I recently completed my Reiki level 2 certification, and am now offering Reiki sessions, in addition to my intuitive energy work offerings. The process of integrating Reiki into my life and my work, and learning to dance with the Reiki energy, and to embody the energy signatures of its Five Precepts, as well as the first three symbols, has been a beautiful one – and it is a continuing one. I had understood for some time that Reiki was a system of language and symbol for working with energy. I had read about William Rand, read his manual, and knew that Reiki was something I was interested in, yet I did not feel like it was in my path to take a weekend workshop, or to learn the way that the William Rand manual I owned described. Something in the western Reiki felt intellectualized and somehow disembodied. I felt called to find a teacher who was local and would teach me Reiki, through the practitioner level, one-on-one. I trusted my higher self and energetic guides to assist me in finding the right teacher for me at this time. I found Darlene Sochin, and we began meeting.
I knew I had found the right teacher for me the first time we talked on the phone, and this was confirmed upon our first meeting in person – to begin my Reiki training. Darlene discussed how the Reiki practice and system created in Japan was transported to the west, and how it was adapted to better meet western needs and fit within the western culture and mindset. In a nutshell, it became somewhat distorted, with an egoic and externalized focus. Practitioners are taught that they need to receive permission, by way of an attunement, from a teacher before work with the energy can begin. Certain hand positions are taught, that correlate to treating certain conditions, and there is an externalizing of the symbols. With Darlene I learned to embody an integrated Reiki practice and methodology that is a return closer to the original intention of the Japanese system. Darlene comes more from a traditional Reiki approach and has integrated what she has learned from the Western system as well.
The traditional Japanese approach to Reiki is one in which Reiki energy is integrated into daily spiritual practice, and there is a focus on the Five Precepts as well as on the first two symbols as mantras, embodied by the Reiki practitioner. This leads to embodiment of oneness, and movement beyond duality (the energy of the third symbol). From this place of inner connectivity, healing, and evolution, the practitioner offers Reiki sessions to clients.
In this Reiki, I learned that the energy force I had awakened, which moved within me and had in part been guiding me, was Reiki energy. I learned that everyone has access to and connection with this universal energy. I learned that Reiki was a name for the energy I had been working with and had felt flowing through my hands as I performed my personal intuitive energy work on myself and others. I learned that Reiki was also a name for a system of working with this energy, and for embodying the oneness of all as well as evolving the self, in connection with higher self. The precepts and the symbols all contained their own energetic signatures, or presences, and I work with the precepts daily and the symbols frequently as I continue to develop, embody, and refine my relationship with my higher self and energetic guidance system through connection with these energies. In other words, I had found a solid framework of language for my deep energetic and spiritual work and for my personal daily practice and process.
Throughout the process with Darlene, I felt the flow of Reiki energy between us, and I was learning and growing in my daily practice. I was preparing to have a relationship with the energy that I could effectively access to assist others in healing themselves and in evolving in their own lives. As a hollow-bone or clear channel for the Reiki energy to come through, I can allow my energy to dance with that of my clients, as I facilitate the movement of stuck energy and release of patterns that no longer serve – while supporting the development of energetic patterns that do serve.
Over several months, I learned to recognize Reiki energy, to center myself and ground myself – balancing and working with hara. This work has contributed to my rich daily practice and has led to a definite growth in the relationship I have with myself, my higher self, my purpose, and my energetic guides. My work with Darlene has been instrumental in helping me name what I am doing, as well as in building my confidence, and deepening my spiritual and energetic relationships.
When I met with Darlene for our final session, marking my completion of Reiki 2 (practitioner level), I knew that what we had done was add to my foundation, and that my work with Reiki was truly only just beginning. This was confirmed for me during my morning meditation practice a few days later. Let me finish this post by sharing that experience, as it felt to me like an embodiment ritual that was no less than the Reiki energy showing me that I am, in fact, at the point in my Reiki practice where it is appropriate to bring my practice forward, in service to others.
I have been chanting the five reiki precepts, in their original Japanese language, daily for several months. My relationship with the energetic signature of the precepts has led me to a still more stable and grounded place on action, not reaction, of flow and stability in motion, and of an ease about my center. In other words, to a greater state of inner peace, and a greater state of refinement of myself, contributing to greater alignment with my soul and life’s purpose. A few days after my culminating session with Darlene, I had some worry. I had some questioning in my body regarding what my next steps were, and how to get from where I am to the path ahead and the ultimate birthing of my vision of myself in service.
I always journal before I meditate, as well as after. And this day, I felt I was to commune with the energy signature of the Reiki precepts, as an entity or force in and of itself. I sank into my chanting of the precepts, and a wonderous experience unfolded. My chanting had more variance in tone and speed than ever before – becoming a beautiful melody. This happened automatically. From here the melody became a backdrop as I was led by the energy into a dance, into a trance, and into a journey state that would last over an hour. In this state, my vague questionings, and doubts, mentioned in my pre-meditation journal were addressed. I felt the reiki precepts in front of me, and then in a partial merge state with my own energy field. As the journey continued, I was led to a greater state of embodiment of the precepts, and into some automatic movements as thanks to, and as an offering to, the Reiki energy for working with me. I saw my vision – my path – before me stretched out in time and space, although I was not in time and space. I was given, or I came to see, the concrete steps I needed to take – what I had been avoiding in part, what I was now ready for that I hadn’t been, in part. Another initiation in my spiritual journey. And there was celebration of progress. A new threshold crossed.
At a certain point, the precepts energy had merged completely with my own energy, and we were in a co-creative dance. The energy feeling embodied, and myself, while still present, entirely following the flow and lead of the precepts. This is somewhat hard to describe, but in essence, I became an embodiment of the five precepts for a time. This gave me an invaluable window into an embodied experience of absolute oneness. Absolute connection. And Absolute peace. This is the direction of our evolutionary growth; this is the direction of our human and our energetic soul potential. At a certain point I felt the dancing ending. My thoughts and awareness of time and space became more present. The energetic realms in which I had just been engulfed became less present. At first, I stopped too abruptly, opened my eyes, and felt jarred. I closed them again. I resumed my chanting. I let it quiet and slow more naturally. This allowed the energetic signature of the Reiki precepts to slowly fade back into my unconscious, as my awareness returned to my physical body and to the room in which I was sitting, the time of day. I felt a sense of culmination, or even consummation, of my relationship with the Reiki system, with Reiki energy, and with my own place in the oneness. It felt like a combination of a completion and a new beginning.
It is from this place, with this experience, that I am called now to offer Reiki as a part of my practice. It is with my daily practice and continued inner growth and evolution that I will always seek to offer what is of highest service to those who work with me. My sessions involve intuitive bodywork, via connection with the energy signature of Reiki, as well as my own energetic body and system of energetic guides. Around this work, we talk, and gain an understanding of where you are as well as where you are. Click here to schedule a free 45 minute consultation.
