Reiki; Let Love flow through your hands

Often we do not realise the value of a teaching until long after the book closes, the course finishes or we move on from our teacher. So it is with my journey into Reiki. When I decided to take Reiki Certification Level 1, it was simply out of curiosity. I had heard about “feeling energy” but never quite understood what the fuss what about. I thought perhaps only certain people could develop their senses in that way, and I likely wasn’t one of them. Yet, I couldn’t discount anecdotes of benefits from spiritual healing, ’laying on of hands’, Qigong, Reiki and other energy-based work. There must be something to it. My own body had benefit from the work of gifted practitioners, but I couldn’t quite imagine being one of them. Then, soon after our family dog was attacked by two other dogs in Thailand, I held little Vanilla on the vet’s table, praying for peace and healing for her. I felt her fear shift as she relaxed her body into my embrace while something warm and strong was flowing through me …could it be energy flowing from above? It was palpable but beyond description and beyond my regular sense of myself.

Her wounds were soon forgotten, but not that moment of peace being poured through me into her. Perhaps it was God, or Pure Consciousness or energy, qi or some other word for a wordless experience. With heightened curiosity, I enrolled in my first Reiki training with Cory Croymans of the Asian Healing Arts Centre in Chiang Mai, Thailand. As a former Austrian Diplomat, Cory brought a direct, no-nonsense approach to the teachings as she infused our days with a sparkle in her eye and passion for her work. ‘Fake it till you make it’ could have been my motto through that training. I occasionally felt tingling in my palms but mostly I still wasn’t sure. But it was enough to keep the flame of curiosity alive as I signed up for level 2…then 3….and finally, Reiki Master Training Certification.

The journey between the levels included weekly volunteer work providing Reiki to patients undergoing cancer treatments, psychiatric patients in a hospital and in a residential institute. My confidence grew as I felt energy shifts in the patients as they opened to new ease during the treatments. Their desire and appreciation was expressed in Thai language, or with a sparkle shining from their eyes despite otherwise depleted bodies. Those without verbal abilities would ‘wai’ tenderly (Thai tradition of bowing), shimmy themselves each week into their waiting positions on their beds, and sometimes wedge themselves between me and the next patient I was about to treat. Together with my teacher and other students, we passed instructions and healing ‘attunements’ to caregivers of the patients. I learned from each patient and caregiver and began to trust the teachings of Reiki on a new level. I began to sense different qualities of energy, associated with varying conditions and exposures. Chemotherapy, radiation, heavy medications, anxiety, love…all began to show me consistent patterns. I sensed this work was to infiltrate my life deeply, but not specifically as a healer. I see my life purpose not as a healer but as one who helps others to heal themselves and to learn skills to use in-line with their own life purpose.

So, when I moved back to Canada, I treated some patients but mostly I allowed my Reiki hands to help me in therapeutic yoga work with clients, to be a part of my family first-aid kit, and to restore my energy as needed. I use Reiki to send love and healing energy from a distance, to protect loved ones, my car, a pilot, my luggage, to energise my food….the applications are limitless.

Now, as I appreciate the teachings I received years ago, I am ready to share them with those who are curious. I am fascinated with similarities between wisdom traditions and faiths of varying kinds. Some of the Reiki meditations are similar to those of yoga nidra, with a nature of welcoming and allowing rather than directing or fixing. The more I learn about different paths, the more I see Reiki as not separate, but as a universal form of connection, healing and protecting. My father summed up Reiki best when, somewhere around this 80th birthday, I gave him a Reiki treatment without telling him what it was. When I asked later what his experience was like he replied with misty eyes, “It felt like love flowing through your hands”. My wish for you is that Reiki, or another tool for ease and healing, becomes one of your skills for ease, peace, clarity and joy in your life and those around you.

Why Retreat?

Pema Chodron's teachings on meditation reflect my wish for you while on retreat: "Meditation practice isn’t about trying to throw ourselves away and become something better. It is about befriending who we are already are. The ground of practice is you or me or whoever we are right now, just as we are. That’s what we come to know with tremendous curiosity and interest….We recognize our capacity to relax with the clarity, the space, the open-ended awareness that already exists in our minds. We experience moments of being right here that feel simple, direct, and uncluttered.”

On retreat, as we unplug from phones and computers and relax into the embrace of nature, a caring community and thoughtful teachings - so too do we unplug from demands on the person we have taken ourselves to be. We relax into who we really are. We begin to feel 'held' in safety, and open to knowing ourselves as we would a dear friend. We lighten up on our foibles, self-judgements, blame and striving and open to ease and joy that is already within.

During retreat, we explore many pathways to this sense of ease; yoga movement, meditation, breath work, sitting quietly in an ancient sacred space, laying under a blanket of twinkling stars, walking briskly in nature or diving into silky, warm waters.

Some of these paths may feel challenging or awkward but we notice our resistance and befriend that too. We choose to do or not-do with wisdom and pleasure. Day after day, this gentle care and self-inquiry delivers us to more clarity. With skills developed during the retreat, we re-enter our lives at home. Rather than a post-holiday "crash", we live our lives more skillfully than before.

Pain and difficulty are inevitable in life, being overwhelmed is not. We may feel off balance again but we never go back to where we were without these skills, resources and sense of connection. Unplug, slow down, let nature breathe you. There is nothing to fix, nobody that needs changing. Allow me to help create the ideal conditions for you to open to the brilliance you already are.

Don't do this at home

Don't do this!

Please don't do this at home!

The photo here is from a wildly popular wellness centre with a strong web presence and great content. However, this photo of downward dog is an exception and 'got my goat,' so to speak. To me it underscores the importance of trusting our inner teacher and not just trying to recreate what we are told or shown to be the thing to do.

Whether we are at a yoga class, reading a yoga magazine, or sifting through our inbox we are inundated with cues and advice of what is good for our body. But is it good for your specific body?

How do we know? We begin to listen inwardly. We get quiet and learn our patterns of tension, compensation and pure movement. We begin to recognise which postures are feeding our compensations along with our tightness and aches, and which are feeding stability, strength and well-being.

Can you see the rounding of the back in this photo? I believe she is honouring the form more than the function of the pose. She is feeding her tendency to round at the mid and lower back. This is likely a compensation for what is not happening in her pelvis' ability to hinge forward. Her elbows are pointing out and heels in, speaking volumes about shoulder mobility that is not developed enough to be in this posture without strain, and alignment through the feet that is telling me what is not happening in the hips and back line of her body.

In person or in a class, when I see this, it is good news for both of us! It means the client and I can work together for them to FEEL what is happening. Understanding the muscles groups, technical terms or Sanskrit names is not important, feeling is.

Then, their downward dog (or another movement that will prepare them for downward dogs of the future) can be a whole new experience, moving them toward ease and a pain-free body, rather than away from it.

When I see this in an image that is meant to inspire others, it is frustrating for me. So, I feel into the frustration, the tightness in my jaw... allow it to be. Then things soften, and I realise this is precisely why I do what I do. It is not that the advice out there is wrong and I am right. (If I ever feel the need to be "right", then I have lost my willingness to be open) It is that we have our own inner wisdom that is the best filter we can ever have. We need to trust, feel and be curious as we allow ourselves to be informed and led in line with our truth.

My advice is no exception to any other advice out there... don't take my word for it. Feel into it, Try it and feel again. Then, let me know if you have any questions. I'll give you something to explore, but don't take my word for that either...feel into it, try it and feel again. And on and on, like the song that never ends, my friends.