Let life surprise me in the most extraordinary ways.

Welcome all. Carnival of Healing Readers and Lifencompass regulars. Welcome to the Journey.

The Carnival of Healing is hosted this month by Cari Campbell,Your Joyous Life, Stop on by December 3rd and find all of the reading, thoughts, healing, and articles there.

I wrote this a few weeks back for to clarify some things by working through some thoughts on what Reiki is. There is a large gap between the Spiritual Life Energy and all of the people that it can assist. After over 20 years as an Energy Worker, and 15 or more of those years including Reiki, I have to say that I am still surprised by this.

Energy work isn’t the most popular but Reiki, having been here in the states since the late 30′s, and strongly since the 80′s that a personal, spiritual-energetic healing system would be a little more attractive.

This is part of my reason for writing this. To talk about Reiki and inform folks what it is.

If you haven’t noticed I have advertised a lot, you may have seen me around the web, Facebook, twitter, Craigslist, backpage. Lifencompass is out there sharing my energy work through Temple Well. I have time to pursue and apply my skills to passion. This is a good thing.

It is week-three of my Independence and I find myself repeatedly asked, “What is Reiki?”

I dropped the question on the social networks for some responses. It is interesting to see what people actually believe and experience but I’m still doing a head scratch at the original question. Wait. What? My practice isn’t that popular? Wasn’t it on Doctor Oz? Didn’t Oprah talk about it? Don’t you bump into a Reiki practitioner every time you turn around?

No?

Well, okay, maybe I am bumping into new people. I will accept that, but the questioning in general has me thinking about a lot of talk, or lack thereof, and definitions for Reiki.

Welcome Carnival of Healing readers and all those who have found my little space on the web.

What is Reiki?

On the website, The International Center for Reiki Training, they write:

“Reiki is a Japanese technique for stress reduction and relaxation that also promotes healing. It is administered by “laying on hands” and is based on the idea that an unseen “life force energy” flows through us and is what causes us to be alive. If one’s “life force energy” is low, then we are more likely to get sick or feel stress, and if it is high, we are more capable of being happy and healthy.”

~What is Reiki, at Reiki.org

It is generally accepted that the word Reiki means spiritual life force energy. Reiki.org defines it as “Gods wisdom or higher power” (Rei), and “Life Force Energy” (Ki), and so “Spiritually guided Life Force Energy.”

Walter Lübeck in his book The Big Book of Reiki Symbols, defines Reiki as “…spiritual life energy,” holding to the esoteric meaning of the word based on the active description of the kanji where the upper part of the kanji [Rei] is rain coming down to the open mouths (kuchi) and the parts for prayer and work. These, combined with the lower part of the kanji [Ki] as awakened seed, are the rice activated by the rains and sky energy.

“An individual grain of rice is the seed of a plant, but not the plant itself. The grain of rice becomes a plant when the energy of the Mother Earth and Father Sky unit. This occurs as soon as the rain brings the energy of the skies to the earth. Consequently the grain of rice can only be grown into a plant through this act of creation, bringing much life energy [Ki] with it.” (Page 434-435, The Big Book of Reiki Symbols).

The definition is clear that Reiki is a process of intercession where the Reiki healer acting as a spiritual medium between the spiritual life force energy and the person seeking the spiritual life force energy. Heaven and earth as pictured in the active Kanji Reiki come together within the connection between the healer and the receiver, bridging worlds.

Christopher Penczak, in Magick of Reiki, talks about the mystical roots of Reiki as a practice and this I tend to emphasize with questions. Questions about the roots of Reiki, where it comes from and in comparison to similar practices, how it is a spiritual process. Christopher notes two schools of thought: Medical Reiki and Spiritual Reiki. Those that wish to focus on the medical practice and benefit to healing from a western motivation and those that refer to Reiki’s modern and ancient origins that are essentially grounded in Buddhist mysticism, monks, and carry back into other mystical and religious traditions.

Though I do believe that Reiki can have an amazing influence on healing the body/mind I do not believe that it is or should be separated from its mystical roots. The Kanji illustrates shamanic practices of calling down spiritual energy, the “master symbol” which is the “great light,” “Great Enlightenment,’ or in truth their Solar Buddha, Dainichi Nyorai the “Great Sun Buddha.” The dogma may be taken out of the Reiki practice but the spiritual components remain a part of the system, in the very symbols that represent the practice. The system comes from a tradition and that’s another thing to consider when defining Reiki. Reiki is “Spiritual Life Force Energy” but it is also a tradition. This can cause some confusion about Reiki.

When talking about Reiki does one  mean to define the system that Dr. Mikao Usui brought out of the Tendai Buddhist tradition or does one mean the energy itself? Isn’t this like Prana, or prayer, or even energy work? How is it different? Is it better? Why are there so many different types of Reiki?

There is a lot of diversity within the Reiki community, in fact if you google Reiki you will come up with a list of differences, methods and understandings about the service. Personally I go with what I have experienced and balance that with the historical facts about the tradition, and the wisdom from others who have written about the subject. Those who have practiced Reiki long before I.

I also like the practical approach of “what worked” and “what didn’t work.” When all is said and done that is what we are looking for, something that is effective and therapeutic. This is where I find my expression of the Reiki energy, my definition comes from the practical approach of what works.

How I Define Reiki?

I like the use of the words “Spiritual Life Force Energy” as a definition for Reiki. I am drawing on the lighter frequencies of energy, the spiritual realm of vast potential and calling it into the body where the healing and balancing possibility awaits.

Understanding Reiki as an energy we see it as an organizing spiritual force of potentials. The power of Reiki is in its proximity to the absolute. If we were to imagine the energy of the body, the life, and the universe in various levels, Reiki is closest to the “Divine” energy, or “the All.” Like Kether (the Tree of Life) it is not the Divine but it the closest that is perceived, that we can connect to.

The Spiritual Life Force Energy has unlimited potential but very little power to heal. Reiki has the power to organize the healing, to align the energy of the mind/body so that it can tap into that innate healing power within [the body of] all things and direct it towards wellness through that alignment.

There is a wonderful and detailed description of this that I give to students from the book, The Spirit of Reiki, by Walter Lübeck, Frank Arjava Petter, and William Lee Rand. Chapter 7 begins with A Japanese System for Describing Life Energies, and filled in a lot of gaps in my understanding of the Reiki / human energy system. Walter writes,

“Through my involvement with the traditional Asian healing arts and Macrobiotics, founded by the Japanese George Ohsawa, I came across a very useful and informative Japanese system of classifying life energies at the beginning of the 1990′s. This system closed an important gap in the information available to me.

(then)

“I found it particularly interesting to discover how much easier it is to understand Reiki itself through the description of the functions and features of other types of energy, which form a system together with Reiki.

“Ki circulates int he human body in the form of various qualities that build upon each other.

1. Kekki
2. Shioki
3. Mizuke
4. Kuki
5. Denki
6. Jiki
7. Reiki

Consequently, the energy form called Kekki, listed int eh following text under no.1 is that with the greatest power but with minor ability to organize.

The energy form  listed under no.7 (Reiki) has the greatest ability to organize the flow of energy in the mind and body; but at the same time, it is hardly capable of having a direct effect.”

~The Spirit of Reiki, Chapter 7, pgs 52-60.

The chapter goes on to describe these energy forms, the densities and functions of the various life force energies and their interaction with one another. It sets up an understanding of who the esoteric energies of Reiki interact with the tangible, body energies, emotions and the mind. Walter, through his education in the Eastern energy systems, and through George Ohsawa, the father of Macrobiotics, dispels the simplistic notion of “Reiki knows where to go” or “Reiki goes where it is needed” and empowers the practitioner with the know-how of the energy system beyond the chakras or layers of the aura.

It is part of an education in the system of energy we call Reiki, Prana, Spiritual Life Force Energy.

Spirituality is not simple.

I feel like I so often want an easy answer. I don’t know what to look to for the influence. It could be modern convenience. It could be dissociation from food and planet in a Western culture that dis-empowers our choices by removing the connection from the “product.” It could be my weak point, a place where I must learn to be conscious but it feels like I am aware of this weakness within me (us?) that is to want something without work, without a price or an exchange.

Let me be clear, I respect “the exchange” of energy not as a bartering system but as a living system that we are all participants, I am not saying that I believe in something for nothing. I don’t see how that idea would even be possible on a planet where everything is interdependent on the elements and life around it and a-thing does not come from no-thing. We are part of the cycle, the circle… Yes I am probably preaching to the silent choir here.

I mean to say that the true spiritual experience is a process that requires work, dedication, commitment to living and understanding ourselves in a world, a dimension, that is in constant interaction with us. Living is interacting. Spirituality is understanding that interaction. I believe it requires an openness to the experience, a loosening of the mind to blossom for that light of spiritual understanding. I also believe that this requires a steady commitment to the process, a level of humbleness to be open to the greater perceptions that can come to you, and the willingness to work for it. To get an education about the things we are learning.

Spirit and flesh, matter and mystery, these are not separate places or things.

Reiki practitioners, healers of energy from any tradition, maybe made in an afternoon or a weekend but for true mastery to occur we have to move beyond the apprenticeship level. It is more than just an attunement, learning where your chakra’s are, and how to place your hands. Reiki is more than taught on a DVD (though I do believe in transmission), and far more than found in a book or a blog. The Spiritual Life Force Energy and the practice of Reiki is a doorway to interacting with the energies, the universe; and participation by those that come to us to hold the spaced and bring the Spiritual Life Force Energy.

This is why I don’t hand out attunements like cookies. Reiki is not a product or a pill, it is a practice that requires responsibility and not given lightly. It awakens us to this connection and that is a powerful transformation.

Reiki and Healing.

So Reiki is Spiritual Life Force Energy, it is the power that brings together the energies of our life and helps to organize balance and restore the living energies in our system. A practitioner is one who passes the Ki to you, one who has received the transmission of energy in a ceremony that awakens one as a conduit, a spiritual functionary, to this energy and often yours.

When you go to anyone to receive Reiki, this should be your experience: Energetic alignment, deep relaxation, balancing and restoring the Spiritual Life Force Energy of the body, mind and spirit.

An appointment for Reiki is restorative, and in the case of long-term healing processes, a gradual increase in the life force energy of the body to bring wellness or hasten passages or life transformations. A practitioner places hands on or above your body in the energetic field that is your aura and passes energy, the process and the outcome are yours, based on  your personal growth, life path, and karma.

In the 18 years that I have passed Reiki, and the 20+ years that I have been an energy worker, I have been present with a host of illness, disease, and pain. I have seen cancers, Auto Immune Diseases, tumors, colds, broken hearts, the spiritually stunted, and those just yearning for that deeper connection. Through all of it the one thing that has been a constant is the connection I make with those I am passing the healing for and the love that flows through that connection.

Ultimately I feel that this is what Reiki is about. It is an awakening to our sense of universal connection and love. It is the message that is found in one of the sacred kanji within the practice itself, a symbol called Han Sha Ze Sho Nen, that the Buddha is within all things. There is no time or space that separates our self from the Universe, there is only us our problems, our illness, our disease or state of being that separate us from connection. Reiki, is about coming out of that disconnect and back into the beautiful state of moving again with life.

And let me tell you, that awakening is just the start of our relating, because as we are connected through the Spiritual LIfe Force Energy we can then begin to expand within that space and truly interact with the world, our lives and passions, and our loved ones on a whole new level.

Here’s hoping this finds you with a smile on your face.

For more information about Reiki services please look for a responsible practitioner in your area or look me up! My Temple Well service page has more information. 

–

Lifencompass
Art. Divination. Healing. 

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