Getting in touch

As my aspiration deepens, the moment to moment choice of what is best shifts naturally. What used to seem horribly complicated, or terribly risky, now seems clear. I don't know everything, and that's fine. As important and seductive as old perspectives once were, it feels wonderful to let them go, and just do what really calls to me. There's so much nourishment and learning in that.

• • •

A young professional arrives for a Reiki session. She is smartly dressed, and strides down the hall to introduce herself.
“I’m here to see what Reiki is like, and if it has anything to offer me,” says Kaye. “I’ve never had Reiki before.”
I show her into the clinic room and ask her to take a seat opposite mine. I pour glasses of water.
“I want a friend to meet me here afterwards,” Kaye says, checking her phone to see if there is any progress on arranging this. “Oh, she can’t make it. Never mind.”
She drops the phone into her bag and collapses back in the chair.
Watching her movement, I get the sense of someone who is feeling quite wound up; and for myself, I feel uncertain and defensive.
A good thing to do when this happens is to get in touch with my purpose.
I say to Kaye, “Before we go any further, let’s take a minute to sit here and relax. Then I’ll ask you about your motivation for coming along.”
Kaye agrees. She says she will take the time to meditate.
“Great.”
I lower my gaze and bring my awareness to my abdomen.
What’s going on with me? I am experiencing a sense of inadequacy. I’ve made a judgement of Kaye’s confidence, and I’ve been thinking, “I’m not a go-getter. She’s not going to relate to me.” I’ve been triggered into a reactive state, and have lost touch with my centre.
Isn’t it great to recognise when this is happening?
I think to myself, I'm here to offer something real. Can this work? And I answer, Yes, once I’m grounded.
After a minute of sitting together in silence, my breath slows down and I feel calm. I ask Kaye how she is feeling.
“Much better, thanks. I was a bit hyper when I arrived.”
“What brings you along today?” I ask.
Speaking quietly, she tells me that she suffers from anxiety. She’s recently been in Chiang Mai, and received healing treatments which helped her feel calmer. However, after two weeks back home, and with her usual lifestyle, the anxiety has returned. She is having trouble sleeping at night.
“I thought Reiki could be good for this. What do you think?”
I now feel present to this person and to myself.
I also have a sense that there’s something about the perception of inadequacy I noticed in myself which contains a clue to what Kaye (and the rest of us) are dealing with.
I explain what a Reiki treatment involves, but I go a bit further.
“Coming to a Reiki practitioner, it’s ultimately not about receiving a treatment. I suspect that, for you, it may not even be about getting rid of your anxiety. It's about being in touch with ourselves.
“We have this wonderful life (regardless of what we say about it), and yet we live in a culture that tells us we need something other than that: better looks, more education, a certain image, popularity, wealth etc. Our media often points us to a bliss or happiness which is outside. They are usually doing that to sell stuff, not to edify us. And our friends and family go the same way – they're often in the same head space. Have external solutions ever lived up to their promise of deep contentment? Even when they're momentarily satisfying, we have to accept that no emotion is final.
“Though we are programmed in many ways not to trust ourselves, when we touch our actual experience, we’ll find the basis for real confidence. If we’re willing to be open to what’s happening internally, it won’t even depend on whether we’re anxious or not. Then the choices we make can come from a place of balance, rather than out of fear or craving. Reiki is one way of getting in touch with that balance.
“Does that make sense?”
Kaye nods. There's a new quality in her eyes: a combination of humility and fire. It’s a powerful thing to see somebody recognise the importance of their life.

• • •

This short work of Reiki fiction is a response to the question of finding our deeper intention.

We all have external tasks to accomplish, like Kaye the young professional. But we are busy in another way too: making a show of our togetherness, our intelligence, our confidence, our fashion, our goodness — because we judge ourselves and others inadequate. We may start to experience side-effects from this way of thinking, and seek solutions to those, rather than to the essential cause of imbalance.

As my own Reiki teacher has pointed out, the client’s underlying search is for something more than the alleviation of symptoms. Each of us is yearning to be in touch with our life.

In a hands-on Reiki treatment, we’re being invited to connect with our life: with things as they are. That will reveal to us what our real needs are.

Surrender brings forth the energy of the Reiki session. Surrender means returning to our true home, reality. When the practitioner is operating in the present moment, the client is given the space to connect with his or her own truth. Consciously and physically, they gain perspective and inspiration on why they’re here and what they need.

Copyright Geoff Moore, December 2015