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The green fields of time and space. March 1, 2014

Posted by ourfriendben in Reiki, Reiki wisdom.
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“To display His eternal attributes in their inexhaustible variety, the Lord made the green fields of time and space.”
—Jami

This is probably the most beautiful sentence I have ever read. The thought of our Creator at play among the “green fields” of time and space is almost heart-stopping to me. We tend to think of time and space as abstract, the realm of physicists and astronomers. Hardly as green fields.

One of the reasons this resonates so strongly with me is that my home is surrounded by farm fields, green in spring and summer before they come to their golden ripeness and harvest in the fall and then the snowy blanket of winter. But another reason involves my laptop computer.

When I got my computer, it had a screensaver—a beautiful, sunlit green field rising up to a blue sky. I don’t know if this screensaver was standard issue for Windows XP, or if it was selected by my company for all employees, but I found it serene and restful and I loved it. It didn’t distress me when it took the computer forever to get to my homepage, since I could look at the serene beauty of the green field and the blue sky.

I work from home, and sadly, one day my laptop died. The guy who fixed it asked me where the first place I went every morning was (Yahoo, to check my e-mail) and what my interests were (numerous, including gardening). Like an idiot, it didn’t occur to me to ask why he was asking such off-topic questions, so I just answered them. When my laptop returned, it no longer opened to MSNBC’s news page, but to Yahoo’s homepage. And my beautiful, restful screensaver had disappeared, replaced with a busy garden scene reminiscent of a pointillist painting, dizzying in the number of elements compressed into the screen space. I was devastated, though of course I was grateful to have a functioning computer back at my disposal.

At some point since then, the garden screensaver simply disappeared. Now there is no screensaver at all. But no day has passed in the years since I got my laptop back that I haven’t thought of the sunlit green field and the blue sky. The Creator at play in the green fields of time and space.

Those of us who work with the third Reiki symbol and the master symbol, the fourth, are also at play in the green fields of time and space. Like all mystics and meditators, we walk freely through those green fields, under the unchanging sky.

But thanks to Usui Founder and the Reiki Way, we have been given tools to help us find those fields and walk through them without losing our way: The Five Reiki Principles (aka Precepts, Ideals), the Reiki symbols, Reiki meditations, and exercises such as Reiki self-healing, hatsurei-ho, and hado breathing. We need not find our way alone, for we are not alone. We are taking our tentative first steps or our confident strides across those fields in the company of those who walk with us on the Reiki path, in their inexhaustible variety.

Just for today, be grateful.

Time and space. October 3, 2013

Posted by ourfriendben in Reiki, Reiki wisdom.
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“Time initiates processes, and space crystallizes them.”

—Pope Francis

This passage caught my attention when I read Pope Francis’s recent interview, appearing in English in the magazine America, because of the Third Reiki Symbol. The Third Symbol frees Reiki practitioners from the constraints of time and space, enabling us to do distant healing and, at the deepest levels, much more.

We humans are so conditioned to view time and space as immutable, rather than as constructs we have created to allow ourselves to function in the world of the physical. As constructs, they are extremely useful, such as when we slice space up into directions and distances so we can find our way from A to B by going, say, West, for what we’ve chosen to call 130 miles. But as the Buddha said, “In the sky, there is no distinction of east and west; people create distinctions out of their own minds and then believe them to be true.”

Recognizing the truth of this, that time and space are fluid and relative, that we need our human constructs and definitions to function in our everyday human life, but that they are not absolutes, or even ultimate reality, is essential to freeing ourselves to experience the full promise of the Third Symbol.

It’s my belief that time, for example, is not a straight line or continuum but an eternal parallel: That the seven days it took God Creator to create the world and everything in it could be seven billion years in our time (which is why I see no contradiction between the story of Creation and evolution); a mayfly’s life might last only a day, but to it, that day might last as long as a human life.

Remember how slowly the minutes and hours passed when you were a small child, seemingly stretching out forever, then how those same minutes and hours started to rush past as you got older, until, if you were old enough, seasons seemed to flash past in the blink of an eye, one arriving before you’d truly registered that the previous one was here? Or how a half-hour business meeting can seem to drag on for hours, while that same half-hour chatting with friends or hawk-watching or being absorbed in a book or movie can flash by in what seems like seconds? It’s still the same time, it’s we who come to it differently.

The same is true of space; we all perceive it differently. I have read that people who are blind from birth, and whose sight is restored at some point by a new treatment or technology, don’t perceive space at all as those of us born with sight do, and must be trained to see what we see. An easy walk for a fit man could be the journey of an entire lifetime for a beetle. A migrating bird perceives space very differently than a cow in a field or a jellyfish in the sea.

Our idea that time and space are “fixed” helps us navigate our world and interact with others in a common language. When we say “My house is three miles down the road; please be there for supper at 7 p.m.,” we feel comfortable that our guests will show up at our door on time and not get lost.

But the reality of time and space is far more malleable, fluid, porous, jellylike, expansive, stretchy, elusive, indefinable, than our ideas of it. If nothing else, space research and its discovery of such things as black holes has shown us that. When we do Reiki distant healing with the Third Symbol, are we going through a Reiki black hole? Or simply setting time and space aside in favor of the formless now?

Just for today, work with the Third Symbol.

New ways to look at Reiki symbols. August 2, 2013

Posted by ourfriendben in Reiki, Reiki wisdom.
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“In Okuden (2nd level Reiki, ‘deep inside’), one is given three attunements, one to each of the symbols that are taught at the second level of Reiki. In Japanese, the symbols are referred to as Focus, Harmony and Connection. Each symbol represents a doorway or connection to a different type of energy.”
—Tom Rigler, on Gendai Reiki
(http://www.lotusheart.us/)

Having had the privilege of taking Gendai Reiki with Tom, who learned it from its founder, Hiroshi Doi Sensei, I thought you all might enjoy learning the Japanese definitions of the first three Reiki symbols. If you think about it, these are also the definitions that are given to each symbol in English; they’re just expressed a little differently.

Just for today, meditate on the symbols.

Why we have Reiki symbols. April 8, 2013

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When we progress to the second level of Reiki (Chuden), we are given three symbols and their accompanying mantras (the spoken form of the symbols): the first, called “the power switch,” the second, the “mental/emotional symbol,” and the third, which allows us to transcend time and space. Then, at the third level of Reiki (Okuden), we receive a final symbol, the “Master symbol.”

What is the true purpose of these symbols? Do we really need them? Do they in fact give us more Reiki “power”? Well, yes and no.

There is no question that each of these symbols carries its own energy signature, distinct from the others’. You can feel which symbol is being drawn by its signature, even if someone is drawing it behind your back. The intent shapes the energy. It is palpable.

But there is a reason for this, and it’s not about power, it’s about focus. At their most basic level, all spiritual practices are about focus, about honing every cell in our bodies to a one-pointed end, whether we are learning Kendo, the Way of the Sword, or Zen, or Reiki, or whether we’re a toothless old peasant mumbling over our rosary beads.

The rosary is not as far away from the Reiki symbols, especially when we chant their mantras, as it might seem. Protestants mocked “the old women mumbling over their beads” as the ultimate symbol of Catholic stupidity and superstition. So, during the Catholic Counter-Reformation, humiliated Churchmen added layer after layer of exercises, guided meditations, to the praying of the rosary to counter this view. This resulted in engaging the mind in active thought every single second during the recitation of the rosary. And in so doing, defeated its purpose, which was to free the mind through mindless repetition to soar to God.

The purpose of the rosary—and of all prayer beads, be they Hindu, Buddhist, or Muslim—is to focus the mind on the repetition, so that your deeper Self can move on toward God. Let’s say the mind is a puppy, rushing here and there, desperate for attention, whining, crying, chewing the furniture, urinating on the rug, doing anything it can to get your attention. So you give the pup a chew toy, or a bone, or a stick. Suddenly, its attention is completely diverted, leaving you to go on about your own business.

This is the goal of all religious exercises. It’s the goal of prayer beads, of mantras, of chanting. It’s the goal of the Reiki symbols: To give your mind something to focus on so your spirit can continue on the Reiki path.

This doesn’t mean in any way that these symbols are frivolous or bogus. They’re incredibly helpful tools on our path. They’re the GPS that lights up our Way and tells us when to go straight and when to turn. But once we can navigate the Way without the GPS, once we can effortlessly find our way on our own, we no longer need to turn on our navigating tool. We can simply thank it, and keep it in reserve, since who knows, another need for it may arise in the future.

Just for today, value the Reiki symbols but don’t become entangled in them.

All content © copyright Red Dog Reiki. All rights reserved.

Transcending time. February 3, 2013

Posted by ourfriendben in Reiki, Reiki exercise, Reiki wisdom.
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“Time is what keeps the light from reaching us. There is no greater obstacle to God than time; and not only time but temporalities, not only temporal things…but the very taint and smell of time.”
—Meister Eckhart

“Even as a solid rock is unshaken by the wind, so are the wise unshaken by praise or blame.”
—The Buddha

“Just for today…”
—Mikao Usui, Founder of Reiki

What do these three quotes have in common? It may not look like it on the surface, but all three of them are about time, and the need to free ourselves from the constraints of time if we are to progress on our spiritual path.

Obviously, God exists outside of time. And Reiki exists outside of time. But most of us are bound and chained by time; it hangs on us like the chains wrapped around Marley’s ghost, which Ebenezer Scrooge found more terrifying than the apparition itself. We do not live in the now, the present moment; most of us are almost never fully mentally present, as our minds dart back and forth between past and future with such dizzying speed that we’re unable to focus on what is before our eyes.

Fortunately for those of us on the Reiki path, Usui Founder gave us two tools for transcending time. One is the second symbol, which we learn during our level II/Okuden class and which enables us to send distant healing, transcending time and space. The other, available to all of us at all levels, is the set of rules to live by that are known as the Five Reiki Principles (also Precepts/Ideals). Usui Sensei asks us to recite (actually chant) the Principles aloud, morning and evening, with hands in gassho (prayer position). And to break time’s grip on us, the recitation begins with “Just for today” (Kyo dake wa).

The point of both the second symbol and the Principles is that they force us to focus, to concentrate, to be present in the now, which is, after all, the only time we actually have and the only way to transcend time. Have you ever wondered why the days seemed so much longer when you were a small child—time seemed to stretch out, to stand still—and then, as the years went by, it gathered steam like a freight train, rushing by faster and faster? Small children, with their innocent, uncluttered minds, are much better than we are at living fully in the present.

I find all the Reiki symbols helpful focusing tools, but for me, the Reiki Principles are like living meditation. With that “Just for today,” they bring the mind back again and again. You can repeat them silently or aloud, as often as you need. You can bring your mind back to the relevant Principle if you find yourself getting angry or starting to worry, if unkind thoughts arise or you find yourself bemoaning your lot instead of feeling grateful, if you need to bring your focus back to the work at hand. They are a gift from Usui founder to us.

So far, so good. But what does being unshaken by praise or blame have to do with time? Think about it. You’re praised or blamed for actions that occurred in the past. You may also be praised because of an action someone wants you to perform in the future, or blamed in advance because another person is afraid their future actions won’t measure up and is setting you up to take the fall. In either case, praise and blame have nothing to do with the present moment, the now. And they contradict the Five Reiki Principles by contributing to feelings of anger, worry, self-importance (which flies in the face of “Be grateful” and “Be kind”), and distraction (which keeps us from our work). The person who can accept praise or blame with equanimity is breaking one more link in the chain of time.

Just for today, be here now.

All original content © copyright Red Dog Reiki. All rights reserved

How to grow in Reiki. December 20, 2012

Posted by ourfriendben in Reiki, Reiki wisdom.
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I know that lots of us who follow the Reiki Way and have progressed beyond Reiki I are, in effect, addicted to the Reiki symbols. We use them constantly, for protection, for enhancement, for healing, to connect mentally, to transcend time and space. Certainly, I do this, so I know whereof I speak. I never get in my car without making the first symbol over the wheel; every morning, I make it over every appliance and electrical circuit in my house, as well as over every door, and of course over everything I eat. And that’s just the first symbol!

But in many systems of Reiki, such as Komyo and Jikiden, the symbols are not so well regarded. Instead, they’re viewed as training wheels, which can be left behind once they and their meaning have been internalized. I both agree and disagree with this. I totally agree that the symbols are a training tool and are not ultimately necessary to achieve the ends that they represent. But I’m also a strong believer in ritual, in setting up an atmosphere in which magic happens, and I think using the symbols helps to establish this. If there’s something urgent that doesn’t make time for symbolic practice, then there’s no need for symbolic practice, only intent. If you do have the time, then using the symbols can create sacred space, ritual space. I guess it ultimately comes down to what works for you.

But for those who wish to leave the trappings of ritual behind, here’s a wonderful quote that will inspire you and allow you to move forward:

“Students should proceed from symbol to discover the principle. When you get the image, forget the words, when you get the intent, forget the image. Then you will be close [to immortality].”—Liu I-Ming

To me, living a ritualistic life, appreciating every second we’re blessed to be in this earthly paradise, is paramount. Giving Reiki to myself and to the All is central to my practice; trying to live up to Usui Founder’s Five Reiki Principles (aka Precepts, Ideals) is paramount. Maybe it’s simply because my Catholic background is so heavy in ritual, and growing up with ritual showed me its inherent value to shape our lives and our days.

For everyone else, Liu I-Ming’s words of wisdom could free you from a literal attachment to the symbols. Connect with the Teachers (Usui Founder, Hayashi Sensei, and Takata Sensei) and ask them if you’ve grown enough in your practice to leave the symbols behind and simply manifest intent. If the answer is yes, it’s time to move on. Immortality is waiting!

All original content © copyright Red Dog Reiki. All rights reserved.

The Tao of duct tape. September 9, 2011

Posted by ourfriendben in Reiki, Reiki wisdom.
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Yesterday, I was grocery-shopping and found myself parked opposite a gigantic pickup truck. It had apparently been in a too-close encounter and its massive front bumper had fallen off. At which point, the owner had reattached it with duct tape. There it was, the giant bumper dangling from the front of the truck, secured only with duct tape, an accident waiting to happen.

This struck me as a perfect metaphor for Reiki practice. Some people take a Reiki class or two, but the Reiki never really “sticks.” They let their practice slide, until it’s falling away from them, dangling by a thread—or a strip or two of duct tape—ready to drop away at any second. Others make their Reiki practice part of their lives, part of themselves, until it forms such an integral part of them that it could never drop away, even if it does take an occasional battering.

Don’t let the precious gift of Reiki fall away like a duct-taped bumper! Instead, make it an essential part of your daily life:

* Do Reiki self-healing on yourself, at night when you lie down to sleep, in the morning when you wake and before you start your day. Continue to give yourself Reiki during all the idle moments of each day: Place your Reiki hands unobtrusively on your solar plexus and abdomen as you wait at a stoplight, wait in a checkout line, wait for yet another interminable meeting to draw to a close, wait for your kid to finish soccer practice.

* As Usui Founder directed, recite the Five Reiki Principles (aka Precepts, Ideals) aloud and in your heart, morning and evening. I do this ritually, hands in gassho (prayer position), in front of photographs of the Teachers (Usui Founder, Hayashi-sensei, and Takata-sensei). But I also try to hold them in my heart and recite them, aloud or silently, as needed throughout the day. And they are needed throughout each and every day! Try saying them in Japanese and see if that makes you feel closer to Usui Founder, Hayashi-sensei, Takata-sensei, and the whole Reiki lineage. (If you’re not a Japanese speaker, I’ll post a transcription soon so you can still sound out the Principles in Japanese and see what that feels like.)

* If you are Reiki Level II (Okuden) or above, make the Symbols an integral part of your daily practice. Draw them in the air, draw them on your palms, feel their unique energetic signatures. Draw them large, one at a time, before you, then step into their energy or reach out, take it, and place it over you. Feel each symbol’s unique resonance. Chant the name of the symbol over and over as you contemplate it. Draw each symbol on paper. Paint it, watercolor it, ink it with calligraphy. Own it. Use the color(s) for each symbol that you feel as you experience them. Enjoy them, enjoy the feel of them, the sound of them!

And use them. Draw the power symbol over the doors of your house to secure it, over your pets, over yourself. Draw it over the vegetables you’re preparing for supper, your houseplants, your lottery ticket, your vitamins. Drop it into your water before drinking it. Place it on the steering wheel of your car, on an important report, on the road ahead to keep from hitting an innocent creature. Draw and chant it over your appliances, light fixtures, water sources. Draw it over your palms and clients during healing; use your breath to draw and direct it; draw it over your abdomen before self-healing.

Use the second symbol to balance mental and emotional issues, and use both the first and second in conjunction with the third to send calmness and competence ahead to any potentially tense issues you or those who need you may have coming up, like a performance review, exam, job interview, or doctor’s appointment.

* If you’re Level II or above, send distant healing every day. Use the third symbol whenever you need to transcend the limits of time and space. Send healing to the earth, to the victims of natural disasters, to war-torn areas, to the victims of violence, to family and friends, to pets abandoned in shelters, to people deposited in nursing homes, to orphans, widows and widowers, to the homeless, to the hopeless. You don’t need to send distant healing to every single area and issue all at once. Just select something each day and send. Remember that you can send distant healing to the past, present or future.

* If you’re a Reiki Master, let Reiki permeate your day, your night, your everything. Use the Master Symbol. Be the Master Symbol. The goal of Reiki practice is to become living Reiki, the Great Bright Light. Practice, practice, in mindfulness, in mindlessness. Let it be. Let it be now. Let it be always. Become Usui Founder’s torch in daylight. Let your light so shine before men… 

So, Reiki people, see Reiki. Be Reiki. And leave that duct tape on the shelf where it belongs.

Just for today, be mindful.

All content © copyright Red Dog Reiki. All rights reserved.