Welcome to the ReikiMastery News!

Nov 2007

In This Edition:

Healing Night & Class Schedule

My full class schedule appears in the left panel.

I have a Reiki Master class coming up Thanksgiving weekend. This is a Friday Saturday Sunday class. Since most people who work a 9to5 job have the day after Thanksgiving off, I schedule this class so they don't have to take a day off of work. I will just be coming back from Japan this month, and that along with the Thankgiving energy will means this master class will be very powerful.

Starting in January I will be offering an extended option for Reiki 1&2 classes in Sierra Madre. The extended option will start friday nights with an origins of Reiki Slide Show and signed copy of my book. The standard Reiki 1&2 class will continue as always on Saturday & Sunday, and Monday has been added as a practice and new techniques day, including a Reiki guide meditation and healing attunement. The cost of the standard Reiki 1&2 will remain $350. The extended class will be $500. Anyone from past classes that want to only come to the extended portion of a future class can sign up to do so.

There will be also extended options for ART/Master and Karuna Master. Still working out the details.

Jess & Jeff Personal News

Please keep sending energy for the best housing situation for Jeff and I and the financial stability to make it work. There is a chance we might have to find somewhere to move to in January, or not. There is a chance we could be allowed to buy the house we are in below market or not. It has been an amazing experience of life in limbo, and dealing with lawyers and a lot more stress than I am accustomed. Jeff has been great at managing things, especailly with me gone in Japan. I am looking forward to it all being settled, your positive energy deeply deeply appreciated.

Reiki's Birthplace: Kurama News

Kurama Prayer Requests:

I have been bringing the prayer requests up to the mountain with me every time and asking the mountain for energy for all those whose prayers I carry. I am going to do a full reading of all the prayers after Nov 10th, so if you havent sent me your requests, please to do. Send an email to jess@reikimastery.com, with "Kurama Prayer" in the subject line. I am not replying to individual prayers til after the 10th.

Kurama Books In Japan

I brought 7 copies of my book to Japan and that was not enough. Then I had 20 more books sent to me, and that is not enough either, so I am getting 20 more. Slowly setting up some distribution channels here. Several people are refusing to accept a percentage for selling the books, which is a great, if unexpected validation of my work. Some copies will be staying in Japan, some will be traveling with Reiki people home to Argentina, Latvia, Canada and Australia. Arjava Petter saw the copy I had sent to Tadao Yamaguchi and has requested a copy as well.

Reiki is Better than Rest For Cancer Patients

Small pilot study demonstrates that cancer patients recieving Reiki treatments had less pain and fatigue then those who spent a similar amount of time simply resting each day. http://www.medscape.com/medline/abstract/17351024

Positive Thinking : A New Old Twist

My friend Linda Crawford heard this technique from her son Blake. When you are having a bad day, instead of trying to chase out the negative thoughts, deliberately think of things that make you feel joy. Favorite places, colors, people, ideas, books, movies. When Linda had surgery a few years ago, for the days before she rented all the comedy movies she could find.

When writing this idea up for this newsletter, I remembered where I heard it before, in the musical, The Sound of Music:

My Favorite Things
Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens;
Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens;
Brown paper packages tied up with strings;
These are a few of my favorite things.

Cream-colored ponies and crisp apple strudels;
Doorbells and sleigh bells and schnitzel with noodles;
Wild geese that fly with the moon on their wings;
These are a few of my favorite things.

Girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes;
Snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes;
Silver-white winters that melt into springs;
These are a few of my favorite things.

When the dog bites,
When the bee stings,
When I'm feeling sad,
I simply remember my favorite things,
And then I don't feel so bad.

The 1000 arms of Kwan Yin

Kwan Yin, known as Kannon in Japan is a wonderful compassionate being who has vowed to help all sentient beings to reach enlightenment. I attended Tadao Yamaguchi's foreign language Reiki 1&2 class (Tadao learned Reiki from his mother who learned directly from Chujiro Hayashi) He described Kannon as a universal beneficial being, as not being connected to any specific religion, and seemed very surprised we didnt understand this.

Kannon is often depicted in Japan as having 1000 arms. In reality these statues of her will have either 40 arms or 25 arms, each of which holds a different implement symbolizing some aspect of her power. Each of the 1000 arms is said to save a world. 1000 is not intended to be the literal number, it simply means many many many worlds.

Kannon is one of the major beings of Kurama mountain, temples have been dedicated to her on the mountain since 790 AD, over 1200 years ago. Walking at Osugi Gongen, I had an inspiriation, an understanding of the 1000 arms that made sense to me.

The 1000 worlds were not 1000 other planets, they were the 1000 worlds inside each of us. And I started thinking about my life as a series of worlds. Home life worlds, work/career worlds, friends and lovers worlds, health worlds. How many worlds do we each walk. In some of these worlds we are magnificent, we have things figured out well, and are acting cleanly with right action. Why should we need energy or healing or help? But then there are the other worlds within us all full of cobwebs and old fears, and things not working. The 1000 arms of Kannon, or 1000 arms of Reiki, or 1000 arms of god, symbolize helping save us in all the worlds we walk, not just those we assign to the symbol "health" or "spiritual" or "new age". Often we spend all our lives focusing on only a handful of the worlds we live in while the rest go empty and unfulfilled.

Take some time this month to think about your 1000 worlds, and make a list of them, and ask what can Reiki do to help heal, strengthen and save that world. Then think about the same thing for the people whose lives you touch.

Using Reiki to Talk to the Sacred Energies

Coming to Japan is always full of Reiki stories for me and not just about people but statues and places. The people who built the temples and statues of Japan loved them.. They were not just art, they mattered.

In a country where I do not speak much of the language, I can at least talk to the land and talk to the energies of the temples and shrines.

This is what I do:

Either go to a place where you feel a sense of presence you would like to connect to be it a church, temple, mountain, beach or statue.

Bow to show respect.

In Japan you would then clap twice, or ring a bell to let the energy of the place know you are present. You can also use the Reiki distance symbol to connect to its energy.

Greet the energy of the place or statue. I do it by saying "Hello" either out loud or silently, and often waving.

State your request, "I would like to experience what you are like" or "Would you please send energy to XXXX"

Wait. Give the energy a chance to respond. You may hear words, you may feel a sense of gratitude, or amusement, or acknowledgement. You may sense nothing. But by allowing a space for a response you are allowing it to be a 2 way communciation, whether they take advantage of it or not.

You might wish to offer aid in the form of Reiki energy to the place to strengthen it's chi. Reiki is wonderful because it really something that is useful in the spiritural world.

Bow and say "Thankyou"

I do this kind of thing alot in Japan. I bring people to Sangusangendo, the hall of 1000 Kwan Yin statues to offer Reiki and charge the statues up.

I do this alot on Kurama. I ask the energy of various places and sacred trees on the mountain to send positive energy to those whose prayers I carry. (Most notably the prayers of prayers you have been sending me (email me with Kurama prayer in the subject by Nov 10th)

I do this in many of the temples and shrines I visit, even the museums. It makes my experiences in Japan much more multidimensional and meaningful.

I am often asked if I am religious. My most recent answer is that I believe deeply in god, but not in religion. So often religion be it Buddhist or Christian becomes about form. Doing the right things at the expected time. Following the form is important, it means that even when one's heart is not in something, you are giving the divine a chance to enter your life. It is like pausing after you pray to see if God answers, or pausing after you talk to a statue to see if it has a reply. Making space in your life for the divine to enter. But if you get to the point where you think the form is all that is important and go through the motions without trying to connect, your spiritual life is empty and you might as well not have a religion at all.

Whatever way you see the non-physical world invite a relationship with it, be it Christian, Buddhist, Muslim, Shinto, Pagan, or simply the Universe itself. If you are religious let your religious life be real and connect deeper into who you are. If you are spiritual without following the form of a religion, make time for the divine in whatever way you can.

One of the great messages of Reiki is that there is more to the world than meets the eye, and that you can connect to it, heal it, manifest it, dream it, in more ways than you thought possible.