Reiki Addition

Reiki healing additionWhen it comes to Reiki healing, more is better, right? Or is less more? How’s a Reiki practitioner to know?

If it’s a matter of how much Reiki healing to offer, then generally more is better.

But even a little is good. As Hawayo Takata* famously said, A little Reiki practice is better than none.

If the question about more is a matter of adding other practices, however, the answer is not so straightforward.

When seized with an urge to add something to a Reiki session, please consider, why? What do you think it would add? What’s your motivation?

And what is your orientation? Are you outcomes-oriented — trying to make something happen — or are you practice-oriented, content to place hands mindfully and passively, while simply observing the client’s response to treatment?

Does it add up?

If you are outcomes-oriented and your need to make something happen is pushing you to step beyond the scope of Reiki practice, two thoughts:

Once you move beyond the scope of Reiki practice, you also move outside the safety of Reiki practice. Interventions — even subtle ones — always carry risk.

If you are going to add something to what your client has been told to expect — a Reiki session — professional ethics requires you to explain what you propose to do, that it is other than Reiki practice, and to ask permission, aka informed consent.

Assuming it is legal, what you and your client agree to is between you and your client.

*Hawayo Takata brought Reiki practice from Japan in the late 1930s with her Reiki master Chujiro Hayashi, who was a student of Reiki lineage founder Mikao Usui.

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10 thoughts on “Reiki Addition”

  1. In my practice I not only offer straight Reiki session but I offer EssentialTouch which uses Essential oils topically. If the client is familiar with Reiki I offer a short Reiki first, prior to the essential oil application with their permission. Reiki so adds to the essential oils and clients say they can really feel the difference.

    So basically I have found that adding Reiki to another modality works well.

    1. I agree with you, Dani. Reiki practice can support any healing approach, whether it’s conventional medicine or a natural, traditional modality, and beginning with even a few minutes of Reiki practice centers the client and the practitioners and gets the session off to a good start.

  2. I love this discussion as it relates to three incredibly important, inter-related elements of Reiki practice:
    (1) the state of mind/state of being of the Reiki practitioner while offering a Reiki session (and in every day life, too);
    (2) who we are and what we do in relation to a client during a Reiki session; and
    (3) how we ‘represent’ Reiki practice to the public.

    I agree with Nayda, Marybeth, and Kelly, who indicated that the practitioner’s state of being, and relationship to the client, is one of ‘companioning’, rather than ‘treating’ or ‘doing’. Therefore, no external “tools” are needed. To me that is the essence of Reiki practice.

    I also agree that there is nothing at all wrong with other healing modalities, but I do feel there are some dicey points that need to be sorted out with this in terms of how we represent Reiki to the public. I feel we might be confusing the public when we offer Reiki treatments, and then add other techniques or modalities into the session.

    I have had many people come to me, and when the session begins, they ask me where the pendulums and crystals are, because their previous Reiki practitioner utilized them in the Reiki session. So these individuals, by no fault of their own, are confused about what a Reiki treatment is and what it entails. When we confuse the public, we all lose credibility, I feel.

    I am not suggesting that we all become Reiki robots and clones, by any means, but if we add other modalities into an advertised Reiki session, we all suffer from the confusion our very own actions are causing.

    A simple solution is for all of us to be very transparent and clear with our clients that we are either offering a Reiki session OR we are offering other healing modalities in combination with Reiki. It is always our task to inform and educate the public about what the practice of Reiki is and what it isn’t, as well as if and when we add non-Reiki elements to our Reiki treatments and trainings.

    All practices and practitioners are living, breathing entities and, as such, are subject to influences and changes, but we cannot look to a possible conversation between Usui Sensei and any of his students as supporting evidence for adding external “tools” derived from entirely non-Reiki, non-Japanese systems. I wonder if this is how we honor the teachings best.

    So let’s all enjoy all of our healing practices for ourselves, but when providing advetised Reiki sessions with the public, being clear and clean with who we are and what we are doing is the best way to honor the Reiki teachings.

    Thank you.

  3. Reiki can be led by intuition. In my practice, I follow the leading of my Reiki Guide. The basic modality is powerful Reiki. I do not feel it “needs” any help in any way, being Source energy. That being said, I am frequently led to place a healing crystal somewhere on the client or under the table, which I of course tell my client. Why? I don’t know why Spirit decides to heal the way Spirit decides to heal. I am sometimes told why a crystal is used, to share with the client. The crystals have healing power in their own rights and augment the Reiki work being done. This much I do know. Energy healing is not totally explainable, of course. To say any of us understands how healing happens is like saying we can explain the Mystery of Source. People are touched and healed in different ways by different means. Sound is used with Reiki as background music to relax and set a healing ambiance. This is a healing modality on its own. Think of singing bowls and tuning forks. Essential oils are powerful healers as well. I’ve seen them used with amazing results in a Reiki healing session. To close off to new ideas of ways of healing is contradictory to what Dr. Usui advised Dr. Hayashi. Dr. Usui told Dr. Hayashi to develop Reiki using the medical model. This shows that even he, Dr. Usui, was open to the further development of Reiki. Thank you!

    1. Thank you for your comment, Maureen.

      Is “Reiki” led by intuition, or is the practitioner? This is an important distinction.

      Please understand that no one is saying other modalities aren’t useful. It’s a matter of whether or not to mix them, and for practitioners who offer combination sessions, the importance of communicating that clearly to the client in advance. The practitioner might be led by intuition or “Spirit,” but the client should be given the opportunity to make an informed choice.

      You say you’ve seen essential oils give “amazing results in a Reiki healing session.” How do you know it was the essential oils? How do you know there would not have been lasting benefit with Reiki practice only?

      In my experience, the decision to add modalities is made by practitioners who have not given enough Reiki-only sessions and haven’t practice daily self Reiki consistently long enough to know what’s possible with Reiki practice only. Sometimes it seems they choose to offer combo treatments out of boredom and a need to be doing something, to intervene, which is the opposite of place-hands-and-observe orientation of Reiki practice.

      How do you know what Usui told Hayashi? If you have documentation, please share it. Neither Usui nor Hayashi was a doctor.

      But even if Usui told Hayashi “to develop Reiki using the medical model,” that does not support your conclusion that Usui “was open to the further development of Reiki.” Usui saw Reiki as a spiritual healing practice — which means the practitioner develops, not the practice, and practicing in a clinic with the client lying on a treatment table, as Hayashi established, rather than the client seated on a chair as per Usui’s practice, did not involve bringing in other modalities.

      Other modalities weren’t added until after Takata’s death, when some American Reiki masters abandoned the traditional value of practice that has been there since Usui. It was a more-is-better move by Americans who didn’t appreciate the Japanese value of simplicity, didn’t understand the power of lineage or spiritual practice, and didn’t have the understanding or discipline to be still and observe the response to practice.

      Is that a development, or is it a loss?

  4. I agree with you Pamela, Marybeth and Kelly. Reiki is enough for me. Nothing wrong with another healing modalities, but Reiki does not need reinforcement. Also when we do Reiki we are not trying to achieve a goal dictated by our ego. We let the energy flow and achieve what is for the highest good of the person or animal receiving it. No judgment, no expectations. For those that practice another healing modalities I agree with the idea of clients being informed of what they are receiving.

  5. I’m a Reiki Master and a Crystal Healer. I offer both modalities independently and together (if requested). I see nothing wrong with combining healing modalities.

    1. Nicole, although I myself am a bit of a purist, I agree with you that there is nothing wrong with combination treatments. It’s a matter of choice.

      It is, however, important to communicate clearly to the clients about what the he/she will receive during the session, so that the client also has choice.

      It is problematical when clients sign up for a Reiki treatment and other modalities are used without express consent.

  6. The energy that flows from Reiki practice is perfect and I totally agree that if one feels the need to add to Reiki practice you move beyond the safety of Reiki. One can not add to Reiki practice, it is fine on its own. If someone wants to add to their Reiki practice, try doing daily Self Reiki and following the precepts and then you will become a greater channel for the energy that passes through your hands. Great Article Pamela.

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