One Woman's Experience...

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/finding-zen-in-the-city/201006/my-reiki-affair

Reiki Review

The cold weather, the holidays, a sick puppy and the death of a friend have all conspired to give me a serious case of writer's block. A big fan of Pamela Miles, Reiki Master/Teacher in NYC, auther of Reiki-A Comprehensive Guide and founder of The Institute for the Advancement of Complementary Therapies, I offer you the following article, written by Pamela, to read instead :)

REIKI-REVIEW OF BIOFIELD THERAPIES

Pamela was also lead reviewer for the following article:

Reiki Backgrounder from the National Institute of Health/National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine

Interested in learning more? Why not check out Pamela's website Reiki In Medicine!

Namaste and with very best wishes for the year ahead,
Janet

Be Kind To Every Living Thing

I remember in my Reiki 1 class when we were discussing the Precepts and, as I looked at this one, I thought "Of course, that means we take care of the environment, be nice to people and animals and treat them with respect, etc. etc." Imagine my surprise when my teacher suggested that, first and foremost, we needed to be kind to ourselves!


I guess it came as a surprise to me because, frankly, I'm not very good at it. I referenced a book in my last blog post called "Radical Acceptance - Embracing Your Life With The Heart Of A Buddha" by Tara Brach and she begins the book with this statement "Believing that something is wrong with us is a deep and tenacious suffering." Yep. That describes me to a T. Both the belief AND the attendant suffering.

But it makes sense, doesn't it? Until we can be gentle with ourselves and treat ourselves with kindness, we cannot be gentle and kind to another living being. Especially around our shortcomings. We all have them. It’s part of being human. When we can have compassion in the face of our own mistakes, we will know what someone else is feeling when they mess up and can treat them with loving kindness instead of derision and disdain. I know for me, that derision and disdain that I often feel towards others is really about me.

That said, I think we have to be careful because kindness, doing for others, doing for this cause and that movement, can also be a cover up for our own feelings of unworthiness.

So what does this mean in terms of our day-to-day lives? Remember the Golden Rule we all learned in grade school – Do unto others as you would have them do unto you? That might be a good place to start. What about animals, pets or otherwise? Plants? Bugs? Personally, I have a difficult time looking the other way when there is a spider dangling from the ceiling in front of my face as I’m working out on my elliptical. But why? What am I afraid of? Well, what if it was poisonous? Hmmm. That’s a tough one, though I don't think there are any where I live...

I think the difficulty is that when we give ourselves permission to kill that spider or fly, or whatever, it’s easier to give ourselves permission to not care about the bird who flies into a window or the bear caught in a horribly painful trap, the homeless animals, the homeless people…and then where does it end?

Does that mean we beat ourselves up if we accidentally step on a bug? No, but it might mean that we stop for a moment the next time we encounter one and consider whether we might be able to shoo it out the door or...just let it be.

What about learning to sit with and breathe through those uncomfortable feelings instead of trying to avoid them or cover them, make up for them, by numbing out with a substance or an activity? When we can do that, we learn that feelings pass. We learn that our feelings are not to be feared and they are not necessarily the truth of who we are. We learn that often, underneath the most uncomfortable feelings, there is something that needs our love and acceptance.

Being kind to all living things. Revering life, all of life, in all its forms. Especially our own.

Namaste,
Janet

I Will Do My Work Honestly

On the surface, the fourth precept seems to be about doing an honest day's work and we can take that to mean several things: Putting our best effort into each and every task, paid or unpaid, and treating those whom we encounter in the course of performing those tasks with integrity and respect. Sound advice to be sure when we consider the benefits to our self-esteem and the resulting healthy relationships that will flow from doing so.

Given that Usui's original intention was that Reiki be a spiritual path, I'd be willing to bet he had something else in mind with this precept.  My guess is that we are being instructed to put some effort each day into working on that spiritual growth by setting aside some time to self treat, meditate on the precepts and what they mean to us, and meditate simply for its own sake, since that was and is a big part of Buddhist practice and we know that Usui was a Tendai Buddhist. 

But where does the "honestly" fit into working on our spiritual path?  Since many of us find it difficult to to squeeze yet another demand into our already crowded days, it might mean that we need to take a look at our need to be so busy.  Are we afraid to face what might surface if we slow down and get quiet?  Anger, perhaps, or worry?  Feeling less-than?  The Chinese pictogram for "busy" also means "heart-killing" - and we can take that literally knowing what we do about the effect of stress on our body, as well as figuratively when we consider the effect of being disconnected from our inner self and not taking time to properly rest and rejuvenate. 

Being overly focused on spiritual growth and development can serve the same purpose, though, by distracting us from what is really going on inside and giving us another way to numb out and/or feel "superior-to".

Incorporating the precepts into our daily lives and using them to guide our thoughts and actions doesn't mean that we beat ourselves up when we fall short - and it's almost inevitable that we will.  It takes courage to honestly face those shadow aspects of ourselves and bring them into the light, where we can hold them tenderly and allow them to heal.  Keeping them hidden only allows them to grow bigger, more menacing and more destructive to ourselves and others.

For anyone wishing to explore this theme even further, I highly recommend reading "Radical Acceptance - Embracing Your Life With The Heart Of A Buddha" by Tara Brach, Ph.D.

Namaste,
Janet

Reiki: A healing touch

Wonderful interview with Reiki Master Pamela Miles, author of "REIKI, A Comprehensive Guide"

Reiki: A healing touch

I Will Count My Many Blessings

My long overdue thoughts on the third Precept:


I'd intended to write this at least in time for the Canadian Thanksgiving last weekend, but I had a terrible case of the blahs which had me feeling less-than-blessed about much of anything but maybe I needed that experience in order to remind me what this Precept is really about for me...


Gratitude.  For everything.  Not just the "good" things because more often than not the "not-so-good" things have something to teach me as well.  Take my "terrible case of the blahs" last weekend.  I wasn't feeling well (and not because I'd eaten too much turkey either!), my sweetie was studying for mid-terms and I was feeling sorry for myself because I still don't have enough clients to quit my oh-so-frustrating job and practice/teach Reiki full-time.  I should mention that my oh-so-frustrating job helps me pay my mortgage, put food on my table, help my sweetie with his studies, take courses myself, buy more books than I can read....)

So, what did I learn from my focus on the "not-so-good" things last weekend?  That I really do have a lot of things in my life to be grateful for - even if practicing/teaching Reiki full-time isn't one of them - yet.  It's still a dream and I still have hope, which is more than a lot of people have.  I also learned (okay, re-learned, for the umpteenth time!) that I have the power to make my day happy or sad, frustrating or not, boring or exhilarating.  I had three days in a row during which I didn't HAVE to do anything! What a luxury!  I got to read to my heart's content (I love reading because it represents so much for me - escape, freedom, knowledge, entertainment) and it was just the two of us for Thanksgiving dinner, so I really didn't have to fuss (I hate cooking and could quite cheerfully exist on President's Choice All Natural Peanut Butter, Country Harvest 12-Grain Bagels and red delicious apples...).

Counting my blessings and feeling grateful for everything that happens in my life doesn't mean that I can't feel sad or angry when I experience a loss or someone crosses a boundary, but it does help me to look at the bigger picture and see it in a more balanced way and for me, Reiki is all about bringing balance to my life (in addition to unconditional life and light, but I'll save that for another day!)

Namaste,
Janet

I Will Let Go Of Worry

The second Precept, for me, is very much a reminder to stay in the moment, in the now. When I do that I'm not fretting about what happened yesterday or what might happen tomorrow.

Without minimizing the difficulties that we all face on a day-to-day basis, when it comes right down to it, worrying does absolutely nothing to eliminate any of them, does it? It can increase our heart rate, make our head spin, keep us awake at night, make us forget to do the things we need to do, make us less effective at performing the task at hand, make us irritable -- in short, it expends a lot of valuable time and energy that might be better spent tending to each moment as it comes.

I recently heard something that really helps me with this: If there is something I can do about a situation right now, go do it. If not, then let it go. Another thing that helps me is setting aside a period of time each day, say an hour, during which to worry. If a worrisome thought pops into my head before that, I shoo it away until the designated time. Guess what? Nine times out of 10, when that hour that I've set aside arrives, I've often forgotten what it was that I was worried about or the reality hits me that I can't do anything about it - or any of the other things that were vying for my attention - at that moment and I'm able to either let it go or, if it is sort of an ongoing worry, I can make a plan to do something about it.

How about some examples...

Let's say I'm worried about a family member's health, but I'm at work and will be for the next 7 hours or so. There isn't much I can do is there? I can make a mental note to check in on them during my "worry hour" later in the day, or perhaps spend some of that hour planning for all of the what-ifs and maybe underneath those what-ifs there lies an issue that I can do something about.

Perhaps I’m tossing and turning at night because I’ve got a presentation to make. If the presentation isn’t finished, I might decide to get up and work on it for a few minutes, but if it’s ready and I’m just fretting about how it will go and whether people will like it, a better choice might be to do some deep breathing, place my Reiki hands on my solar plexus and just trust that all will go well.

Whatever the situation, those last few words make a fine mantra: “Just trust that all will go well."

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the second Precept!

Namaste,
Janet