After several years of study as a Reiki student and as a Reiki Master I began to see some disturbing trends in Contemporary Reiki. To be perfectly blunt,  the modality has become Westernized to the point of impracticability.

If one peruses the original hand book of Dr. Usui, the facilitator who reintroduced the modality, one sees that a great deal of what makes Reiki a effective healing practice, has been removed from modern texts. Mrs Takata one of the Masters credited for bringing Reiki to Western Culture has students and descendants that are still living and practicing Reiki in it's whole complete form.They've made mention of this distortion of sound practices but pretty much are ignored.

What are we practicing? Read on.

More disturbing is that this very vital information the core of Reiki ,as far as self healing, and dis-ease therapy, has been replaced with either a lot of 'gobbedly-gook' that has little to do with self healing. Or we have introduced  practices while beneficial in their own right,are not as effective without the original precepts.

Some things to look out for and to think about.

I very seldom see meridian work done in any in depth way Meridian stimulation is the core of Reiki for physical healing, and to effect cellular rotation so that imbedded emotions can lift out and be cleared. Why?

I have no idea. (Helpless look)

Original Reiki was a therapeutic practice that stimulated healing on a physical, cellular, and core level, by stimulating the meridian points of the body. These have since been replaced by 'chakra stimulation'--basic hand placements that effect a relaxing effect but only address part of the core healing issues. No one really learns much about any hand placements after Reiki I introduces  Chakra based hand placements. We are told we learn them 'intuitively'. If one has not yet developed healing intuition this of little help.

Therapeutic Reiki for all levels of healing has over fifty hand placements. If you are not being taught these hand placements you are not setting a good foundation for your intuitive healing work.  If you have never pinched a recipients lips or stuck your fingers in their mouth you probably had a lot missing from your Reiki Education.  This may or not be your fault. We only know what we are taught, but once we are informed of these omissions and continue to dismiss them as unimportant you are willfully perpetrating misuse of the modality and that effects the entire Reiki community.You are then offering something to someone but not delivering it. That's out of integrity and it's also infringing on scamming people.

I know we don't like hearing this but remember its simply part of spiritual and healing growth. We've had this omission imposed on us, so let's remove that imposition. 

Now some of these traditional hand placements overlap those that are taught today, but still a good portion of what made Reiki such a revolutionary healing precept are missing.

Dr. Usui based Reiki in part on a Buddhist precept or poetry that was called Heart Sutra. This Sutra makes a reference to 'emptying the soul'. It's my belief that this practice of Heart Sutra was either misunderstood by Western Culture or viewed as a sort of negative thing, this emptying of the soul.Sounds sorta scary, right?

It's not. It's the basis of self healing.

Heart Sutra is really about removing imbedded emotions and core beliefs, karmic crud we've carried over from previous lives, matters that should be of intense focus during Reiki I when we are healing ourselves. I realized this was not utilized at all when I found so many wounded and uncertain Reiki Masters and Practitioners running around. Why do we still feel uncertain and fearful on a personal level if we have been through our Level 1 self healing?  If you have mastered the modality why are we so uncertain about practicing Reiki?

Because your Reiki Levels I and II didn't involve the Heart Sutra Work.

Reiki is being disclaimer-ed to death because of fear. If the Heart Sutra work was done there would be no fear! 

Dr. Usui stated that Reiki was intended to CURE. We now disclaimer this left and right in uncertainty by saying "Reiki should be used in conjunction with modern medicine." Really? Dr. Usui didn't. Modern Medicine either  didn't exist then or was in it's earliest infancy.But Reiki was still a very effective healing modality.Actually this fear is a core belief imbedded in US Culture. This lack of core belief work has perpetrated this fear which causes us to self efface and to disclaimer.

Want me to prove it. It's easily proven through  practice. You won't know for sure until you try it, and you can't know until you do try it. And if you don't try it you will always carry the knowledge that you willfully chose not to live up to your full potential as a healer. There's no reason not to learn it.

It's not hard, these are not difficult concepts, or involve a lot of effort on our part.

With our focus on the Chakras that was introduced by Western Culture we forget the areas of the body where the body is most in need of healing and where the negative emotions imbed at. If a Chakra is blocked, unblocking it does nothing for these areas. It will soon block again. The Chakra is not responsible for imbedded emotion;' it's a red flag alert that imbedded emotions, negative beliefs, and karmic crud is present.

Now if we see a sinking ship, and it's flying a  sodden distress flag, do we swim in and fix the flag or do we try to fix what is making the ship sink in the first place? 

Chakra work is great for relaxation. Relaxation alone doesn't help anyone to heal all on it's own.  It can help to remove imbedded emotions  but only when the original practices are retained. Working a Chakra  will clear it and then ...it will clog again. So even the Chakra work is misinterpreted in modern Reiki.  Again, because the core work has not been taught. It's those stressed energetic bodies, haras, and core subtle bodies that are causing the Chakra to block, not the other way around.

Tanden work is entirely overlooked. The Tanden is an area that is so important that it's stated "If no other Reiki work can be offered, offer it to the Tanden area" . I have yet to see anyone perform Tanden stimulation on anyone. Almost but not quite.

Westernized Reiki has little to offer in the way of efficacy COMPARED to keeping the traditional teachings in place and building contemporary teachings around that very effective base.Why do we keep perpetrating this? Fear. Because how to get rid of fear on the mind, body, spirit level was never addressed when we learned Reiki.

When I found out about this omissions I got MAD. And then I fixed the omissions in my education.I have to say it was nothing short of transformational for me.

Now read that again.  Because by this time I'm sure I'm triggering people. That's not my intention.  I'm suggesting  a means of healing growth . Neither am I saying contemporary Reiki is not effective. I'm saying if we had retained the original precepts our healing abilities, and our own inner wounds, would be way more profound. Instead of learning the intense, effective practices we cluttered the modality up with a bunch of additions that can't replace the core of the modality. Crystals are great. They amplify energy. But they don't replace the intentions held between healer and recipient in restoring the spirit to divine health.

Mass Milling Reiki. There is a reason why we don't give back-to-back attunements. Reiki I attunement involves a  period of healing and cleansing using Heart Sutra precepts to clear out core beliefs. When we pile another attunement on top of that we deny the student the opportunity to do depthful work by distracting them with other precepts. Face it we are not doing them any favors. There is a REASON why we don't do back-to-back attunements. Attunement fever is the least of the problem.

We are the teachers and masters of Reiki and we should not be denying or imposing mass attunements on students. How masterful are we if we can't refrain from splashing attunements hither and yon. Mastery implies SELF mastery.

We are the ones who are supposed to know why not to perpetrate this and have enough authority (mastery) to refrain from moving things along in such a rush. We are not adding anything beneficial we are denying those who don't know any better an opportunity to engage in a profound healing of self that will benefit them in all areas of their life. So the back-to-back attunements say more about you the teacher, the master...it says you are not...yet.

But it is in your power to change that.

Another precept we have rattling around: Reiki will just do what it needs to do. This is in opposition to a basic and well known precept that we work with intention. Which one is it?  It's two opposing beliefs. Effective healing is wrought when the healer and the recipient are holding the same intention. Reiki will not override someone's free will  and just make them over. How does the recipient continue their healing if we/they don't know where to direct it at and make an intentioned choice towards healing. Not to say we must have an intention always  but the body gives us enough clues to where we should be directing our intention instead of leaving it all up to chance. Again we go back to fear. No Reiki won't harm but how helpful is it without a bit of firm intention which is the basis of manifestation healing? If Reiki 'just healed people thoughtlessly' there would be no need for directors--Reiki practitioners with intent and who pass those intents on to those they are working with. 

Excusing these omissions by saying we develop our own style does not fix anything. It just means we are ignoring our full potential as Reiki practitioners and trying to replace it with something else. We develop our own style of Reiki AFTER the basic groundwork has been set. It's the same as learning to write. We learn the basics of punctuation and grammar before we develop our own style.

Just a few decades ago Reiki was a costly endeavor. The reason for this was to keep the modality intact, so that people who were truly serious about healing would understand and accept the precepts without muddling it up with a lot of fluff. It was to preserve the modality; only those who were truly serious about Reiki would dish out that much cashola. And that is exactly what happened. Once it was made affordable to the masses, the masses took Reiki and distorted it making it something it wasn't.  Now adding something to Reiki is great, but to take out what made it so effective, so miraculous in the first place...?!! 

Questions, comments, rebuttals welcome.

Chelley