the accounts changed and expanded and Reiki itself was combined with other techniques and philosophies. The result was like a game of Chinese whispers (or rather, Japanese), and the history of Reiki became almost fiction. But now we finally have new information about its origins.
It turned out that much information had been kept secret by a small group of Japanese Reiki Teachers. Only since the 1990s has this gradually come out into the open. Today we have three main sources for this additional information:
Based on this information, Chapter 1 of this book, ‘The history of Reiki’, relates the remarkable life story of Mikao Usui, which offers plenty of opportunities to reflect on similarities in our own lives. It also examines the cultural and spiritual influences on the Reiki system and the key discovery: that the system of Reiki is the result of a moment of enlightenment.
The next step would normally be to look at the system itself. But since it was designed in the 1920s, science has taken a big leap forward and, quite rightly, today Reiki is subject to close scrutiny. So, is there a scientific basis for it? Is there an explanation of how it works? This is what we’ll explore in the next two chapters, ‘Energy’ and ‘Healing’.
We’ll see that ‘energy’ really describes everything – and shows how everything is interconnected. This provides a basis for understanding how Reiki works. We’ll also look at what it means for us, for we are energy too. Energy is of importance not only for the body but also for the entire universe. After all, rei and ki mean ‘universal energy’.
The second keyword is ‘healing’. Of course this is what we look for when we use a healing system. But what does it actually mean? This chapter introduces the different levels of healing, offers a holistic understanding and ultimately touches on how Reiki can help us find meaning in our existence and so heal not only our body but our whole life.
I call the above ‘the basics’. Exploring them can help enormously in making sense of Reiki. But, as I never tire of repeating, Reiki is about experience. And this comes when we actually use the techniques.
So this book provides a comprehensive overview of the system Mikao Usui created, based on the latest research. I am going back to the roots with the aim to free Reiki from the add-ons, the myths and the fiction that have changed the system over the years. As so often, I tend to find the original still works best.
First, in Chapter 4, we have a quick look at the structure of the system: the three levels of training. We also examine the elements around which the system is designed: attunements; palm healing; symbols and mantras; breathing, cleansing and meditation; the five Reiki principles and Waka poetry.
Although the elements are consistent throughout the levels of training, I have singled out the attunements and consider them first, in Chapter 5, before we look at the different levels in depth. After all, the attunements (or initiations) are the mind-blowing speciality of Reiki. A short ritual is all it takes for students to establish a personal connection to Reiki. Once they’ve been attuned in this way, they can feel a physical sensation in their palms, become aware of an inner spiritual connection and use Reiki to heal themselves and others. The closer we get to an understanding of the attunements, the closer we get to understanding Reiki.
Reiki 1 (Shoden in Japanese), the first level of Reiki, which is explored in Chapters 6, 7 and 8, covers the basics of using the system. In Chapter 6, the technical aspects are shown in step-by-step exercises, including how to give a complete Reiki treatment. This covers the foundations of Reiki treatment on all levels. We also look at the common effects on clients – we don’t want the practitioner left as puzzled as the recipient afterwards! (Although it has to be said that Reiki often brings something new, even for the most seasoned practitioner.)
Chapter 7 looks at meditation, breathing and energy cleansing and includes many original techniques that were only recently rediscovered. They can deepen the experience of Reiki in absolutely amazing ways.
Chapter 8 completes our look at the first level of Reiki with an explanation of the Reiki principles and the use of poetry and spiritual texts in the system – simple tools to bring Reiki into everyday life.
Reiki 2 (Okuden), the next level, which is covered in Chapter 9, introduces the famous Reiki symbols – not just their use, but also the amazing concept behind them. I also include advanced palm-healing techniques and take a brief look at practising Reiki professionally.
Finally, in Chapter 10, we look at the Master level (Shinpiden) and discover that Reiki is a path to enlightenment. This chapter sums up the ultimate goal of Reiki and brings all the previous techniques and stages together.
The last section of the book is dedicated to notes for and from Reiki practice. It covers frequently asked questions and anything else I haven’t managed to squeeze into the previous chapters.
I have also included an appendix on the development of Reiki after the death of Mikao Usui. A Further Reading section and index are also provided at the end of the book.
I would like to mention that most of the time I use the terms ‘Reiki’, ‘system of Reiki’ and ‘Usui system of Reiki’ interchangeably. They all refer to the system created by Mikao Usui. I have made it clear when I use the word ‘Reiki’ to refer to the energy rather than the system.
And finally, I would like to stress that this book does not replace a Reiki course. Reiki always needs to be kick-started with an attunement – a one-to-one energy transfer. This is what makes it so special. Luckily, Reiki teachers can be found all over the globe. I’m sure you’ll find the right one for you.