What is Reiki?
“Reiki is the source power of the universe, the thing Albert Einstein was looking for and hoping to identify as a mathematical equation. Reiki heals because it is unconditional pure love.”
– Raven Keyes
Reiki, pronounced “Ray-Key”, is a non-invasive healing treatment that helps in down-regulating the nervous system to promote the body’s natural, innate ability to heal. The technique, using gentle touch and no touch, activates the natural healing process and restores physical and emotional well-being. The primary function of Reiki is to restore balance and harmony to our well-being on every level – physical, mental, emotional spiritual…even social.
Reiki is a simple, natural, and safe method that is available to everyone for healing and self-improvement.
Reiki treatments stimulate the body’s own innate ability for healing, which makes it the appropriate support as a complementary treatment for most conventional medical treatments, such as cancer treatment therapies, recovering from surgery, pre-surgery support, managing chronic stress or anxiety, and more. Treatments are adaptable to any environment, for people of all ages, and most conditions: newborns, children, teens, adults, and seniors.
What is a Medical Reiki™ Master?
Certified Medical Reiki™ Masters are trained to offer Reiki in medical environments safely and respectfully. They are passionate about sharing reiki as a holistic, complementary therapy for patients and their caregivers.
Medical Reiki™ Masters do not diagnose conditions, prescribe or perform medical treatments, nor do they interfere with the treatment of a licensed medical professional. Their mission is to support the patient and/or caregiver during difficult or challenging times.
REIKI FACTS
Reiki treatments are one of the top three complementary in-patient therapies offered in 800 plus US hospitals.
These hospitals include or provide reiki as a complementary service to their patients: Johns Hopkins, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard, Yale, Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and George Washington University Hospital as well as Wounded Warrior Programs and Hospice.
Medical Reiki™ can be offered in:
Hospitals: pre, post, and during surgery, with the approval of the surgeon.
Cancer treatment centers.
Chemotherapy suites
Rehabilitation facilities
Assisted living and senior nursing homes
Hospice
Children’s units: NICU, PICU
Labor and Delivery
Intensive care units
Emergency rooms
Veterans hospitals
BENEFITS OF REIKI
Help reduce anxiety, tension, stress, depression, and pain.
Reduces side effects of chemotherapy, radiation therapies, and medications including anxiety, nausea/vomiting, skin eruptions, fatigue, and insomnia.
May decrease the amount of medications needed.
Relaxes soothes the body and mind and calms emotions.
Accelerates surgical recovery and healing.
Balances the body’s immune system.
Dissolves energy blockages and releases toxins.
Enhances feelings of overall well-being.
BENEFITS OF REIKI FOR CAREGIVERS AND MEDICAL STAFF
Immediate relief from stress.
Harmonizes the effects of a stressful environment.
Balances the immune system.
Eases burnout.
A TYPICAL REIKI SESSION
A treatment feels like a wonderful glowing radiance that flows through and around you. A typical session is 60-75 minutes, sometimes 90 minutes if time permits. A Reiki practitioner, treats you, not the complaint. In other words, the treatment focuses on you rather than the ailment. The session starts with a brief conversation which helps to set the intention for the healing. This process helps the client to get comfortable and it gives the practitioner a chance to get a feel for the clients’ energy. The client is fully clothed. It is recommended to wear loose comfortable clothing.
The practitioner gently places hands in different positions on the body or hoovers slightly over the body while the client is either laying down or seated, whichever is most comfortable for the client. The practitioner may place hands or hover on the part of the body that hurts, as well as a series of hand placements on your head, the front and back of the torso, arms, legs, and feet.
The client may or may not notice sensations, such as heat, coolness, and subtle movements are the more common experiences. Clients will experience feeling more open, lighter, more comfortable in the body. Pain is likely to diminish, and possibly disappear.
The treatment is simple, relaxing, and powerful.
BALANCING THE PARA-SYMPATHETIC SYSTEM
No matter where the practitioner’s hands are, the most important benefit of Reiki healing is what’s happening beneath the surface of what you can see, its inner healing inside your body, igniting the natural process of the body remembering how to heal itself. Reiki practice is balancing your whole system. When your body is balanced, your own self-healing is functioning at an optimum level.
Whether or not you feel an evident response, there is an overall response as your body shifts into the powerful parasympathetic nervous system (PNS). When PNS is dominant, the body moves into the rest and digest mode, making it a priority to recover, heal, deeply nourish, and restore itself. This is the body’s innate response, it knows how to do these things naturally.
Our busy lifestyles keep us in the reactive sympathetic nervous system (SNS) mode, which is when the body is coping, it’s in the fight or flight mode. When the body is not given the opportunity to move out of the fight/flight, SNS mode, for long periods of time, chronic stress and chronic contraction take over resulting in dis-ease and illness affecting our well-being on every level – physical, mental, and emotional. The body simply cannot heal when it’s in-flight/fight mode.
