When I took my first Level One Usui Shiki Ryoho Reiki Class in February of 2018, I had no idea how much that energetic modality would change my life. It was a curiosity more than anything else honestly.
As a Feng Shui Consultant, I understood clearly the concept of how energy flowed around us and through our environments. I learned how to manipulate the energy in such a way that those who experienced the changes in their homes felt better physically, had direction they hadn’t had before, and welcomed other positive shifts into their lives as well.
I did not understand though, and hadn’t been able to grasp the idea of this invisible life force energy called Reiki that flowed through our bodies. Little did I know then the impact it would have on me and the multitude of uses and situations I would be applying it to in my own daily life.
There is a standard answer most Reiki Practitioners will give when asked what this alternative modality even is. I say alternative because simply put, it is another method anyone can use and integrate into their own healing regimen once they have been attuned to the Reiki energy. You may have heard it described as a hands on, or off, Japanese stress reduction technique that is used for alleviating symptoms associated with pain, depression, anxiety, and more.
Whenever we experience discomfort in or on our bodies, like a headache, or falling down and getting a scrape, our hands immediately gravitate towards that pain. We do this instinctively because we are all natural born healers, but this is a concept that not many people can seem to grasp or even understand.
That’s because we live in a world where we were taught that the common way to alleviate our ailments was to go outside of ourselves to seek help instead of going within.
We end up going to doctors who write us prescriptions that we fill at pharmacies in order to be able to put something foreign into our systems for temporary relief. But taking a pill from a bottle usually doesn’t address the root cause of the problem, and many people are left dealing with chronic conditions that require more medicine. More medicine can then create other health related problems as a result of the first medication’s side effects. (And to be clear, I am not anti-western medicine. In fact, I feel there is a great need and place for our doctors in this world and the medicines that they prescribe.)
Taking pills is such the norm that even our homes have designated spaces in our bathrooms for all of the medicines we take. But Reiki doesn’t come in a bottle and it certainly doesn’t sit on a shelf. It is a beautiful healing energy that we can access all the time and anytime once we have been attuned to it.
When people ask me what an attunement is, I explain it like this; “Imagine your favorite song is on the radio, but you can’t hear it until you tune into the radio station that it is playing on. You physically have to use your hand to turn a dial to pick up a signal on a specific station to hear a song. An attunement is a similar process between a Reiki Master Teacher and a Reiki Student. The Reiki Master Teacher is tuning the dial, or rather the Reiki Student, into the station, or rather the Reiki Energy, to be able to hear the favorite song.
Reiki has allowed me to heal myself in ways I never thought possible. One of my Reiki Teachers, Libby Barnett, said we are our own laboratories and have to have our own experiences before we can attest to something as being true for us. Having said that, I can wholeheartedly say with confidence that the things I have experienced with my own Reiki healing are inexplicable but have yielded results that even I was shocked to see.
Earlier this year I had my Covid Vaccine and one week after my first shot I developed a raised welt that itched just larger than the size of my hand on my right shoulder at the site of the vaccination. After speaking to a medical professional, and then googling of course because that’s the age we are in, I discovered it was a rare side effect, but had already been documented in 30,000 people. I was told it would last approximately 1-3 weeks but would go away on it’s own. This was a great opportunity for me to apply what I knew.
It was a Sunday morning and my daughter wanted to watch something on Netflix so I sat with her on the couch and took my left hand, crossing my arm over my chest and rested it over to my right shoulder and upper arm area. Hands on with my intention is what turns the Reiki on.
There I sat, comfortably, not even focusing on what I was doing, because with Reiki, there is no doing, there is only being. I laughed through the funny parts of whatever it was we were watching and even forgot that my hand was resting on the vaccination sight. My feet were comfortably crossed on the foot rest in front of me and I am telling you all of this so you can understand the simplicity of this. You do not even need a Reiki table, you do not need to be lying down, and you do not have to sit rigidly with legs uncrossed or in any certain way for healing to take place. I do however have a Reiki table in my Zen Den where I do Reiki treatments with people lying down, and I have been on a table receiving treatments as well, but for all intents and purposes, you only need to be and do what is comfortable for you.
An hour later the show was over and I noticed the itching had subsided. I took my hand off my arm and went about my day not paying anymore attention to it.
Because I am a Reiki Teacher, I feel it’s important to take before and after pictures to show students as this helps them understand the magnitude of what we can do for ourselves alone with this beautiful gift. I had taken a picture that morning to keep track of it and have something to compare it to. Well that night, after my shower I checked it again and was in awe of what I saw. The welt, just 10 hours after I did Reiki, was almost completely healed. The even more amazing thing is you can see where my left hand was directing the Reiki. Because the welt was slightly larger than my hand, my hand was centered over it. The area where my hand rested received direct intensive healing and the wound cleared up from the center outward. You can even see the outline of some of my fingers. It was completely cleared up by the next morning. That was a great example of how Reiki speeds up the recovery process and reduces symptoms.
Another incidence where I used Reiki and it amazed me happened just this past July of 2021. On a 90˚ degree hotter-than-hot kind of day, I took my daughter Arianna and her friends to the beach for some summer fun. The girls decided to take a walk along the shallow part of the shoreline and Arianna stepped on a broken shell cutting the bottom right heel of her foot. Not much of a concern, she cleaned it when she got home. The next morning however she was limping around telling me it hurt to put weight on it. When I looked at it, I saw a tell tale sign of infection. She had a streak that had started to develop coming out of the wound site. Even though I practice Reiki, I also practice common sense and know when not to play the waiting game. I called her pediatrician and made an appointment knowing she would most likely need antibiotics to kick what was brewing. I still sat her down at 9 o’clock that morning and had her put her feet in my lap. She watched tv and I put my hands on her foot and turned on the Reiki. We cleaned and bandaged the wound and put a sock on her foot to keep it protected.
Five hours later we were in the doctors office and explained what happened. The doctor asked Arianna to pull off her sock so she could examine it and the streak was GONE. I couldn’t believe my eyes. And I LOVE that I STILL get that excitement and amazement when I am witness to this kind of healing. The pediatrician said, “If there was a streak, then I would say start the antibiotics immediately, but I don’t see a streak.” I had to take out my phone to show her the picture from just 5 hours before to prove I wasn’t crazy. She told me if she had seen my daughter’s foot looking the way it did in the picture just 5 hours earlier that she would definitely be taking the antibiotics. We were given a prescription to take just in case the streak came back, but it didn’t. And her foot healed just fine on it’s own. That’s another example of how Reiki helped with a speedy recovery and reduction of symptoms.
Aside from those examples I just gave of how I’ve used Reiki in the past, I truly do use it in my life daily. I turn it on in my morning meditations to start my day on the right foot. I send Reiki to my plants, my family, my pets, my friends, and I love it so much that I teach it. I also send it distantly to situations and for world healing. I belong to many social media groups where people request Reiki and we send it to each other distantly. There are so many ways to apply it and integrate it into your own life and for your own healing.
If you have ever been curious about learning more about Reiki or becoming a practitioner, I strongly encourage you to do so. Especially in times like we are in now, the world could use more healers and we can always always use a little more healing.
