DISTANT REIKI
- Just like Grandma used to do...
Copyright © 2006 James Deacon

During a refreshment-break on the second day of a level 2 Reiki class I was teaching, one of the younger students asked if we could talk for a moment.

She told me how much she was enjoying the course, and how she felt she had to share something with me.

A little while earlier in the day, I had introduced the students to the idea of using a teddy bear as one many possible forms of medium for delivering distant treatment to a client.

This particular student explained how she had not wanted to interrupt the flow of the course at the time (Brownie Points for that, I thought!), but that she was excited by the realisation that her grandmother might well have been a Reiki practitioner, even though the now very elderly lady had never ever mentioned the fact.

“Well”, she said, ”Grandma was always into herbs and natural cures, that kind of thing, y’know; so I suppose she might have also done Reiki training – actually, come to think of it, she might even have been a Reiki Master!”

She explained how, as a child, she had on several occasions, seen her grandmother doing what she now recognised as a variation on the teddy bear proxy-healing practice (her grandmother had actually worked with a small, plain, 'rag-doll').

“Now, I know you said Reiki can be seamlessly integrated into other therapeutic practices – if a person feels the need – but,” she asked, almost hesitantly “do many people actually use Reiki and some other therapy together - for doing distance healing?"

"I suppose it’s really a matter of what the individual feels works best for them” I replied. “So, why do you think your Grandmother was trained to Reiki master-level?” I asked.

“Well, it only just struck me a few moments ago”, she explained "I think she might have used the master symbol mantra when she was working 'distantly' on the client. I always remember, as a little girl, sneaking into her bedroom and watching her work. Of course I had no idea then as to what she was doing – and I never let her know that I had often watched her."

“You see, Grandma used to kind of half-whisper under her breath – when she was ‘treating’. In fact, the more I think about it now, the more sure I am that what she was quietly chanting was the mantra of the Reiki master symbol!”

The young woman was becoming very animated now.

”Yes, I’m almost certain that’s what it was!” she continued excitedly, "Each time Grandma pricked one of the acupuncture needles into the rag-doll’s head or torso, she would repeat the mantra three times – though, because of the way she was whispering, I could only ever hear the first syllable…"