Sometimes in life we meet people who touch us more than others. And I don’t mean just in a physical sense. There is a knowing, a comfort, an attraction, not just physically, but the familiarity is so strong that trust is instantly established.
When I lived in Jakarta, Indonesia, and helped my friend at a bazar in 2014, I saw an Indian woman at the entrance, and it was like lightning struck. This woman was Priya and she introduced me to Reiki. We started talking and it was as if we had known each other forever. On her table, I experienced the healing power of Reiki for the first time.
In July 2015, when I took my first Reiki 1 course, with my teacher Joshua Lie in Jakarta, it felt like I was falling in love. First, my confused mind thought that I was smitten with my teacher. But then over time, I realized that, due to my daily Reiki self-care practice, I was falling in love with myself.
I began to treat myself with more kindness, generosity, compassion. In the silence, I began to listen to myself. Up until then I wasn’t even aware that I had been working against myself. Through my personal Reiki practice, I began the process of working with myself. I began to identify the cobwebs of confusion, thinking patterns, habits, and started to explore practices that bring me more clarity, focus and compassion. Mind you, this is a daily and lifelong process, which doesn’t end after a Reiki session or class. On the contrary, these are just the beginning, an invitation to your journey back to yourself. But more on that in a future post.
Then in 2016 I met my teacher Frans Stiene from the International House of Reiki. Immediately, I was fransified. I observed the same phenomenon happening to other practitioners. Then it dawned on me, because he embodies the Reiki precepts and is Reiki, his great bright light shines light onto our essences. By simply being who he is, he reminds us of the opportunity to be ourselves. In such a joyful, life-affirming way – that one can’t help to be smitten.
When I participated in Frans’ Shinpiden class in Cologne, Germany, this past weekend, we practiced reiju, the spiritual blessing in the system of Reiki, over and over again. When practicing with one of the other participants, I was madisfied. When he set the intention to share reiju with me I felt like I was electrified. Although we don’t know each other, there was an instant connection, an intimacy that transcended time and space. It felt like a dance between two spaces, permeating into each other, and becoming one. Another participant described this experience as two people being as intimate as possible, naked, with each other, without taking their clothes off and without touching each other physically. People also told me that they have been andreafied. Sometimes my clients even leave my Reiki room saying “Love you” on their way back to their lives. The more I think about this, I realize that we all have been Reikified.
Reiki is full of compassion, truth, and gratitude. It’s a space that provides comfort, safety and possibilities. Infinite possibilities. And when the Reiki practitioner and teacher lives their practice, looks and deals with their own sh*t, lives their life as closely to the Reiki precepts as humanly possible (you can read more about them here), we touch others – simply with our presence and by being ourselves. And this, in turn, provides a safe space for others to be themselves. A space where we are seen, heard, and touched.