reiki: use it or lose it (well... sort of)

i'm looking forward to hosting my april reiki share tonight... 

this is a monthly social and healing gathering where reiki healers interact and swap treatments. i give suggestions, answer questions and help healers feel the energy coming through, interpret how it wants to work and what that means for the specific healing situation.

why share reiki?

i was a bit of a 'reiki slut' when i first trained - i'd meet someone and next thing i knew i was giving them a treatment. i'd dart out of the office to give treatments every night. practising on strangers was great - i knew nothing about them so i didn't feel limited by shyness or fear of what they would think.

most healers don't do this. and so a big challenge after learning reiki is the lack of opportunity to practice on diverse people. without practice, it's hard to gain the self-confidence you need as a healer. this is where practical hands-on experience comes in, to move beyond self-doubt.

with practice, doubt dissipates. you start to feel more natural about identifying or interpreting blockages and warnings, developing bedside manner and communicating or relaying root causes of symptoms that are felt during a treatment.

amazingly, the more you practice and develop focus and intention, the more reiki is available to you. you become expert at grounding, protection, cleansing and intuition. it is subtle and yet powerful - it requires time to sense and identify what the energy means to each healer.

so developing your circle of reiki healers is important as we often need to discuss challenges, share approaches, practice and hone skills, and remind each other to practice.

as a teacher, it's an amazing opportunity to share in the development of students and help them break free of self-doubt and rigidity, as well as hone their sense of trust and intuition. 

and tonight...

my intention for tonight's coaching is to "pull out all the stops", which quite literally means to pull out all the limits, the barriers and stop signs pinning us down and to let go!!   or as we say in our circles... let the reiki flow.

making your full moon wish

make a wish and send it out...
image: double dandelions by dennis vebert

as far back as i can remember i'd duck and hide on the full moon. something odd would always seem to happen...

one time my car window was smashed in, parked right in front of my apartment window. for apparently no reason, nothing was stolen...

another time, someone dropped their phone on the sidewalk and when i went to pick it up my vintage dress suddenly ripped open all down the back...

even as a teenager, i nearly sliced my finger off in class once and while the instructor was talking to me i fainted standing up...

people would always say "full moon"... let's just say it got my attention. i'd cringe at it looming on the calendar. but recently i took some time to study the cycles of the moon and here's what i found.

opposition

for centuries, many calendars, festivals and events were set by the lunar cycle. farmers would plant and harvest based on the movements of the moon. the full moon is the brightest and most luminous part of the cycle because at that point the sun and moon are in opposition. this positioning across from each other on either side of planet earth elicits special behaviours...

animals become more active. ocean waves and tides get more violent. humans act up. paramedics know it. prison officers know it. emergency room staff know it. remember the riots in vancouver after they lost to boston? toronto's transformation from a clean, decent city to mass chaos during a the G20 summit? full moons. i wished governments knew it.  

if we are all energy, then we are all connected energetically. and if energy intensifies at the full moon, no wonder we experience intense emotions, express ourselves more intensely and encounter intense situations. we feel each other's energy more intensely. but this is not always a bad thing.

making the most of full moonery

if we think in terms of the intensity of a full moon, we can consciously choose to be at our intensely best at the full moon. we could be our most intensely inspirational. our most intensely influential. our most intensely genuine, our most intensely vital, intensely creative.

so instead of ducking for cover during the full moon, here's what i suggest.

• take a moment. take a deep breath. step into your true integrity, your true self. 
• create a vision of something simple you want. in other words, make a wish. a great one, for you and for everyone around you. 
• breathe and meditate on it, filling it in with details. allow your vision to intensify and get energized. 
• imagine the vision taking place now, in reality. allow yourself to feel it in every cell of your body.
• release the vision after a few minutes allowing it to float out through the breath. release your ownership of it. 

now, instead of looking at the calendar and getting anxious, i feel more optimistic. i've even built a whole manifestation meditation program around the lunar cycle, with each position of the moon a reminder of the next step in the process, which culminates around the full moon.

so take a moment and create that vision for what you want in your life. may your full moon wishes come true.

your win-culture

win-culture: this darling finished 1st in 20 of 21 races

i had one of those days. the kind when you feel like closing the blinds and hiding. too much fear abound. i get calls from people asking me to give them yes/no answers about their future. 60 questions fired at me in 20 minutes. and i feel queasy after. don't get me wrong, i don't dislike people. in fact i love them very much. but, this is the way we are living our lives? so here's a hint: if you want to ask me questions about your future, please don't. instead, read this. 


many years ago i remember being forced to go to a horse race track. 


it was my sister's birthday and that was her wish: to have a decadent afternoon brunch spent betting on horses. now, i absolutely *hate* gambling, lotteries, casinos, horse betting, wagers... the energy around these things still gives me the heebie-jeebies. but some how, i managed to find myself at the monolith toronto woodbine racetrack. i even found myself having a monolith brunch and i even placed bets. 


a funny thing happened. i won a whole lot that day. every single horse i bet on finished within the top three. how did i do it? the formula was equal parts intuition and study. and no fear. 


since i was stuck at the race track and since they went through the trouble of publishing statistics on each horse, i studied them. all the horses i chose had this in common: none achieved anything less than wins within in the last 6 months of their racing careers, and all their trends were upward. why were these details important? because these young horses were developing a personal culture of winning. my study told me that winning was in their mindset. my intuition said it was in their blood.   


simply put, if you want to be the best, then develop your win-culture, your personal culture of being nothing but the best. sure there will be adrenaline. but it's gotta be the healthy kind. the excited, passionate kind. not the looking-over-your-shoulder-for-what's-going-to-beat-you kind. that's plain fear. too much of that and you will wind up looking everywhere but at your prize.


so if you are looking for answers, this is it. you don't need a fortune teller or a horseshoe up your ass. develop your personal win-culture. and if you really, really want something and you dedicate yourself fully to it with passion... i bet anything that you will have it. 

three things i loved about learning reiki

And you get to work with your hands

teaching reiki is tiring work... but i love it. one of the best parts is watching the shift people experience as they go through an intensive weekend with you. some see bright colours, others feel sensations that are new and exotic to them. others still beam like sunshine after they are done. there are three huge reasons why i love teaching reiki to people:

#1: i love the feeling of "beginner's mind" 

it was shunryu suzuki who said: "in the beginner's mind there are many possibilities. in the expert's mind there are few".

i remember my first Reiki course. it was supernatural. i was in awe at my teacher. i mean, he saw things. i couldn't discuss it with anyone. and yet, as soon as i had the chance i pounced on my homework: 10 treatments on other people.

it was my icebreaker at parties. 

i'd sidle up to someone. "hey, are you free tuesday night?" knowing the answer would be a yes,  i'd follow up with, "great, can you lie down for an hour so i can put my hands on you and give you a reiki treatment?" nobody ever said no. i learned a lot this way. 

in two months, i had given close to 40 treatments to different people.

#2: i love intuitive experimenting. 

if practised correctly, you get to hone your intuition. feeling the different energies, the difference in sensation in each treatment, trying out new things and feeling creative again. noticing when i'd need to make movements, sounds or speak and deliver an important message. simply letting go of any control and letting reiki radiate, pulse or flow out, drenching the person in pure vital energy.

i found the more i let go, the more effective the treatment was. i'd pick up images, and know immediately that something they thought was the problem was just a physical manifestation of something hidden. and then hearing what people felt and sensed and knowing i felt and sensed the same things was amazing confirmation that reiki was working in subtle and powerful ways.

#3: you start with yourself 

reiki is one of the few things you can actually do for yourself first. it's part of the course. you give yourself a treatment before you give anyone else a treatment. and as you do, you notice how effortless it is, how amazing you feel after and how beneficial it is to practice on yourself as much as possible. (i still do).

selfish, you say? sure. but who am i to tell you about you, before i start with me? and so i did. the transformation was slow but profound. i had radical shifts in perception. i had amazing shifts in my ability sense energy, target pain and illness and discover its roots. and i transformed from a pretty cynical hospital worker into a reiki healer and teacher. who woulda thought?

so even though teaching is hard work, it's a privilege to pass this ability on. and to anyone who feels the pull to learn reiki... get pulled! besides being easy and transformational, it's super natural.

want to learn?

Salima teaches weekend Reiki courses in Toronto each month. Find out more about learning Reiki or get a Reiki treatment and feel the difference it makes for yourself!

what i learned from juggling

do try this at home!

a few months ago i helped organize a retreat called the art of seeing clearly.

it was a weekend in the country by the water, designed to help people learn how to improve their vision naturally. amazing right? what's even better was the full body and mind approach.

juggling class

so one afternoon we broke into groups. each group learned a new skill or talent. i was giddy. i was going to learn how to juggle!

now, i had done this a lot in my life. with work, with time, with people... just not with my hands. little did i know what i was about to experience was more than a mere trick or circus act.

time after time, my little hacky sacks would fall to the floor. plop-plop-plop! a little embarrassed and a little determined, i'd quickly swipe them up and try again. over and over. sometimes i'd catch them. sometimes they'd fall to the floor, making that terrible bean-baggy sound. less plops, more pshh-pshh-pshh!

where was i going wrong? so i started to mindfully watch what was happening, blow by blow, noting every move like a sports commentator. and here's what i noticed.

le trick: let go

we tend to believe when we start out, that juggling is about catching things. yes, catching is important, but in reality the hardest part about juggling is actually the letting go.

if you are a juggler, you know. the whole trick is in the constant and mindful release. the opening up of the clenched hands, the hands that want to cling, covet, keep these prized objects. when really, they are just hacky sacks.

in an instant i saw how everything in life is a hacky sack. everything! and we are made to think that we need these things. but if we learn to let go, to open up and throw everything into the air, to mindfully release, we find that the catching takes care of itself.

so next time i drop the ball, i'm going to pick it up and toss it high up. i might just make enough space to see a bit more clearly. or i might join the circus, who knows.