Reiki is an oriental method of working with energy, it originally came from Japan in the 1900s. Reiki was very much about working on yourself: it was a system that you could use for self-healing, self-development and spiritual development and it’s now been used to help others.
To understand Reiki, you need to get your head around the idea that there is a subtle energy that permeates us and surrounds us, an energy which we can learn to experience and direct, an energy which we can move through our bodies and channel through us into other people. While this may seem to be a strange thing to believe from a Western perspective, it is a central belief in many Asian cultures and underlies many exercise systems, meditation practices and healing or treatment methods.
What is a Reiki Healer?
Not just anyone can call themselves a Reiki Healer. Professional Reiki Healers must complete a series of courses, beginning with Reiki Level 1, often continuing through Reiki Level 2, then onto the Reiki Master Course and practicum. Some Reiki Healers choose to continue their education to become Reiki Master Teachers, where they can empower others with healing through Reiki.
What does a Reiki session involve?
A complete Reiki session is offered to a fully clothed recipient who is lying on a treatment table or sitting comfortably supported in a chair.
Most commonly, Reiki is offered through light, non-invasive touch with the practitioner’s hands placed and held on a series of locations on the head and front and back of the torso. The placement of the hands should never be intrusive or inappropriate, nor should there be any pressure.
What might I experience?
“I feel very refreshed and seem to be thinking more clearly.” “I think I fell asleep.” “I can’t believe how hot your hands got!” “I feel more relaxed than even after a massage.” “My headache is gone.” These are some of things people typically say after a Reiki session.
The experience of Reiki is subjective, changeable, and sometimes very subtle. People often experience heat in the practitioner’s hands, but sometimes the practitioner’s hands feel refreshingly cool. Other common experiences are subtle pulsations where the practitioner’s hands are placed or cascading waves of pulsations throughout the body.
Some people fall into a deep, sleep-like meditative state. Sometimes the experience of Reiki is dramatic, while for other people, the first session in particular may be uneventful, although they feel somehow better afterwards. The most common experience is an almost immediate release of stress and a feeling of deep relaxation.
Reiki is cumulative and even people who don’t notice much the first time usually have progressively deeper experiences if they continue. Besides the immediate experience of the Reiki, you may notice other changes that continue to unfold as the day goes on: perhaps stronger digestion, a sense of being more centred and poised and less reactive, and sleeping deeply that night.
