Threshold Notes -- Doing The Work

So you have had your Reiki attunements, your Reiki classes, maybe some training about symbols and other techniques; you might even be a Reiki teacher now (or at least attained that level of training.)   Has all this experience made the changes in your life you had hoped for?  Or are you still searching for that magic bullet that will shift everything for you? 

When we start on a new spiritual or personal development path, a lot of times there is a certain excitement and a great amount of determination to change ourselves and the world around us for the better.  We might read other people’s success stories, or even assist some changes in our own family, friends, clients; sometimes we too can notice our own changes as well.  But then everything seems to level off, we get used to the energy we are flowing, the ways things are now in our life; but it doesn’t seem like enough. So we go out searching for a better Reiki, or more symbols, more techniques, hoping that maybe one of these will make what the change or shift we feel we should be experiencing.  Sometimes, we might just give up, for in spite of what other people report, we don’t seem to be reaching the levels or the experiences we had hoped for.  We wonder what might be the problem.  How did Usui do all this in the first place? 

Well, that’s a good place to start.  Looking at Usui’s life (at least what we believe to know of it) might give us some clues, even if he did live in another time, another society.  The first thing to consider is that he was placed on a spiritual path at a very early age, his parents taking him to the local Tendai Buddhist temple at the age of 4.  It was only a few blocks away (it’s a very small village), but still it was the beginning of a new path for him.  And then at around age 16 or 17, after his father’s passing, he left his small village and set out to experience the world. But he did so as a lay monk, a man walking and living a spiritual path every day. So each and every day he was building his inner potential.  And part of his life would be the random 3 week ritual fast from time to time, most likely in the location of the nearest Tendai temple.

So it was that around 1914, as the story goes, after about 45 years of this kind of life in many occupations, he suddenly and unexpectedly experienced an immense jump in his personal energy while in the process of such a traditional fast.  The energy increase seemed to be a by-product of a lightning-like moment when he suddenly knew his life purpose and how to attain it. Not long after this he reportedly began presenting his reiki ryoho, what later became his own Usui Method (what he simply called “my method”) towards the goal of personal peace and development.  But he was also known for that powerful ki (personal energy) that he might use from time to time to assist others in their needs for wellness.  From what his students have reported, he didn’t actually promote that latter part, that healing ability (what Hayashi, Tomita and others later referred to simply as “Reiki”) but instead presented his version of a path towards personal peace of mind and inner development.  I feel he knew that while it was not the main goal, if people wished their own healing power to expand, then like him, they would need to do the inner work first to prepare for this. 

However, his student Eguchi and the retired admirals, Ushida and Taketomi, managed to use some of his ideas and put together a program to awaken that inner healing ability of others, most likely the growing Japanese navy being the intended audience.  The new system, while it did include Usui’s document with his concepts (what we might call the Usui Gainen), it did not include most of the details of the initial level of teachings Usui taught each day.  Unfortunately only a few people like Hayashi, Eguchi and the 5 lay nuns who assisted in the Usui dojo daily had progressed beyond that point through to the completion of what Usui taught. So the spiritual path of Usui, along with the daily personal work it suggested, did not become a part of what became the Reiki teachings of the new system. 

In our times, we have therefore been presented with a very fast path to personal energy development.  But I feel our lack of fulfilment centres around not having a process to do the inner spiritual development that those like Usui and other masters before him experienced before they went out to teach or heal. It’s like we found a back door, walked in and experienced what we thought was the end result of this type of development.  But the healing side is just a sort of carrot (incentive) to working on ourselves each day.  I don’t mean applying Reiki to ourselves, although that is a very good daily habit.  I mean finding some inner form of development that grows the spiritual side of us.  It does not have to be Usui’s original methods, although those are a fine path.  It does not have to be a form of Buddhism, or any religious or New Age type of belief system.  It simply needs to be something that you work with daily, that you actually use and develop with, a growing part of your life.  As you do so, I think you will find that your own energy abilities will grow and expand along with that inner development. 

I’ve also noticed that for some, Reiki tends to draw to them lessons to help bring this about.  The balancing properties of Reiki help to loosen our hold on beliefs and attitudes that are not advantageous to our development.  Unfortunately these can be very harsh lessons for some, even causing the people around us to grow distant or avoid us.  An example is how some Reiki masters seem to be only interested in gaining power over others.  So like Usui, I think it’s a good idea to pursue and live some sort of spiritual training, if you have not already found something that speaks to you.  It may begin with a video, a meditation method, a book or an interesting class. I have a few ideas at my Light Body Threshold resources page, but there are many more avenues available to you. Let your Heart centre lead the way. I think you will know what is right for you just by how you begin to feel better in the process.  It’s a good start to getting around to “doing the work.”