Reiki Thoughts by Liz Clark
My Reiki journey began nearly 20 years ago. And after my attunements, I worked with people who required healing. Some years later, I decided to attune people interested in Reiki. This series of articles are based on my opinions of the beautiful healing flow of Reiki energy. I cover attunements, Reiki’s use, and how Reiki can change one’s life, and these are my thoughts based on two decades of being a Reiki Master. I make this comment because there are hundreds of different ideas and opinions regarding Reiki. My thoughts could be a million miles away from another’s!
Pseudo-new age or reality?
There is a need to address this question. There are numerous articles supporting the introduction of Reiki therapy into NHS facilities. Over 800 hospitals in the United States have Reiki healing available to patients. (source www.medicalnewstoday.com). Reiki is also available on the NHS; a simple Google search will confirm the statement.
For sure, there will be many people who will dismiss outright any alternative or complementary methods of healing. This article is not written to change minds or convert the suspicious. Its thread is a personal viewpoint that some will find interesting, and others will dismiss. Although, it seems relevant that many established medicine practitioners consider Reiki as a possible addition to help with healing. The sceptic seems quick to use health professional opinion to support their opposition to alternative therapies. In this instance, the facts are here for all to see that health professionals are considering alternative possibilities.
Name
Reiki is made of two Japanese words – Rei, which means universal and ki, which means vital force energy. So Reiki is ‘Universal life force energy.’
History and Training
Dr Mikao Usui is acknowledged as the founder of Reiki attunement. His method is far away from the tier system generally used today. Although some Reiki Schools in Japan, America and Europe still follow the ‘Meditations on Enlightenment and single attunement’ Of Usui. It is believed the tier system (1st – 2nd 3rd Master) was first offered by Phyllis Furumoto during the late ’60s. Indeed Phyllis is recognised as insisting on an exchange of money for attunement! Her mother Hawayo Takata, is acknowledged as bringing Reiki to the Western world in the late 1940s.
I have no preference for the way of attunement. Some schools are exceptional and follow the tier system, preferring to train in groups carefully and studiously. Other Reiki Masters will only work with one student at a time and intensively teach them. Finally, they will make a single master attunement. The student has to follow their heart and soul. There is no right or wrong way.
Some controversy here!
Some feel that an individual can self-attune. And this is worth considering. I once spoke to an advanced and compelling Reiki Master. He said, ‘Liz, how can we differentiate between vibrational healing, spiritual healing and Reiki? Is Reiki training only another way of harnessing what is already available? Do we have to consider with absolute care the idea that Universal Healing Energy is exactly the energy used and harnessed by the great spiritual masters? Liz, if we research Master Usui and the original teachings. We will discover that nowhere does Master Usui claim to be the source of Universal Healing Energy. He teaches how to harness the energy as a conduit. If this were not true, the energy source would have died with the Master. I believe an individual who studies the healing masters and the many ways of Reiki can harness the energy force as they research the wonders of spiritual healing. Therefore is attunement by another necessary?’
So influential were Reiki Master Lai’s words. I wrote them down in shorthand, and they became the bedrock of my teaching and attunements for the years I worked with Reiki as a healing medium.
Method
In simple terms, a practitioner attuned to Reiki can become a conduit of Universal life force energy by settling down and focusing on the high intent of healing. The receiver of Life force energy only has to relax and allow the energy to flow from the Reiki practitioner through their being. The healing process goes where it is needed. Incidentally, the energy also benefits the Reiki practitioner. If the practitioner feels drained or out of sorts after the session they have not sourced the healing energy. One should feel uplifted and within a wonderful state of wellness after the session. An understanding of this indication is a part of the wisdom of the Reiki Master. I will write about this in future articles.
On the most basic level, a Reiki practitioner sits and meditates on the potential of Universal Life Force Energy. And during the mediation, the energy is activated and heals their mind, body, soul and spirit. The healing power goes where needed, so there is no point in focussing on one issue. Allow me to explain:
There are tiers of illness. Many people (including health practitioners) feel one environment initially negatively influences the human being. Everything from chemicals to establishment rhetoric sets the chain of events toward illness. Some have a mental or physical weakness; where the flaw is found, the wedge of ill health begins. There is, of course, another level of unhappiness, which is a darkening of kindness or creative/spiritual awareness.
And we do not suffer on one level. We can be in discord on every level. A domino effect, which eventually fells the whole body. Consider the reality we do not know when an illness has started, it could be with us for months or years before it becomes manifest. I suggest that life force energy can be part (and I emphasise the word PART) of a holistic healing process. By considering each aspect of discord and recovery in an almost abstract way the path to wellness and becoming well begins. I will write about this in the next part of this article.
In Conclusion
Therefore, when we consider self-healing in any way. Or consider the possibility of self-healing through mediation and thoughts of a vibrational healing process, (I repeat again) the path to wellness and becoming well again begins.
This concludes the first part of My Thought’s on Reiki – Part two next week.
Liz
Liz Clark
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