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   The first symbol is Cho-KU-Rei (pronounced cho-koo-ray), which is often referred to as the 'power symbol. You will normaly use this symbol in every healing session, as frequently as you feel is right. Its affect is to channel far stronger healing energy. Some people may feel attracted to drawing it counter clockwise instead. If you experiment, you will usually find which feels better for you.The second symbol is SEI-HE-KI (pronounced say-hay-kee) and is used in most healings. It is sometimes called the 'emotional symbol' because it specifically addresses the emotional healing process and helps release deeply repressed feelings, quickly and easyily. It is usually drawn once at the start of a session, and can be used again when you feel drawn to it at any time during the healing.Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen (pronounced hon-sha-zee-show-nen) "The Distance Symbol" Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen is used to send Reiki. You can send Reiki to anyone and anything. It is used to send Reiki over distance and time (such as when using Reiki to heal a past trauma or sending Reiki to a point in the future when you or someone might need it). It is also drawn before sending a distant attunement. You may be guided intuitively to use it in other situations when necessary. If you feel you need to use it but have trouble recalling it exactly, just repeat the name of of the symbol and let Reiki do the rest for you.What did Mikao Usui teach?
Since the 1990s Reiki has been going through some changes in many quarters. Until then everyone had assumed that the Reiki that Mikao Usui taught was the same as the Reiki that Mrs Takata had been teaching: in fact her teachings are usually referred to as "traditional" Usui Reiki. It was thought that Reiki had died out in Japan, and that the only Reiki that had survived was the system that Mrs Takata had been teaching. But the 1990s ushered in a new stage in Reiki's development, when information started to filter through from Japan, in dribs and drabs, from different sources. Some information made sense, some seemed confusing, a lot of the information contradicted what people had believed about Reiki, and some of the information was inconsistent or contradictory.
Over time, though, we have built up more of a consistent picture of what Usui Sensei's system was all about, what he taught and how he taught it, though you can find books that contain the earlier - now contradicted - view of what Usui's system was all about. The main confusion arose when the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai (Usui Memorial Society) was discovered.
Everyone thought that this society had been founded by Usui himself and that it had continued Usui Sensei's system in its original form, but now we know that the society was set up after his death by the Imperial Officers, who had been taught a system that was not representative of the system that Usui had been teaching to the majority of his students, and we know that the Imperial Officers changed and altered what they had been taught early on in the ‘Gakkai's history. ‘Gakkai Reiki proved to be very different from Usui Reiki.
We discovered that Usui's system was not called "Reiki". In fact the system had no real name. Usui seems to have referred to his system as a ‘Method to Achieve Personal Perfection', and some of his students seem to have called the system ‘Usui Teate' (teate means ‘hand application' or ‘hand healing') or ‘Usui Do' (way of Usui).
The word Reiki appeared in the Reiki precepts, but the word 'Reiki' seems there to mean 'a system that has been arrived at through a moment of enlightenment', or ‘a gift of satori'.The name 'Reiki' as a description of system came later, and may have been used first when the naval officers set up the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai. We also discovered that the purpose of Usui's method was to achieve satori, to find one's spiritual path, to heal oneself. Usui's system was not really about treating others. Treating others was not emphasised; it was not focused upon; it was a side issue. This came as rather a shock to a Reiki world that saw Reiki as a hands-on treatment method first and foremost.
‘Standard' Western-style Second Degree Western-style Reiki is very much presented as a hands-on treatment technique, with an undercurrent of spirituality and self-healing, and Second Degree is no exception. Western Second Degree involves being ‘attuned' to three symbols and there is a widespread belief that the symbols are useless - they will not work for you - until you have been ‘attuned' to them on the day of the course.
Students are taught how to use these symbols when giving Reiki treatments and when carrying out distant healing, though there is no real consensus about how the symbols should be used - this differs in different lineages. There tend to be quite a few rules and dogma concerning how the symbols must, and must not, be used, and symbol use tends to be quite complicated, with mixtures of symbols and symbol ‘sandwiches' being taught routinely . The symbols tend not to be used when self-treating.
Students are usually not shown how to experience the energy of a particular symbol, because they are taught to mix the symbols together all the time, often in an arbitrary and illogical fashion. This contrasts greatly with Mikao Usui's system, as passed on to us by his surviving students.
Mikao Usui's Second Degree (Okuden)
Usui's Second Degree was split into two sub-levels - Okuden Zenki and Okuden Kouki - with perhaps 70 students having reached Zenki and maybe 30 of those having reached Kouki level.
The energy work at Second Degree furthered the self-healing and spiritual development by allowing you to fully experience your physical reality and your spiritual essence, and allowing you to experience a state of oneness, a powerful process for helping to achieve balance. The energy work was carried out by the students using meditations, chanting , and a few of the students used symbols.
The Spiritual teachings introduced at Second Degree level involved studying Buddhist sutras: The Lotus sutra is the foundation document of Tendai Buddhism, and it seems that Usui Sensei was passing on the inner teachings of Tendai Buddhism in a way that could be understood by everyone. Usui did not expect his students to have a particular religious background,
Zenki In the first of the two second-degree levels (Zenki) you would practice ‘becoming' the energies of earth ki and heavenly ki, two fundamental energies that are used and referred to in Taoism, Buddhism, Shinto, and in energy practices like QiGong and Tai Chi.
You would do this by practising various meditations over many months, or by chanting sacred sounds and meditating on the energies that they elicited, or maybe a bit of both approaches. You learned to ‘become' these energies over an extended period of time in order to move along your path to enlightenment, and to promote self-healing.
Students might do some treatments at this level. Treatments would be based on a few simple hand positions that were used on the head - the focus was very much on developing your own relationship with the energy and learning to trust and allow the energy to connect deeply with you and not be `interpreted by your linear, narrow focus, or left brain hemisphere alone - this naturally resulted in you developing your intuition and conscious communion with Reiki.
This then allows you to support clients more naturally and gives a great foundation to then being able to apply and use additional models and techniques as and when relevant and useful and of course in relation to your knowledge of personal evolvement, development stages and chakra/meridian applications as a way of understanding, conveying and engaging with your client over and above being the channel for the Reiki energy to directly connect with the clients energy blocks.
In short it means that you are very conscious of the key being the Reiki energy and that any additional expansion of your session was on the basis of helping your client integrate, trust Reiki to help them release their mental, emotional, spiritual and physical blockages.
Kouki At this second sublevel of Second Degree you would be introduced to the concept of oneness, which was one of the goals of the system, and you would learn through carrying out meditations, and/or chanting one of the Reiki Kotodama, to fully experience ‘oneness'. Distance healing as practised in the West is an expression of oneness, and Usui's students would have realized that they could do this easily.
Put simply the difference between Zenki and Kouki is the extent to which an individual has fully internalized and consciously understands the whole essence of Reiki and to what extent they have opened up and worked with Reiki to personally evolve and begun to shift their centre of being from the narrow focus that all societies and individual human conscious awareness operates from by default.
The Use of Symbols in Usui's system
Interestingly, no symbols entered into Usui's system for the majority of his students. The Reiki symbols were introduced into the system late in Usui Sensei's life. The meditations and the sacred sounds that Usui taught to most of his students simply did not make the journey to the West with Mrs Takata. But since the symbols are there to represent the energies of earth ki and heavenly ki, we can use the symbols when meditating to experience these energies, in the same way that the earlier students used sacred sounds, for example, to fully ‘become' the energies of earth ki and heavenly ki. You can meditate on the symbols and this is something that may come up during your training - if it doesn`t, and you would like to learn about this please feel free to ask me. Mrs Takata passed on her interpretation of Dr Chujiro Hayashi teachings to the West. The Japanese military wanted Usui to teach a simple hands-on healing system that could be used by Imperial Naval officers in a navy that had inadequate levels of medically-trained staff. Usui passed on to them a system focused on the treatment of others So we have emphasized treatment of others as the reason for Reiki which extended to the use of symbols as paramount when treating people at Second Degree level.
Treating others at Second Degree level In a world where Reiki is presented to the world as a sort of complementary therapy, something that you do to other people, we need to continually remind ourselves that the treatment of other people was not what Usui's system was all about. Treating others was not focused upon or emphasised. At First Degree level, Usui's students would probably have just worked on themselves. They might have treated others at Second Degree level.
But there is a world of difference between the often dogmatic, complex and ‘technique-heavy' treatment approach of many Western Second Degree courses, and the simple and intuitive approach adopted by Usui Sensei and his students. We can treat more in the original way by embracing intuitive working, and you will be learning a simple method that you can use to open yourself to your intuitive side. Reiki is presented to the world as a treatment technique and this course gives you what you need to treat others confidently and successfully, moving beyond standard hand positions to go ‘freestyle',gearing your treatments towards the individual energy needs of the people you are working on. Now, you know that, at First Degree, empowerments can be seen as a way of ‘connecting' you to the energy, or a way of allowing you to recognize something that is within. At Second Degree, of course, you are already ‘connected' to or channelling Reiki, and have been for some time, so the empowerments that you receive on this course are not so much about ‘connecting' you, but are more about helping to reinforce that connection. People often notice that after receiving their Second Degree empowerments the energy seems to flow more strongly, and this is frequently noticeable to the people that you have been treating. The Second Degree empowerments ‘flag up' to your energy system certain energies or states that are going to be helpful to you in terms of your self healing and spiritual development, energies which you can continue to work with by meditating on and using the Reiki symbols.
The diagrams for the symbols are at the end of the manual_
The First Symbol: Cho Ku Rei Earth ki Pronunciation Cho, pronounced like this: 'show' Ku, pronounced like this: 'koo' Rei, pronounced like this: 'ray' Even emphasis on all syllables
The Second Symbol: Sei He Ki Heavenly ki Pronunciation Sei, pronounced like this: 'say' He, pronounced like this: 'hay' Ki, pronounced like this: 'key' Even emphasis on all syllables
Where did the symbols come from? This is not completely clear, but we can say that these were existing symbols introduced into the system jointly by Mikao Usui and Toshihiro Eguchi. They were not something new, invented by Usui. ChoKuRei (usually abbreviated to CKR) means ‘by divine decree' and has correspondences in Shintoism, where the phrase is used as an order (e.g. ‘let there be sunshine... ChoKuRei'). It is also found in Tendai Buddhism, with an indefinite spiral. SeiHeKi (usually abbreviated to SHK) is found all over Japan in its calligraphic form, and can be found in India and Tibet too, in Buddhist temples. The symbol we use is a line version of the Japanese symbol, which in itself is a Japanese version of a letter from the Sanskrit alphabet
Personal Evolvement - Consciousness We know that Reiki is associated with Buddhism, though we do not need to embrace Buddhism, or any religious beliefs, in order to practise Reiki. One of the goals of Buddhism is to ‘experience things as they really are', so Usui Sensei gave his students the tools to use to help them to experience things as they really are, in terms of their physical reality and their spiritual essence. The view would be that what we are is physical reality and spiritual essence, and coming to fully experience these two fundamental aspects of ourselves is a powerful process for achieving balance. Thus CKR elicits an energy that relates to our physical reality, our physical existence, it is an energy that reminds us where we are from, and SHK elicits an energy that makes a link with the spiritual, drawing the two energies into harmony. The ultimate reality is that of oneness, and Usui gave his students the tools to use to experience this state too.
Focusing on the Tanden is something that I usually cover in some detail when discussing Reiki and your developing relationship and conscious connection.
The Third Symbol: Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen - Oneness Pronunciation Hon rhymes with 'gone', 'on' Sha pronounced like this: 'shah' Ze pronounced 'zay', rhymes with 'day', 'hay' Sho as in 'show' Nen rhymes with 'men', 'when', 'hen' Even emphasis on all syllables
In Shintoism the phrase ‘honshazeshonen' means ‘man and God are one'
What happens when you practise Reiji ho is that your hands will drift to areas of need, as if they were being pulled by invisible magnets. Of course it is you who is moving your hands: your brain sending messages to your nerves, you controlling your muscles. But it is the subconscious part of your mind that is controlling the hand movements. So Reiji ho is a bit like dowsing, where the pendulum moves in circles, or up and down, because you are jiggling it, with your subconscious mind controlling the movements. A pendulum is a tool to allow you to access intuitive knowledge, and so is Reiji ho. When you practise Reiji ho you will be standing by the treatment table and hovering your hands motionless a few inches above the recipient. After a while they should drift and stop. Wherever they stop, you then rest your hands down to treat (obviously depending where they stopped: there are some areas of the body where it would not be appropriate to rest your hands). When you feel that you should move on to another hand position, you bring your hands back to hover over the body, and see where they want to go next. So you do not change the way that you treat, to only hover ove the body: you use Reiji ho to work out where to put your hands down to treat. Sometimes you hands will not necessarily move and stop, but will drift up and down the body for a while, in which case you accept this and allow it to happen. Occasionally one hand will come to a halt and one hand will continue to move for a while. Occasionally your hands will drift further away from the body, so that you are being directed to channel energy into one of the layers of the aura, and after a while your hands should move closer to the body again. Quite often the hand positions will be asymmetrical. There are many variations. You are likely to end up with fewer hand positions when compared with a standard scheme, each set of positions are likely to be held for longer, and you are likely to feel a great deal of energy coming through: intuitive treatments are usually powerful, more powerful than treatments based on standard hand positions. This makes sense, because you are putting your hands into just the right combination of positions for each person on each occasion. Not only are you putting your hands in just the right places for each recipient that you treat, but you are also directing the energy into the best sequence of positions for each recipient on each occasion. Treatments based on standard sequences of hand positions work well, but intuitively guided treatments are something special.
How to perform Reiji ho Reiji ho is very simple: there is no magic formula, really, other than deliberately making yourself open and receptive. You have already started to do this. When you treat someone you empty your mind, merge with the energy, merge with the recipient and allow the energy to flow. Reiji ho continues this practice: you are empty; you have no expectations; you are in neutral; you feel yourself disappearing into the energy, merging with the energy, becoming one with the energy; you allow your hands to drift. The more you try hard to make Reiji ho work, the less likely it is that it will work. Reiji ho will work for you when you give up and stop trying, stop thinking, stop noticing what is going on in your hands, stop analysing and rationalising. Give up and stop trying and just be with the energy, and Reiji ho will work for you. With practice it gets easier and easier to click into a lovely, empty, merged state, and after a while your intuitive working will be effortless. This should now be the way that you approach treatments: seated treatments and full treatments.
Here are some suitable instructions:
1. Place your hands in the prayer position, close your eyes, and feel your connection with Reiki through the crown of your head. Take a few long deep breaths. 2. Feel the energy building in your Tanden. We work from the Tanden, the centre of our intuition. 3. Move your hands in front of your third eye, and ask the Reiki energy to guide your hands, to guide your hands to where the energy is needed most. Say to yourself something like ‘I give myself over to be guided'
4. Being and focusing on this intention your hands will feel like a tool for Reiki to connect with the recipient.
5. Become one with the energy, join with the energy, merge with the energy that is flowing through your crown, shoulders, arms and hands.Allow your hands to drift.
In fact you do not need to put your hands in the prayer position, nor place them in front of your third eye (a little ritual for connecting your hands to the third eye, which is seen as the chakra associated with intuition). You do not need to say a form of words either. A simpler approach would be as follows:
1. Hover your hands over the recipient and take a few long deep breaths. 2. Feel your connection with Reiki through the crown of your head. 3. Feel the energy building in your Tanden. We work from the Tanden, the centre of our intuition. 4. Blank your mind. Become one with the energy, join with the energy, merge with the energy that is flowing through your crown, shoulders,arms and hands. Allow your hands to drift.
Using Reiji ho does not mean that you are going to change your way of working so that you spend most of your time hovering your hands over the body: Reiki is basically a hands-on therapy. You simply use Reiji ho as a way of working out where to put your hands. You treat in the intuitively-guided positions and when the feelings in your hands tell you that it is ok to move on to another treatment position, or when you have an impression that you ought to move on to a new position now, you use Reiji ho again to find out where your hands should be placed next. If you have not treated an area sufficiently, your hands will be dragged back there until it has been treated sufficiently
Reiki as a Therapy Reiki is often presented to the world as a sort of complementary therapy, like Reflexology or Indian Head Massage, and it works wonderfully as a therapy. Some therapists practice Reiki as their main or only therapy, while others offer many different modalities to their clients, including Reiki.
If you are thinking about setting yourself up as a Reiki Practitioner, then this section should contain some useful information for you. In the following pages you can find out about these areas: 1. Record Keeping 2. Post-treatment advice sheets 3. Reiki Insurance 4. Reiki Associations 5. Useful Reiki books 6. Useful Reiki web sites 7. Music to use when treating 8. Treatment table suppliers 9. Recommended books about promotion and marketing In the Appendix to this manual you can also find some information about Reiki and the Law, Health and Safety, and the treating of children. Record Keeping It is being suggested in some quarters that Reiki people should be presenting themselves as "healthcare professionals", able to deal with and refer patients to Doctors and liaise with other healthcare providers. For me, such a thing is an attempt to jam a square peg into a round hole. Reiki practitioners are and never will be healthcare professionals. We do nothing other than rest our hands on people and this allow them to move more into a state of energetic balance. We do not diagnose, we do not treat, we do not advise our clients, and our practice has neither scientific basis nor contra-indications. I have seen some Reiki ‘client record sheets' that require a more detailed medical history than would be taken by a dental surgeon! This is over-the-top of course. I suggest that you keep details of any client's name, address and contact telephone number (maybe e-mail address too). On the basis that Reiki might have an effect on the blood sugar levels of some diabetics, and could in theory alter the drug requirement of people with hypertension (high blood pressure), ask them if they have these conditions and advise them to keep an eye on their blood sugar levels after the treatment, or to keep an eye on their blood pressure. To know that a person is epileptic would be useful to you, so that you can ask them what they would like you to do in the highly unlikely event that they had a fit on the treatment table (or maybe you might decide to treat them on a duvet on the floor, for example). There is no evidence that Reiki treatments produce seizures in epileptics, by the way. Ask them why they have come for a treatment - what is their problem - and record this in the notes. Note the dates when they came for treatments, and anything interesting or unusual that you or they experienced. I believe that this is sufficient. What to say at the start of a treatment When someone new comes for a treatment with you, it is a good idea to explain a few things to them about Reiki, what you are going to do, and what they can expect after the treatment has finished. You could make these points:
to treat yourself and other people.
remove their shoes (and maybe belts) for comfort.
positions; energy flows through the practitioner's hands into the client.
and out of consciousness or fall asleep.
see coloured lights or feel like they are floating, or very heavy.
or that their mind is empty! They may find that some aches and pains come to the surface during the treatment. This perfectly normal.
Talking will distract the practitioner and the treatment won't be so effective.
practitioner!
example, resting one hand on their shoulder and turning down the music. You should demonstrate the hand positions you are going to use so that they know what to expect. If you work intuitively then you can demonstrate the sort of combinations that are likely or possible, and your demonstration will reassure them that hands will not wander into inappropriate positions. At the very least you can show then that you will start with the shoulders, move on to work on the head, and then stand up to work on the torso, finishing with the ankles. If you are going to spend a little time feeling the energy field or scanning, or using Reiji ho as a scanning method, let them know that to begin with there will be no hands on them for a little while, and that's fine.
What to do at the end of a treatment Move back from the torso and take a few long, deep breaths. Rub your hands together to ‘disconnect'. Then rest your hand gently but firmly on their nearest shoulder. .Say to the client "ok... you can slowly bring yourself back now... and open your eyes". Turn the music down
You might ask them how they feel, what they felt etc. They may ask you what you noticed, and you might comment in general terms about the areas where energy was rushing in bigger amounts, but remember that we do not diagnose and we should not suggest to the client that an area where energy flowed in big amounts represents an area where there is a problem or a disease. You should explain that Reiki works on many levels, so a ‘hotspot' over the heart, for example, does not mean a heart problem. Get a drink of water ready for them, and pass it to them when they sit up on the treatment couch. Help them off the table, or be ready to help them: they may be a bit unsteady. Explain that they might feel a bit light-headed for a while, or relaxed, or tired, and they may sleep very well this evening. They might experience some emotional ups and downs, or irritability, or some aches and pains coming to the surface; this is normal and nothing to worry about. Say that Reiki is likely to do something for them, but any effect is not likely to be long-lasting: if they want to get the greatest benefit out of Reiki then they will be looking at, say, 4-6 sessions at weekly intervals. Explain that the effects of Reiki build up cumulatively or gather momentum over time, and 4-6 sessions is usually enough to produce a permanent change, without the need to come along for regular top-up sessions, though they may choose to do this because the treatments feel so nice!What did Mikao Usui teach? Since the 1990s Reiki has been going through some changes in many quarters. Until then everyone had assumed that the Reiki that Mikao Usui taught was the same as the Reiki that Mrs Takata had been teaching: in fact her teachings are usually referred to as "traditional" Usui Reiki. It was thought that Reiki had died out in Japan, and that the only Reiki that had survived was the system that Mrs Takata had been teaching. But the 1990s ushered in a new stage in Reiki's development, when information started to filter through from Japan, in dribs and drabs, from different sources. Some information made sense, some seemed confusing, a lot of the information contradicted what people had believed about Reiki, and some of the information was inconsistent or contradictory.
Over time, though, we have built up more of a consistent picture of what Usui Sensei's system was all about, what he taught and how he taught it, though you can find books that contain the earlier - now contradicted - view of what Usui's system was all about. The main confusion arose when the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai (Usui Memorial Society) was discovered.
Everyone thought that this society had been founded by Usui himself and that it had continued Usui Sensei's system in its original form, but now we know that the society was set up after his death by the Imperial Officers, who had been taught a system that was not representative of the system that Usui had been teaching to the majority of his students, and we know that the Imperial Officers changed and altered what they had been taught early on in the ‘Gakkai's history. ‘Gakkai Reiki proved to be very different from Usui Reiki. We discovered that Usui's system was not called "Reiki". In fact the system had no real name. Usui seems to have referred to his system as a ‘Method to Achieve Personal Perfection', and some of his students seem to have called the system ‘Usui Teate' (teate means ‘hand application' or ‘hand healing') or ‘Usui Do' (way of Usui). The word Reiki appeared in the Reiki precepts, but the word 'Reiki' seems there to mean 'a system that has been arrived at through a moment of enlightenment', or ‘a gift of satori'.The name 'Reiki' as a description of system came later, and may have been used first when the naval officers set up the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai. We also discovered that the purpose of Usui's method was to achieve satori, to find one's spiritual path, to heal oneself. Usui's system was not really about treating others. Treating others was not emphasised; it was not focused upon; it was a side issue. This came as rather a shock to a Reiki world that saw Reiki as a hands-on treatment method first and foremost.
‘Standard' Western-style Second Degree Western-style Reiki is very much presented as a hands-on treatment technique, with an undercurrent of spirituality and self-healing, and Second Degree is no exception. Western Second Degree involves being ‘attuned' to three symbols and there is a widespread belief that the symbols are useless - they will not work for you - until you have been ‘attuned' to them on the day of the course.
Students are taught how to use these symbols when giving Reiki treatments and when carrying out distant healing, though there is no real consensus about how the symbols should be used - this differs in different lineages. There tend to be quite a few rules and dogma concerning how the symbols must, and must not, be used, and symbol use tends to be quite complicated, with mixtures of symbols and symbol ‘sandwiches' being taught routinely . The symbols tend not to be used when self-treating. Students are usually not shown how to experience the energy of a particular symbol, because they are taught to mix the symbols together all the time, often in an arbitrary and illogical fashion. This contrasts greatly with Mikao Usui's system, as passed on to us by his surviving students.
Mikao Usui's Second Degree (Okuden) Usui's Second Degree was split into two sub-levels - Okuden Zenki and Okuden Kouki - with perhaps 70 students having reached Zenki and maybe 30 of those having reached Kouki level. The energy work at Second Degree furthered the self-healing and spiritual development by allowing you to fully experience your physical reality and your spiritual essence, and allowing you to experience a state of oneness, a powerful process for helping to achieve balance. The energy work was carried out by the students using meditations, chanting , and a few of the students used symbols. The Spiritual teachings introduced at Second Degree level involved studying Buddhist sutras: The Lotus sutra is the foundation document of Tendai Buddhism, and it seems that Usui Sensei was passing on the inner teachings of Tendai Buddhism in a way that could be understood by everyone. Usui did not expect his students to have a particular religious background,
Zenki In the first of the two second-degree levels (Zenki) you would practice ‘becoming' the energies of earth ki and heavenly ki, two fundamental energies that are used and referred to in Taoism, Buddhism, Shinto, and in energy practices like QiGong and Tai Chi. You would do this by practising various meditations over many months, or by chanting sacred sounds and meditating on the energies that they elicited, or maybe a bit of both approaches. You learned to ‘become' these energies over an extended period of time in order to move along your path to enlightenment, and to promote self-healing. Students might do some treatments at this level. Treatments would be based on a few simple hand positions that were used on the head - the focus was very much on developing your own relationship with the energy and learning to trust and allow the energy to connect deeply with you and not be `interpreted by your linear, narrow focus, or left brain hemisphere alone - this naturally resulted in you developing your intuition and conscious communion with Reiki. This then allows you to support clients more naturally and gives a great foundation to then being able to apply and use additional models and techniques as and when relevant and useful and of course in relation to your knowledge of personal evolvement, development stages and chakra/meridian applications as a way of understanding, conveying and engaging with your client over and above being the channel for the Reiki energy to directly connect with the clients energy blocks. In short it means that you are very conscious of the key being the Reiki energy and that any additional expansion of your session was on the basis of helping your client integrate, trust Reiki to help them release their mental, emotional, spiritual and physical blockages.
Kouki At this second sublevel of Second Degree you would be introduced to the concept of oneness, which was one of the goals of the system, and you would learn through carrying out meditations, and/or chanting one of the Reiki Kotodama, to fully experience ‘oneness'. Distance healing as practised in the West is an expression of oneness, and Usui's students would have realized that they could do this easily. Put simply the difference between Zenki and Kouki is the extent to which an individual has fully internalized and consciously understands the whole essence of Reiki and to what extent they have opened up and worked with Reiki to personally evolve and begun to shift their centre of being from the narrow focus that all societies and individual human conscious awareness operates from by default.
The Use of Symbols in Usui's system Interestingly, no symbols entered into Usui's system for the majority of his students. The Reiki symbols were introduced into the system late in Usui Sensei's life. The meditations and the sacred sounds that Usui taught to most of his students simply did not make the journey to the West with Mrs Takat But since the symbols are there to represent the energies of earth ki and heavenly ki, we can use the symbols when meditating to experience these energies, in the same way that the earlier students used sacred sounds, for example, to fully ‘become' the energies of earth ki and heavenly ki. You can meditate on the symbols and this is something that may come up during your training - if it doesn`t, and you would like to learn about this please feel free to ask me. Mrs Takata passed on her interpretation of Dr Chujiro Hayashi teachings to the West. The Japanese military wanted Usui to teach a simple hands-on healing system that could be used by Imperial Naval officers in a navy that had inadequate levels of medically-trained staff. Usui passed on to them a system focused on the treatment of others So we have emphasized treatment of others as the reason for Reiki which extended to the use of symbols as paramount when treating people at Second Degree level.
Treating others at Second Degree level In a world where Reiki is presented to the world as a sort of complementary therapy, something that you do to other people, we need to continually remind ourselves that the treatment of other people was not what Usui's system was all about. Treating others was not focused upon or emphasised. At First Degree level, Usui's students would probably have just worked on themselves. They might have treated others at Second Degree level. But there is a world of difference between the often dogmatic, complex and ‘technique-heavy' treatment approach of many Western Second Degree courses, and the simple and intuitive approach adopted by Usui Sensei and his students. We can treat more in the original way by embracing intuitive working, and you will be learning a simple method that you can use to open yourself to your intuitive side. Reiki is presented to the world as a treatment technique and this course gives you what you need to treat others confidently and successfully, moving beyond standard hand positions to go ‘freestyle',gearing your treatments towards the individual energy needs of the people you are working on. Now, you know that, at First Degree, empowerments can be seen as a way of ‘connecting' you to the energy, or a way of allowing you to recognize something that is within. At Second Degree, of course, you are already ‘connected' to or channelling Reiki, and have been for some time, so the empowerments that you receive on this course are not so much about ‘connecting' you, but are more about helping to reinforce that connection. People often notice that after receiving their Second Degree empowerments the energy seems to flow more strongly, and this is frequently noticeable to the people that you have been treating. The Second Degree empowerments ‘flag up' to your energy system certain energies or states that are going to be helpful to you in terms of your self healing and spiritual development, energies which you can continue to work with by meditating on and using the Reiki symbols.
The diagrams for the symbols are at the end of the manual_
The First Symbol: Cho Ku Rei Earth ki Pronunciation Cho, pronounced like this: 'show' Ku, pronounced like this: 'koo' Rei, pronounced like this: 'ray' Even emphasis on all syllables
The Second Symbol: Sei He Ki Heavenly ki Pronunciation Sei, pronounced like this: 'say' He, pronounced like this: 'hay' Ki, pronounced like this: 'key' Even emphasis on all syllables
Where did the symbols come from? This is not completely clear, but we can say that these were existing symbols introduced into the system jointly by Mikao Usui and Toshihiro Eguchi. They were not something new, invented by Usui. ChoKuRei (usually abbreviated to CKR) means ‘by divine decree' and has correspondences in Shintoism, where the phrase is used as an order (e.g. ‘let there be sunshine... ChoKuRei'). It is also found in Tendai Buddhism, with an indefinite spiral. SeiHeKi (usually abbreviated to SHK) is found all over Japan in its calligraphic form, and can be found in India and Tibet too, in Buddhist temples. The symbol we use is a line version of the Japanese symbol, which in itself is a Japanese version of a letter from the Sanskrit alphabet
Personal Evolvement - Consciousness We know that Reiki is associated with Buddhism, though we do not need to embrace Buddhism, or any religious beliefs, in order to practise Reiki. One of the goals of Buddhism is to ‘experience things as they really are', so Usui Sensei gave his students the tools to use to help them to experience things as they really are, in terms of their physical reality and their spiritual essence. The view would be that what we are is physical reality and spiritual essence, and coming to fully experience these two fundamental aspects of ourselves is a powerful process for achieving balance. Thus CKR elicits an energy that relates to our physical reality, our physical existence, it is an energy that reminds us where we are from, and SHK elicits an energy that makes a link with the spiritual, drawing the two energies into harmony. The ultimate reality is that of oneness, and Usui gave his students the tools to use to experience this state too. Focusing on the Tanden is something that I usually cover in some detail when discussing Reiki and your developing relationship and conscious connection. The Third Symbol: Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen - Oneness Pronunciation Hon rhymes with 'gone', 'on' Sha pronounced like this: 'shah' Ze pronounced 'zay', rhymes with 'day', 'hay' Sho as in 'show' Nen rhymes with 'men', 'when', 'hen' Even emphasis on all syllables
In Shintoism the phrase ‘honshazeshonen' means ‘man and God are one'
What happens when you practise Reiji ho is that your hands will drift to areas of need, as if they were being pulled by invisible magnets. Of course it is you who is moving your hands: your brain sending messages to your nerves, you controlling your muscles. But it is the subconscious part of your mind that is controlling the hand movements. So Reiji ho is a bit like dowsing, where the pendulum moves in circles, or up and down, because you are jiggling it, with your subconscious mind controlling the movements. A pendulum is a tool to allow you to access intuitive knowledge, and so is Reiji ho.
When you practise Reiji ho you will be standing by the treatment table and hovering your hands motionless a few inches above the recipient. After a while they should drift and stop. Wherever they stop, you then rest your hands down to treat (obviously depending where they stopped: there are some areas of the body where it would not be appropriate to rest your hands). When you feel that you should move on to another hand position, you bring your hands back to hover over the body, and see where they want to go next.
So you do not change the way that you treat, to only hover over the body: you use Reiji ho to work out where to put your hands down to treat. Sometimes you hands will not necessarily move and stop, but will drift up and down the body for a while, in which case you accept this and allow it to happen. Occasionally one hand will come to a halt and one hand will continue to move for a while. Occasionally your hands will drift further away from the body, so that you are being directed to channel energy into one of the layers of the aura, and after a while your hands should move closer to the body again. Quite often the hand positions will be asymmetrical. There are many variations. You are likely to end up with fewer hand positions when compared with a standard scheme, each set of positions are likely to be held for longer, and you are likely to feel a great deal of energy coming through: intuitive treatments are usually powerful, more powerful than treatments based on standard hand positions. This makes sense, because you are putting your hands into just the right combination of positions for each person on each occasion. Not only are you putting your hands in just the right places for each recipient that you treat, but you are also directing the energy into the best sequence of positions for each recipient on each occasion. Treatments based on standard sequences of hand positions work well, but intuitively guided treatments are something special.
How to perform Reiji ho Reiji ho is very simple: there is no magic formula, really, other than deliberately making yourself open and receptive. You have already started to do this. When you treat someone you empty your mind, merge with the energy, merge with the recipient and allow the energy to flow. Reiji ho continues this practice: you are empty; you have no expectations; you are in neutral; you feel yourself disappearing into the energy, merging with the energy, becoming one with the energy; you allow your hands to drift.
The more you try hard to make Reiji ho work, the less likely it is that it will work. Reiji ho will work for you when you give up and stop trying, stop thinking, stop noticing what is going on in your hands, stop analysing and rationalising. Give up and stop trying and just be with the energy, and Reiji ho will work for you.
With practice it gets easier and easier to click into a lovely, empty, merged state, and after a while your intuitive working will be effortless. This should now be the way that you approach treatments: seated treatments and full treatments.
Here are some suitable instructions:
1. Place your hands in the prayer position, close your eyes, and feel your connection with Reiki through the crown of your head. Take a few long deep breaths. 2. Feel the energy building in your Tanden. We work from the Tanden, the centre of our intuition. 3. Move your hands in front of your third eye, and ask the Reiki energy to guide your hands, to guide your hands to where the energy is needed most. Say to yourself something like ‘I give myself over to be guided'
4. Being and focusing on this intention your hands will feel like a tool for Reiki to connect with the recipient.
5. Become one with the energy, join with the energy, merge with the energy that is flowing through your crown, shoulders, arms and hands.Allow your hands to drift.
In fact you do not need to put your hands in the prayer position, nor place them in front of your third eye (a little ritual for connecting your hands to the third eye, which is seen as the chakra associated with intuition). You do not need to say a form of words either. A simpler approach would be as follows:
1. Hover your hands over the recipient and take a few long deep breaths. 2. Feel your connection with Reiki through the crown of your head. 3. Feel the energy building in your Tanden. We work from the Tanden, the centre of our intuition. 4. Blank your mind. Become one with the energy, join with the energy, merge with the energy that is flowing through your crown, shoulders,arms and hands. Allow your hands to drift.
Using Reiji ho does not mean that you are going to change your way of working so that you spend most of your time hovering your hands over the body: Reiki is basically a hands-on therapy. You simply use Reiji ho as a way of working out where to put your hands. You treat in the intuitively-guided positions and when the feelings in your hands tell you that it is ok to move on to another treatment position, or when you have an impression that you ought to move on to a new position now, you use Reiji ho again to find out where your hands should be placed next. If you have not treated an area sufficiently, your hands will be dragged back there until it has been treated sufficiently
Reiki as a Therapy Reiki is often presented to the world as a sort of complementary therapy, like Reflexology or Indian Head Massage, and it works wonderfully as a therapy. Some therapists practice Reiki as their main or only therapy, while others offer many different modalities to their clients, including Reiki.
If you are thinking about setting yourself up as a Reiki Practitioner, then this section should contain some useful information for you. In the following pages you can find out about these areas: 1. Record Keeping 2. Post-treatment advice sheets 3. Reiki Insurance 4. Reiki Associations 5. Useful Reiki books 6. Useful Reiki web sites 7. Music to use when treating 8. Treatment table suppliers 9. Recommended books about promotion and marketing In the Appendix to this manual you can also find some information about Reiki and the Law, Health and Safety, and the treating of children. Record Keeping It is being suggested in some quarters that Reiki people should be presenting themselves as "healthcare professionals", able to deal with and refer patients to Doctors and liaise with other healthcare providers. For me, such a thing is an attempt to jam a square peg into a round hole. Reiki practitioners are and never will be healthcare professionals. We do nothing other than rest our hands on people and this allow them to move more into a state of energetic balance. We do not diagnose, we do not treat, we do not advise our clients, and our practice has neither scientific basis nor contra-indications. I have seen some Reiki ‘client record sheets' that require a more detailed medical history than would be taken by a dental surgeon! This is over-the-top of course. I suggest that you keep details of any client's name, address and contact telephone number (maybe e-mail address too). On the basis that Reiki might have an effect on the blood sugar levels of some diabetics, and could in theory alter the drug requirement of people with hypertension (high blood pressure), ask them if they have these conditions and advise them to keep an eye on their blood sugar levels after the treatment, or to keep an eye on their blood pressure. To know that a person is epileptic would be useful to you, so that you can ask them what they would like you to do in the highly unlikely event that they had a fit on the treatment table (or maybe you might decide to treat them on a duvet on the floor, for example). There is no evidence that Reiki treatments produce seizures in epileptics, by the way. Ask them why they have come for a treatment - what is their problem - and record this in the notes. Note the dates when they came for treatments, and anything interesting or unusual that you or they experienced. I believe that this is sufficient. What to say at the start of a treatment When someone new comes for a treatment with you, it is a good idea to explain a few things to them about Reiki, what you are going to do, and what they can expect after the treatment has finished. You could make these points:
to treat yourself and other people.
remove their shoes (and maybe belts) for comfort.
positions; energy flows through the practitioner's hands into the client.
and out of consciousness or fall asleep.
see coloured lights or feel like they are floating, or very heavy.
or that their mind is empty! They may find that some aches and pains come to the surface during the treatment. This perfectly normal.
Talking will distract the practitioner and the treatment won't be so effective.
practitioner!
example, resting one hand on their shoulder and turning down the music.
You should demonstrate the hand positions you are going to use so that they know what to expect. If you work intuitively then you can demonstrate the sort of combinations that are likely or possible, and your demonstration will reassure them that hands will not wander into inappropriate positions. At the very least you can show then that you will start with the shoulders, move on to work on the head, and then stand up to work on the torso, finishing with the ankles.
If you are going to spend a little time feeling the energy field or scanning, or using Reiji ho as a scanning method, let them know that to begin with there will be no hands on them for a little while, and that's fine.
What to do at the end of a treatment Move back from the torso and take a few long, deep breaths. Rub your hands together to ‘disconnect'. Then rest your hand gently but firmly on their nearest shoulder. .Say to the client "ok... you can slowly bring yourself back now... and open your eyes". Turn the music down
You might ask them how they feel, what they felt etc. They may ask you what you noticed, and you might comment in general terms about the areas where energy was rushing in bigger amounts, but remember that we do not diagnose and we should not suggest to the client that an area where energy flowed in big amounts represents an area where there is a problem or a disease. You should explain that Reiki works on many levels, so a ‘hotspot' over the heart, for example, does not mean a heart problem.
Get a drink of water ready for them, and pass it to them when they sit up on the treatment couch. Help them off the table, or be ready to help them: they may be a bit unsteady. Explain that they might feel a bit light-headed for a while, or relaxed, or tired, and they may sleep very well this evening.
They might experience some emotional ups and downs, or irritability, or some aches and pains coming to the surface; this is normal and nothing to worry about. Say that Reiki is likely to do something for them, but any effect is not likely to be long-lasting: if they want to get the greatest benefit out of Reiki then they will be looking at, say, 4-6 sessions at weekly intervals.
Explain that the effects of Reiki build up cumulatively or gather momentum over time, and 4-6 sessions is usually enough to produce a permanent change, without the need to come along for regular top-up sessions, though they may choose to do this because the treatments feel so nice!What did Mikao Usui teach?
Since the 1990s Reiki has been going through some changes in many quarters. Until then everyone had assumed that the Reiki that Mikao Usui taught was the same as the Reiki that Mrs Takata had been teaching: in fact her teachings are usually referred to as "traditional" Usui Reiki. It was thought that Reiki had died out in Japan, and that the only Reiki that had survived was the system that Mrs Takata had been teaching. But the 1990s ushered in a new stage in Reiki's development, when information started to filter through from Japan, in dribs and drabs, from different sources. Some information made sense, some seemed confusing, a lot of the information contradicted what people had believed about Reiki, and some of the information was inconsistent or contradictory.
Over time, though, we have built up more of a consistent picture of what Usui Sensei's system was all about, what he taught and how he taught it, though you can find books that contain the earlier - now contradicted - view of what Usui's system was all about. The main confusion arose when the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai (Usui Memorial Society) was discovered.
Everyone thought that this society had been founded by Usui himself and that it had continued Usui Sensei's system in its original form, but now we know that the society was set up after his death by the Imperial Officers, who had been taught a system that was not representative of the system that Usui had been teaching to the majority of his students, and we know that the Imperial Officers changed and altered what they had been taught early on in the ‘Gakkai's history. ‘Gakkai Reiki proved to be very different from Usui Reiki. We discovered that Usui's system was not called "Reiki". In fact the system had no real name. Usui seems to have referred to his system as a ‘Method to Achieve Personal Perfection', and some of his students seem to have called the system ‘Usui Teate' (teate means ‘hand application' or ‘hand healing') or ‘Usui Do' (way of Usui). The word Reiki appeared in the Reiki precepts, but the word 'Reiki' seems there to mean 'a system that has been arrived at through a moment of enlightenment', or ‘a gift of satori'.The name 'Reiki' as a description of system came later, and may have been used first when the naval officers set up the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai. We also discovered that the purpose of Usui's method was to achieve satori, to find one's spiritual path, to heal oneself. Usui's system was not really about treating others. Treating others was not emphasised; it was not focused upon; it was a side issue. This came as rather a shock to a Reiki world that saw Reiki as a hands-on treatment method first and foremost.
The Original System
The information that we have about the system that Mikao Usui taught has come mainly from a group of surviving students who are in contact with one or two people in the West. They were twelve in number when they were first discovered, though I understand that now - in 2005 - there are only a handful of them left. These are people who knew Usui, trained with him, and passed on his teachings to others in a quiet and limited fashion. Their information has helped to ‘make sense' of the sometimes confusing and contradictory information from other sources in Japan, and they paint a picture of a simple spiritual system that is very different from the treatment-based Reiki that we see routinely in the West. So the original Japanese form of Reiki is very different from the way that it has ended up being practised in the West. The thing that strikes me most about original Usui Reiki is the fact that it is so simple, so elegant, powerful and uncluttered. The system is not bogged down in endless mechanical techniques and complex rituals that now clutter up a lot of Western-style Reiki, with endless rules and regulations and restrictions.The prime focus of Mikao Usui's Reiki was the personal benefits that would come through committing oneself to working with the system, in terms of selfhealing and spiritual development. Reiki was a path to enlightenment. Healing others was a minor aspect of the system, not emphasised, not focused upon; it was simply something that you could do if you followed Usui's system. Original Usui Reiki involved committing yourself to carrying out daily energy exercises, self-healings, and receiving spiritual empowerments on a regular basis. You would have received training in an open ended fashion, rather like the way that martial arts is taught in the West today: you kept turning up and slowly developing your skills, and when it was thought that you had progressed sufficiently, you were allowed to move on to the next level. The system was rooted in Tendai Buddhism and Shintoism, with Tendai Buddhism providing spiritual teachings and Shintoism contributing methods of controlling and working with the energies. The system was based on living and practising the Reiki precepts. The vast majority of Usui's students started out as his clients - he was well known as a healer, though what he taught was not really a treatment method. He would routinely give people empowerments so that they could treat themselves in between appointments, and if they wanted to take things further then they could start formal training with him, to learn how to heal themselves. Before I detail what Usui Sensei taught at Second Degree level, and how we can echo this system, I want to take a slight detour by describing how Second Degree is taught in ‘standard' Western-style ‘Takata' Reiki, as distorted and mutated as it has passed from teacher to teacher over the years.
‘Standard' Western-style Second Degree Western-style Reiki is very much presented as a hands-on treatment technique, with an undercurrent of spirituality and self-healing, and Second Degree is no exception. Western Second Degree involves being ‘attuned' to three symbols and there is a widespread belief that the symbols are useless - they will not work for you - until you have been ‘attuned' to them on the day of the course.
Students are taught how to use these symbols when giving Reiki treatments and when carrying out distant healing, though there is no real consensus about how the symbols should be used - this differs in different lineages. There tend to be quite a few rules and dogma concerning how the symbols must, and must not, be used, and symbol use tends to be quite complicated, with mixtures of symbols and symbol ‘sandwiches' being taught routinely . The symbols tend not to be used when self-treating.
Students are usually not shown how to experience the energy of a particular symbol, because they are taught to mix the symbols together all the time, often in an arbitrary and illogical fashion. This contrasts greatly with Mikao Usui's system, as passed on to us by his surviving students.
Mikao Usui's Second Degree (Okuden)
Usui's Second Degree was split into two sub-levels - Okuden Zenki and Okuden Kouki - with perhaps 70 students having reached Zenki and maybe 30 of those having reached Kouki level.
The energy work at Second Degree furthered the self-healing and spiritual development by allowing you to fully experience your physical reality and your spiritual essence, and allowing you to experience a state of oneness, a powerful process for helping to achieve balance. The energy work was carried out by the students using meditations, chanting , and a few of the students used symbols.
The Spiritual teachings introduced at Second Degree level involved studying Buddhist sutras: The Lotus sutra is the foundation document of Tendai Buddhism, and it seems that Usui Sensei was passing on the inner teachings of Tendai Buddhism in a way that could be understood by everyone. Usui did not expect his students to have a particular religious background,
Zenki In the first of the two second-degree levels (Zenki) you would practice ‘becoming' the energies of earth ki and heavenly ki, two fundamental energies that are used and referred to in Taoism, Buddhism, Shinto, and in energy practices like QiGong and Tai Chi.
You would do this by practising various meditations over many months, or by chanting sacred sounds and meditating on the energies that they elicited, or maybe a bit of both approaches. You learned to ‘become' these energies over an extended period of time in order to move along your path to enlightenment, and to promote self-healing.
Students might do some treatments at this level. Treatments would be based on a few simple hand positions that were used on the head - the focus was very much on developing your own relationship with the energy and learning to trust and allow the energy to connect deeply with you and not be `interpreted by your linear, narrow focus, or left brain hemisphere alone - this naturally resulted in you developing your intuition and conscious communion with Reiki.
This then allows you to support clients more naturally and gives a great foundation to then being able to apply and use additional models and techniques as and when relevant and useful and of course in relation to your knowledge of personal evolvement, development stages and chakra/meridian applications as a way of understanding, conveying and engaging with your client over and above being the channel for the Reiki energy to directly connect with the clients energy blocks.
In short it means that you are very conscious of the key being the Reiki energy and that any additional expansion of your session was on the basis of helping your client integrate, trust Reiki to help them release their mental, emotional, spiritual and physical blockages.
Kouki At this second sublevel of Second Degree you would be introduced to the concept of oneness, which was one of the goals of the system, and you would learn through carrying out meditations, and/or chanting one of the Reiki Kotodama, to fully experience ‘oneness'. Distance healing as practised in the West is an expression of oneness, and Usui's students would have realized that they could do this easily.
Put simply the difference between Zenki and Kouki is the extent to which an individual has fully internalized and consciously understands the whole essence of Reiki and to what extent they have opened up and worked with Reiki to personally evolve and begun to shift their centre of being from the narrow focus that all societies and individual human conscious awareness operates from by default.
The Use of Symbols in Usui's system Interestingly, no symbols entered into Usui's system for the majority of his students. The Reiki symbols were introduced into the system late in Usui Sensei's life. The meditations and the sacred sounds that Usui taught to most of his students simply did not make the journey to the West with Mrs Takata.
But since the symbols are there to represent the energies of earth ki and heavenly ki, we can use the symbols when meditating to experience these energies, in the same way that the earlier students used sacred sounds, for example, to fully ‘become' the energies of earth ki and heavenly ki. You can meditate on the symbols and this is something that may come up during your training - if it doesn`t, and you would like to learn about this please feel free to ask me.
Mrs Takata passed on her interpretation of Dr Chujiro Hayashi teachings to the West. The Japanese military wanted Usui to teach a simple hands-on healing system that could be used by Imperial Naval officers in a navy that had inadequate levels of medically-trained staff.
Usui passed on to them a system focused on the treatment of others So we have emphasized treatment of others as the reason for Reiki which extended to the use of symbols as paramount when treating people at Second Degree level.
Treating others at Second Degree level
In a world where Reiki is presented to the world as a sort of complementary therapy, something that you do to other people, we need to continually remind ourselves that the treatment of other people was not what Usui's system was all about. Treating others was not focused upon or emphasised. At First Degree level, Usui's students would probably have just worked on themselves. They might have treated others at Second Degree level.
But there is a world of difference between the often dogmatic, complex and ‘technique-heavy' treatment approach of many Western Second Degree courses, and the simple and intuitive approach adopted by Usui Sensei and his students.
We can treat more in the original way by embracing intuitive working, and you will be learning a simple method that you can use to open yourself to your intuitive side. Reiki is presented to the world as a treatment technique and this course gives you what you need to treat others confidently and successfully, moving beyond standard hand positions to go ‘freestyle',gearing your treatments towards the individual energy needs of the people you are working on.
Now, you know that, at First Degree, empowerments can be seen as a way of ‘connecting' you to the energy, or a way of allowing you to recognize something that is within. At Second Degree, of course, you are already ‘connected' to or channelling Reiki, and have been for some time, so the empowerments that you receive on this course are not so much about ‘connecting' you, but are more about helping to reinforce that connection.
People often notice that after receiving their Second Degree empowerments the energy seems to flow more strongly, and this is frequently noticeable to the people that you have been treating.
The Second Degree empowerments ‘flag up' to your energy system certain energies or states that are going to be helpful to you in terms of your self healing and spiritual development, energies which you can continue to work with by meditating on and using the Reiki symbols.
The diagrams for the symbols are at the end The First Symbol: Cho Ku Rei Earth ki Pronunciation Cho, pronounced like this: 'show' Ku, pronounced like this: 'koo' Rei, pronounced like this: 'ray' Even emphasis on all syllables
The Second Symbol: Sei He Ki Heavenly ki Pronunciation Sei, pronounced like this: 'say' He, pronounced like this: 'hay' Ki, pronounced like this: 'key' Even emphasis on all syllables
Where did the symbols come from? This is not completely clear, but we can say that these were existing symbols introduced into the system jointly by Mikao Usui and Toshihiro Eguchi. They were not something new, invented by Usui. ChoKuRei (usually abbreviated to CKR) means ‘by divine decree' and has correspondences in Shintoism, where the phrase is used as an order (e.g. ‘let there be sunshine... ChoKuRei'). It is also found in Tendai Buddhism, with an indefinite spiral. SeiHeKi (usually abbreviated to SHK) is found all over Japan in its calligraphic form, and can be found in India and Tibet too, in Buddhist temples. The symbol we use is a line version of the Japanese symbol, which in itself is a Japanese version of a letter from the Sanskrit alphabet
Personal Evolvement - Consciousness We know that Reiki is associated with Buddhism, though we do not need to embrace Buddhism, or any religious beliefs, in order to practise Reiki. One of the goals of Buddhism is to ‘experience things as they really are', so Usui Sensei gave his students the tools to use to help them to experience things as they really are, in terms of their physical reality and their spiritual essence. The view would be that what we are is physical reality and spiritual essence, and coming to fully experience these two fundamental aspects of ourselves is a powerful process for achieving balance. Thus CKR elicits an energy that relates to our physical reality, our physical existence, it is an energy that reminds us where we are from, and SHK elicits an energy that makes a link with the spiritual, drawing the two energies into harmony. The ultimate reality is that of oneness, and Usui gave his students the tools to use to experience this state too.
Focusing on the Tanden is something that I usually cover in some detail when discussing Reiki and your developing relationship and conscious connection.
The Third Symbol: Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen - Oneness Pronunciation Hon rhymes with 'gone', 'on' Sha pronounced like this: 'shah' Ze pronounced 'zay', rhymes with 'day', 'hay' Sho as in 'show' Nen rhymes with 'men', 'when', 'hen' Even emphasis on all syllables In Shintoism the phrase ‘honshazeshonen' means ‘man and God are one' What happens when you practise Reiji ho is that your hands will drift to areas of need, as if they were being pulled by invisible magnets. Of course it is you who is moving your hands: your brain sending messages to your nerves, you controlling your muscles. But it is the subconscious part of your mind that is controlling the hand movements. So Reiji ho is a bit like dowsing, where the pendulum moves in circles, or up and down, because you are jiggling it, with your subconscious mind controlling the movements. A pendulum is a tool to allow you to access intuitive knowledge, and so is Reiji ho. When you practise Reiji ho you will be standing by the treatment table and hovering your hands motionless a few inches above the recipient. After a while they should drift and stop. Wherever they stop, you then rest your hands down to treat (obviously depending where they stopped: there are some areas of the body where it would not be appropriate to rest your hands). When you feel that you should move on to another hand position, you bring your hands back to hover over the body, and see where they want to go next.
So you do not change the way that you treat, to only hover over the body: you use Reiji ho to work out where to put your hands down to treat. Sometimes you hands will not necessarily move and stop, but will drift up and down the body for a while, in which case you accept this and allow it to happen. Occasionally one hand will come to a halt and one hand will continue to move for a while.
Occasionally your hands will drift further away from the body, so that you are being directed to channel energy into one of the layers of the aura, and after a while your hands should move closer to the body again. Quite often the hand positions will be asymmetrical. There are many variations.
You are likely to end up with fewer hand positions when compared with a standard scheme, each set of positions are likely to be held for longer, and you are likely to feel a great deal of energy coming through: intuitive treatments are usually powerful, more powerful than treatments based on standard hand positions.
This makes sense, because you are putting your hands into just the right combination of positions for each person on each occasion. Not only are you putting your hands in just the right places for each recipient that you treat, but you are also directing the energy into the best sequence of positions for each recipient on each occasion. Treatments based on standard sequences of hand positions work well, but intuitively guided treatments are something special.
How to perform Reiji ho Reiji ho is very simple: there is no magic formula, really, other than deliberately making yourself open and receptive. You have already started to do this. When you treat someone you empty your mind, merge with the energy, merge with the recipient and allow the energy to flow. Reiji ho continues this practice: you are empty; you have no expectations; you are in neutral; you feel yourself disappearing into the energy, merging with the energy, becoming one with the energy; you allow your hands to drift.
The more you try hard to make Reiji ho work, the less likely it is that it will work. Reiji ho will work for you when you give up and stop trying, stop thinking, stop noticing what is going on in your hands, stop analysing and rationalising. Give up and stop trying and just be with the energy, and Reiji ho will work for you.
With practice it gets easier and easier to click into a lovely, empty, merged state, and after a while your intuitive working will be effortless. This should now be the way that you approach treatments: seated treatments and full treatments.
Here are some suitable instructions:
1. Place your hands in the prayer position, close your eyes, and feel your connection with Reiki through the crown of your head. Take a few long deep breaths. 2. Feel the energy building in your Tanden. We work from the Tanden, the centre of our intuition. 3. Move your hands in front of your third eye, and ask the Reiki energy to guide your hands, to guide your hands to where the energy is needed most. Say to yourself something like ‘I give myself over to be guided'
4. Being and focusing on this intention your hands will feel like a tool for Reiki to connect with the recipient.
5. Become one with the energy, join with the energy, merge with the energy that is flowing through your crown, shoulders, arms and hands.Allow your hands to drift.
In fact you do not need to put your hands in the prayer position, nor place them in front of your third eye (a little ritual for connecting your hands to the third eye, which is seen as the chakra associated with intuition). You do not need to say a form of words either. A simpler approach would be as follows:
1. Hover your hands over the recipient and take a few long deep breaths. 2. Feel your connection with Reiki through the crown of your head. 3. Feel the energy building in your Tanden. We work from the Tanden, the centre of our intuition. 4. Blank your mind. Become one with the energy, join with the energy, merge with the energy that is flowing through your crown, shoulders,arms and hands. Allow your hands to drift.
Using Reiji ho does not mean that you are going to change your way of working so that you spend most of your time hovering your hands over the body: Reiki is basically a hands-on therapy. You simply use Reiji ho as a way of working out where to put your hands. You treat in the intuitively-guided positions and when the feelings in your hands tell you that it is ok to move on to another treatment position, or when you have an impression that you ought to move on to a new position now, you use Reiji ho again to find out where your hands should be placed next. If you have not treated an area sufficiently, your hands will be dragged back there until it has been treated sufficiently
Reiki as a Therapy Reiki is often presented to the world as a sort of complementary therapy, like Reflexology or Indian Head Massage, and it works wonderfully as a therapy. Some therapists practice Reiki as their main or only therapy, while others offer many different modalities to their clients, including Reiki.
If you are thinking about setting yourself up as a Reiki Practitioner, then this section should contain some useful information for you. In the following pages you can find out about these areas: 1. Record Keeping 2. Post-treatment advice sheets 3. Reiki Insurance 4. Reiki Associations 5. Useful Reiki books 6. Useful Reiki web sites 7. Music to use when treating 8. Treatment table suppliers 9. Recommended books about promotion and marketing In the Appendix to this manual you can also find some information about Reiki and the Law, Health and Safety, and the treating of children.
Record Keeping It is being suggested in some quarters that Reiki people should be presenting themselves as "healthcare professionals", able to deal with and refer patients to Doctors and liaise with other healthcare providers. For me, such a thing is an attempt to jam a square peg into a round hole. Reiki practitioners are and never will be healthcare professionals. We do nothing other than rest our hands on people and this allow them to move more into a state of energetic balance. We do not diagnose, we do not treat, we do not advise our clients, and our practice has neither scientific basis nor contra-indications. I have seen some Reiki ‘client record sheets' that require a more detailed medical history than would be taken by a dental surgeon! This is over-the-top of course.
I suggest that you keep details of any client's name, address and contact telephone number (maybe e-mail address too). On the basis that Reiki might have an effect on the blood sugar levels of some diabetics, and could in theory alter the drug requirement of people with hypertension (high blood pressure), ask them if they have these conditions and advise them to keep an eye on their blood sugar levels after the treatment, or to keep an eye on their blood pressure. To know that a person is epileptic would be useful to you, so that you can ask them what they would like you to do in the highly unlikely event that they had a fit on the treatment table (or maybe you might decide to treat them on a duvet on the floor, for example). There is no evidence that Reiki treatments produce seizures in epileptics, by the way. Ask them why they have come for a treatment - what is their problem - and record this in the notes. Note the dates when they came for treatments, and anything interesting or unusual that you or they experienced. I believe that this is sufficient.
What to say at the start of a treatment When someone new comes for a treatment with you, it is a good idea to explain a few things to them about Reiki, what you are going to do, and what they can expect after the treatment has finished. You could make these points:
to treat yourself and other people.
remove their shoes (and maybe belts) for comfort.
positions; energy flows through the practitioner's hands into the client.
and out of consciousness or fall asleep.
see coloured lights or feel like they are floating, or very heavy.
or that their mind is empty! They may find that some aches and pains come to the surface during the treatment. This perfectly normal.
Talking will distract the practitioner and the treatment won't be so effective.
practitioner!
example, resting one hand on their shoulder and turning down the music.
You should demonstrate the hand positions you are going to use so that they know what to expect. If you work intuitively then you can demonstrate the sort of combinations that are likely or possible, and your demonstration will reassure them that hands will not wander into inappropriate positions. At the very least you can show then that you will start with the shoulders, move on to work on the head, and then stand up to work on the torso, finishing with the ankles.
If you are going to spend a little time feeling the energy field or scanning, or using Reiji ho as a scanning method, let them know that to begin with there will be no hands on them for a little while, and that's fine.
What to do at the end of a treatment Move back from the torso and take a few long, deep breaths. Rub your hands together to ‘disconnect'. Then rest your hand gently but firmly on their nearest shoulder. .Say to the client "ok... you can slowly bring yourself back now... and open your eyes". Turn the music down
You might ask them how they feel, what they felt etc. They may ask you what you noticed, and you might comment in general terms about the areas where energy was rushing in bigger amounts, but remember that we do not diagnose and we should not suggest to the client that an area where energy flowed in big amounts represents an area where there is a problem or a disease. You should explain that Reiki works on many levels, so a ‘hotspot' over the heart, for example, does not mean a heart problem.
Get a drink of water ready for them, and pass it to them when they sit up on the treatment couch. Help them off the table, or be ready to help them: they may be a bit unsteady. Explain that they might feel a bit light-headed for a while, or relaxed, or tired, and they may sleep very well this evening.
They might experience some emotional ups and downs, or irritability, or some aches and pains coming to the surface; this is normal and nothing to worry about. Say that Reiki is likely to do something for them, but any effect is not likely to be long-lasting: if they want to get the greatest benefit out of Reiki then they will be looking at, say, 4-6 sessions at weekly intervals.
Explain that the effects of Reiki build up cumulatively or gather momentum over time, and 4-6 sessions is usually enough to produce a permanent change, without the need to come along for regular top-up
sessions, though they may choose to do this because the treatments feel so nice! Client advice sheet It might be helpful if you prepared a brief sheet about Reiki, so the client has something to take away with them after the treatment. Such a sheet could include the following:
Reiki Insurance You can obtain Reiki practitioner insurance direct from the insurers listed below; you do not need to be a member of a Reiki society or association in order to obtain insurance.
Towergate SMG Professional Risks SMG House, 31 Clarendon Road, Leeds LS2 9PA Tel: 0113 294 4000 www.smg-professional-risks.co.uk
Balens 2 Nimrod House, Sandy's Road, Malvern, Worcestershire WR14 1JJ Tel: 01684 893006 Option 5 Email: info@balen.co.uk www.balen.co.uk If you are already a complementary therapist, or counsellor you may be able to have Reiki ‘added' to your existing policy.
I personally use Holistic Insurance Services.
Reiki Associations There is no need to be a member of any Reiki society or association, and most people who practise Reiki won't be a member of any of the associations. I cannot recommend membership of any of the organisations. In my opinion membership is a waste of money and the societies have some very strange ideas Live the Precepts
Mikao Usui's precepts were one of the most important parts of his system, and as much spiritual development was said to come through following these as was possible through carrying out energy work.
Focus on the precepts each day, remind yourself of them regularly and consider how they apply in your life.
Focus just being in the moment, whatever you might be doing.
Dwelling in the past and on the future, is a learned habit that takes exuberance from life. Be compassionate towards yourself, too, which means not beating yourself up for not being perfect, forgiving yourself as you forgive others.
Remember that the human condition, by definition, involves loss, grief therefore over loss, centre in your core being, connect with your inner knowing. .
Work on others
The wonderful thing about Reiki is that you can make a positive difference in people's lives, so get out there and plonk your hands on as many people as possible! If you have your family around you, then practice on them.
Rope in your friends and neighbours to be guinea pigs, and see what happens. Tell them that you have learned a Japanese relaxation technique, and that if they have a treatment session with you they will feel so calm, so relaxed, and so stress free at the end of it. Not many people would say 'No' to that!
You don't necessarily have to carry out hour-long treatments on everybody. Go with what time you have available. Do 15-20 minute treatments on people's heads/shoulders while they are sitting in a straight-backed chair.
Do short blasts on a painful knee. Treat your cat, your goldfish and your houseplants. Reiki your salad, and your glass of water, and see what happens! The important thing is to use the energy regularly.
What you will be doing at Second Degree that is different is to use the energies of CKR and SHK when you treat people, and you will be working intuitively, using Reiji ho. Use Reiji ho whenever you treat someone, and intuitive working will become effortless
Grounding and Protection
‘Grounding' I don't want to make a lot of fuss about the issue of grounding. There are some within the world of Reiki who attribute almost every malady known to man to ‘not being grounded', and take many steps at regular intervals to ‘ground' themselves and other people. I think that problems associated with not being grounded are very overstated.
When you practise Hatsurei ho you are grounding yourself.
When you focus your attention on your Tanden, as you do whenever you practise Hatsurei ho, whenever you treat someone, whenever you meditate on CKR and SHK, and whenever you practise distant healing, you are grounding yourself.
Yes, you can feel a bit spaced out sometimes when you complete a Reiki treatment, and this is more about relaxation and contentment than not being grounded, but doing normal, mundane things grounds one well. Walking outside, doing the washing up: these are grounding practices.
But just for completeness, here is a visualisation that you can use to ground yourself, offered to you with the proviso that you really do not need to do this. Stand or sit with your feet firmly on the ground. Become aware of the contact between your feet and the floor, and feel a firm, solid contact between yourself and the ground. Now imagine that your feet have turned into roots.
These roots push further and further down into the ground, insinuating themselves between rock and clay as they travel further and further into the earth, binding you to the heavy ground beneath your feet. The roots spread out as they go, with more and more branches and rootlets fusing you with the earth. You are heavy and solid.
Go through this visualisation yourself, or if you feel that your Reiki client needs to be grounded, you could talk them through this visualisation at the conclusion of the session, once they are standing or sitting with their feet in contact with the floor.
Protection In the same way that some people are worrying a great deal about the issue of grounding, there are some people who have been taught to worry a great deal about the issue of ‘protection'. A preoccupation with protection is a characteristic of many spiritual healers, and ‘protection' issues being raised by Reiki teachers can often be traced to a spiritual healer who subsequently went on to learn and teach Reiki, but who brought with them their spiritual healing ‘baggage'.
Reiki and Spiritual Healing are not the same things, and practices that might be thought to be justified in some spiritual healing quarters do not apply to Reiki. There are various aspects to 'protection', which we can take as meaning 'protection from psychic attack' of some sort, or 'protection from picking things up' from the people we have been treating.
Sometimes Reiki practitioners can 'echo' their clients' problems, by feeling their pain for example during the course of a treatment. However, that is temporary and it is intuition working in a particular way. This is different from the situation where the practitioner walks away at the end of the treatment still experiencing the client's problems. So it is highly unlikely that you will ‘pick up' problems from the people that you treat - the energy flows one way, from you to them - but it is perhaps wise to take simple precautions to guard against this largely theoretical danger.
That is why when we finish a treatment we make a ritual disconnection by shaking our hands, clapping or rubbing them together, or blowing through them. You can even say to yourself 'disconnect' if you like. You also know how to use Kenyoku for this purpose, and you might choose to do this after treating someone.
Chakra correspondences
A chakra may be seen as ‘open', or spinning in a balanced fashion. It could be seen as ‘closed' or spinning sluggishly. It could be seen as spinning too fast, though this seems to be less common in my experience. What I am going to do first of all is to describe the mental and emotional characteristics that accompany ‘closed' or sluggishly spinning chakras.
When you are treating a person and your hand is over one of the chakra positions, and when you feel a lot of energy flowing into that area, this suggests that - assuming the energy is actually working on the chakra - it may be ‘closed' or spinning sluggishly and needs Reiki energy to become open. The energy can be seen as dealing with the, or some of the, mental/emotional associations of that chakra.
Sense and perceive through your intuition whether the energy is working on someone's chakra rather than any physical part of him or her. What impression do you get? As with all things, do not take these associations as dogma to be read out to the patient at the end of the treatment session.
Be careful about what you say to people until you are confident in your ability to perceive. Think carefully about the chakra associations, about what you know about the person you are treating, think carefully about the energy sensations you are experiencing in the different treatment positions, and whether some associations may seem more appropriate than others for this person. You might be better advised to say nothing, to watch and to learn.
The Reiki Practitioner and the Law Provided by Susie Jennings, Reiki Master / Teacher
In England the law is divided into two main categories: Criminal Law and Civil Law. Criminal law is contained in Acts of Parliament and if a person contravenes Criminal Law he is prosecuted by the State. If found guilty, the offender may be fined or imprisoned. Civil Law concerns the rights of citizens in their relationship to one another and action is initiated by the injured party. If the claim succeeds, the offender is ordered to pay damages for redress of injury.
The Prohibited Appellation Act This Act makes it a criminal offence for anyone who does not hold the relevant qualification to use any of the following titles: chemist, chiropodist, dental practitioner, dental surgeon, dentist, dietician, doctor, druggist, general practitioner, medical laboratory technician, midwife, nurse, occupational therapist, optician, orthoptist, pharmacist, physiotherapist, radiographer, remedial gymnast, surgeon, veterinary practitioner, veterinary surgeon.
The Prohibited Functions Act This Act prohibits unqualified persons performing certain specified functions in the field of medicine: dentistry,midwifery, veterinary surgery and for the treatment of venereal disease. The only exception would be helping a woman in childbirth only in cases of sudden or urgent necessity.
Fraudulent Mediumship The law stipulates that anyone who purports to act as a spiritualistic medium or to exercise any power of telepathy, clairvoyance or other similar powers with intent to deceive is guilty of an offence.
AIDS - It is for the individual practitioner to decide whether to give treatment to an AIDS patient.
Wilful and Reckless Exaggeration
Wilful and Reckless Exaggeration of ones abilities and skills is held in law to constitute fraud. It is therefore vital that practitioners should exercise great restraint in describing their own abilities and also the benefits of reiki.
Advertising
The law makes it an offence to refer in an advertisement to any article or service in terms which are calculated to lead to the use of that article or service for treating human beings for any of the following diseases: Bright's Disease, Glaucoma, Cataract, Locomotor Ataxy, Diabetes, Paralysis, Epilepsy or fits; Tuberculosis.
There is, however, no prohibition on treating a client for the foregoing diseases, the offence is in advertising treatment.
It is an offence to publish any advertisement which offers to treat, to prescribe a remedy for or give advice on the treatment of cancer, or refers to any article or service in terms calculated to lead to its use in the treatment of cancer. It is not an offence to treat a client with cancer,
it is an offence to advertise treatment or a cure for the condition. At all times advertising should comply with standards laid down by the British Code of Advertising Practice and meet the requirements of the Advertising Standards Authority.
The Treatment of Children
It is an offence for the parent or guardian of a child under 16 to fail to provide adequate medical aid for the child. The law does not prohibit a practitioner from treating children. However, to avoid being charged with the statutory offence known as ‘ aiding and abetting ‘, the reiki practitioner should explain to the parent or guardian the nature of the obligation imposed by law and request them to sign a disclaimer.
Professional Negligence
The only Civil Law to which practitioners are subject is an action for damages for professional negligence. The meaning of negligence in English law is, very broadly, that in any contract with other citizens a person must have regard for their interests and that, if through some act of commission or omission committed without sufficient regard for another person's interest, that other person sustains injury, he is liable to pay damages as monetary redress for the injury inflicted.
The relationship of practitioner and client automatically imposes on the practitioner a duty to observe a certain standard of care and skill in the treatment or advice he gives. Failure to attain to that standard exposes the practitioner to the risk of an action for damages.
A ‘professional' person is by definition one who professes to have certain specialist knowledge or skill not possessed by the layman and, in general, a practitioner of any profession is bound to possess and exercise the knowledge, care and skill of an ordinary competent practitioner of that profession.
Professional negligence may take one of two forms; either lack of requisite knowledge and skill to provide the treatment offered, or else, while possessing the necessary knowledge and skill, failure to apply it properly.
It will therefore be seen that the knowledge and skill which reiki practitioners profess to have, is of crucial importance in the context of professional negligence. It is essential that practitioners do not claim to possess knowledge, or purport to exercise skills, they do not possess.
It should be an essential part of training to ensure that every practitioner is aware when a case is beyond the scope of his/her particular skill and when to call in a more skilful person, to refer the client to a medical practitioner, another therapist or to ensure that the client no longer relies exclusively on his skill alone.
False and Misleading Statements
The law on this subject was greatly expanded by the Misrepresentations Act 1967 and the Trades Description Act 1968.
Under the 1967 Misrepresentations Act - If a client engages the services of a practitioner, and pays fees for the treatment which proves unsuccessful, having been induced to engage the practitioner's services by a misrepresentation made by the practitioner about the efficacy of the treatment, the client could recover those fees (and any other expenses incurred as the result of the lack of success of the treatment) as damages for breach of contract.
Under the 1968 Trades Description Act - Any statement about the properties of goods or the nature of services offered which is false, misleading or inaccurate can give rise to prosecution.
As reiki practitioners do not sell or supply goods, the relevance of this Act is in the provisions concerning false statements as to services. This includes false statements about the effect of the treatment. It would therefore be unwise for a practitioner to claim he could cure or diagnose or make any statement about qualifications and experience unless it is true and can be proved to be true.
Insurance
Any individual wishing to practice as an alternative or complementary therapist should ensure that he/she is adequately insured to practice. Such insurance should cover public liability and professional indemnity against malpractice.
Failure to do so could result in disciplinary procedures from the membership body to which the reiki practitioner belongs and also payment of any legal costs should the case be successful.
Health and Safety at Work Act 1974
The Act requires employers to provide systems of work that are, so far as is reasonably practicable, safe and without risk to health. All equipment must be safe and checked regularly, the environment must be kept free of toxic fumes, fire fighting equipment should be accessible and in good working order, first aid supplies available, exits unobstructed and access possible for disabled people.
Employees have responsibilities to take reasonable care of themselves, and any other people affected by their work, not to misuse any equipment and to co-operate with their employers in the discharge of their legal obligations.
Notifiable Diseases It is a statutory requirement that certain infectious diseases are notified to the Medical Officer of Health of the district in which the client resides or in which he is living when the disease is diagnosed. The person responsible for notifying the MOH is the GP in charge of the case. If, therefore, a practitioner were to discover a notifiable disease that was clinically identifiable as such, he should insist that a doctor be called in. Each local authority decides which diseases shall be notifiable in its area but it is assumed that the following diseases are notifiable everywhere. Acute encephalitis Acute meningitis Acute poliomyelitis Anthrax Cholera Diphtheria Dysentery Food Poisoning Infective Jaundice Leprosy Leptospirosis Malaria Measles Opthalmia neopatorum Paratyphoid Cough Plague Relapsing Fever Scarlet Fever Tetanus Tuberculosis Typhoid Fever Typhus Whooping Cough Yellow Fever
Further Legal information
This information is as published by the UK Reiki Federation. A parent or guardian who wilfully fails to provide adequate medical aid for a child under the age of 16 may be committing a criminal offence.Reiki is not defined as a medical aid by law so anyone who treats a child whose parents refuse medical aid could be seen to be aiding and abetting that offence. When treating a child it is advisable to secure the signature of the parent or guardian to the following statement: "I have been warned by (Reiki practitioner's name) that according to Law I must consult a doctor concerning the health of my child (child's name)." This statement should be signed and dated by both parent or guardian and a witness and kept within the client records.
Reiki in Hospitals
All Reiki practitioners visiting Hospitals should comply with the guidelines laid down by the British Complementary Medicine Association (BCMA). The hospital is responsible for the patient. Reiki practitioners may only treat patients in hospitals with permission from the patient, the hospital authority including the ward charge nurse. Reiki practitioners should not wear clothing which gives the impression that they are a staff member of the hospital. They may have some sort of identification such as a lapel badge.
Where permission is given to provide treatment on the ward, this must be carried out without fuss or interruption to other patients and staff. If other patients request treatment, the permission of the ward charge nurse, nursing officer (and if relevant, the patient's doctor) must first be obtained. Reiki practitioners should never undermine the patient's faith in hospital treatment or regime. Where credentials are requested, Reiki practitioners must provide their associated current membership card or other proof of membership and permission to visit.
Health and Safety Guidelines
Provided by Sue Jones, Reiki Master / Teacher This is a quick guideline to the Health and Safety requirements of running your own Reiki business. It must be noted that this is for a self-employed person who does not have any employees. Britain's Health and Safety Commission (HSC) and the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) are responsible for the regulation of almost all the risks to health and safety arising from work activity in Britain. The HSE website www.hse.gov.uk - is a wealth of information, or if you have any questions you can call them direct on their Info Line 0845 345 0055 (they are very helpful), or to order a free copy of any booklets mentioned in this guide, call 01787 881165.
British Health and Safety law requires that you carry out certain duties to ensure that you, your client and members of the public are working and enjoying a Healthy and Safe environment. To this end, I have compiled the list below as guidance to these duties.
Risk Assessments
A Risk Assessment is nothing more than a careful examination of what, in your work, could cause harm to people, so that you can weigh up whether you have taken enough precautions or should do more to prevent harm. In Reiki, this could be someone falling from the massage couch that you use, to someone falling down the stairs if you use an upstairs room in your home. Risk Assessments are very easy to compile; first you need to list the hazards, then the people who might be at risk from the hazards, and then list controls you have to ensure that the risks are minimized.
So, someone falling off the couch is the hazard, the client would be the person at risk from the hazard, and the controls you have to ensure the risks are minimized are that you assist people on and off the couch and let them take their own time to sit up on the couch after a Reiki session.
Slips & Trips
Slips and trips account for 33% of all reported major injuries, therefore it is always important that you take into account the floor surfaces that you are working on. If you use your own premises for treatment, it is always a good idea to do a Risk Assessment to highlight any potential dangers and allow you to minimise them.
HSE Booklet ‘Five Steps to Risk Assessment' contains further information.
Manual Handling
Manual Handling covers a wide variety of tasks including lifting, lowering, pushing, pulling and carrying. It is important that you Risk Assess any tasks that you do that include any of the above. If you carry your massage couch about with you to give treatments, it is advisable that you complete a Risk
Assessment, to show that you have considered the risk involved in carrying the couch and have taken reasonable steps to ensure your safety. HSE Booklet ‘Getting to Grips with Manual Handling' contains further information.
Use of Electrical Equipment
If you use Electrical Equipment during your sessions, you have a responsibility to ensure that the equipment is well maintained. This can be done by a regular visual inspection, to look for visible signs of damage or faults, and where necessary have the equipment tested by a professional. HSE Booklet ‘Electrical Safety and You' contains further information.
The Provision and Use of Work Equipment (PUWER)
Like the use of Electrical Equipment, this regulation is designed to ensure that you use suitable equipment for the job you do, and that it is well maintained. Again, a regular visual inspection to look for visible signs of damage or faults will be required. HSE Booklet ‘Simple Guide to the Provision and Use of Work Equipment' contains further information
Insurance
While the HSE only enforce the requirement of Insurance if you employ people, they do strongly advise that you take out insurance to cover yourself for Professional Indemnity and, if you use your own premises, you will need to take out Public Liability Insurance.
Health and Safety Policy Statements
On a side note, I was informed by the HSE that while it is not a requirement for a self-employed person with no employees to have a Health and Safety Policy Statement, it is considered good practice to have one.
A copy of a policy statement can be found, along with a Risk Assessment example, in the HSE booklet ‘An Introduction to Health and Safety'.
It must be remembered that the above is a guide only, and that Health and Safety Regulations and Requirements are an ongoing venture.
It is your responsibility to ensure that you have kept up to date with any changes in the laws concerning Health and Safety. Another booklet that you might find helpful is ‘Health and Safety Regulation ... A Short Guide'.
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The form of the symbols The Reiki symbols are partly based on the Japanese writing system, Kanji. The symbols should be drawn or visualized as they have been taught during the Reiki 2 Attunement. As more and more people get attuned to Reiki this will mean that there can be a great number of variations between the symbols taught by different Masters. This is not really a problem as there is not a 100% right or wrong way to draw them. The Reiki symbols given to a student will work however they look as they incorporate the intention and the connection to the metaphysical energies it represents.
The Reiki Power symbol - Choku Rei The power symbol can be used to increase the power of Reiki. It can also be used for protection. See it as a light switch that has the intention to instantly boost your ability to channel Reiki energy. Draw or visualize the symbol in front of you and you will have instant access to more healing energies. Choku Rei also gives the other symbols more power when they are used together. The symbol can be used any time during a treatment but it is especially effective if it is used in the beginning of a session to empower the Reiki energy or when used at the end of a session to close the session and seal off the Reiki energies. The Reiki Power symbol is, as I have said before, mainly a power switch but you can also assign it further uses. Remember it is always your intention that governs what happens. If you want to add new "functions" to the Power symbol then just have a clear statement and intention of what it is you want the symbol to do and it will do it for you. Some uses:
These are just a few uses. You can use your own intuition and imagination to find other uses for the Reiki Power symbol - Choku Rei. There are no limits to what you can do. The power is all in your mind, let your clear intention guide the function of the symbols.
The Mental/Emotional symbol - Sei He Ki (Sei He Ki pronounced as: "Say-Hay-Key") Sei He Ki has a general meaning of: "God and man become one". The Mental/Emotional symbol brings together the "brain and the body". It helps people to bring to the surface and release the mental/emotional causes of their problems. Many people (even doctors) are starting to realize that many of our ailments are based on mental and emotional unbalances that we probably are not even aware of. The symbol works to focus and harmonize the subconscious with the physical side. This symbol can be used to help with emotional and mental healing. It balances the left and right side of the brain and gives peace and harmony. It is also very effective on relationship problems. The Sei He Ki symbol can also be used on diverse problems like nervousness, fear, depression, anger, sadness etc. Some uses:
Further information The left part of the symbol represents Yang and our left side of the brain (logic, structure and linear thinking etc.) The right side of the symbol represents Yin and our right side of the brain. (fantasy, feelings, intuition etc.) When you are facing another person and draw the symbol the left side of the symbol, i.e. the Yang part of the symbol ends up on the receiver's right side of the brain and the Yin part on the left side thereby helping to balance the two sides.
The Reiki Distance Healing symbol - (Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen is pronounced as: "Hon-Sha-Zee-Show-Nen") The symbol has a general meaning of: "No past, no present, no future" or it can have the meaning of "The Buddha in me contacts the Buddha in you". The Distance symbol can, as its name implies, be used to send energies over a distance. Time and distance is no problem when using this Reiki symbol. Many practitioners consider Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen as the most useful and powerful symbol. The use of the symbol gives access to the "Akashic Records", the life records of each soul and can therefore be used in karmic healing. Trauma and other experiences from this life, previous or parallel lives that affect and mirror peoples' behaviors can be brought to light and released. In doing distance healing be open! Do not focus your efforts on healing a specific problem like a headache. Send the Reiki energies without limitation as they will go where they are best needed. When doing distance healing the energies will work on the receiver's subtile body, the Chakras and the Aura, and not as much on the physical level (i.e. it can take some time before the energies seep down to the body and eases for instance pain). The person you are sending Reiki to is likely to feel it happening. If he/she has an open mind he/she can usually tell what you have done and when you have done it. Distance healing does not take nearly as long as a hands-on treatment. You actually only need a few minutes to send distance healing. You can even set up a Reiki distance healing to automatically repeat sending energies to a person. If you want to do this I recommend that you put a time limit on the repeat (as it otherwise might continue forever) and also to renew and empower the distance healing every other day. Remember it is your intention that guides what happens! Some uses:
Further information: Describing how I do distance healing is not really relevant. If you put 10 Reiki Masters in a room they would probably all do distance healing in a different way. Absentee healing is basically a process of visualization i.e. imagine or "see" the person you want to send healing to and do it. You can use a photo if you have one, if not don't worry about it just send. Sometimes I send to people I don't really know (like a name I have received in an e-mail), I only have their name and city. No problem, it is the intention of sending Reiki to this unknown person that makes it work. My advice is to let go of all you doubts, formulate a clear intention, use the Reiki symbols and send the energies! Additional (not Level Two) The Master Reiki Symbol Japanese Name: Dai Ko Myo
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