In 1985, as a brand new and proudly licensed massage therapist, I had the great good fortune to work in a very small clinic that served a large, diverse clientele. Affiliated with the meditation center where the kids and I spent every summer, there were always people who wanted treatments of all sorts, which is what we provided. Three little rooms on either side of a central hallway made perfect spaces for us: I gave massages, the man next to me taught the Alexander Technique, and something cool was going on in the third room. I don't know what went on across the hall; that four or five feet of divide made it like another country.
From the third room on my side, all I heard was laughter. Delighted ribbons of laughter pealed out of there, while the Alexander guy kept his stiff perfect serious posture and I rubbed away on the big sore muscles of the guys from the building crew.
Mine was hard physical work; no one had ever shown me or taught me that we could relieve tension in the body in softer, easier ways. I did what I had been taught, and one day I was working on a guy who was about 6'4" with size 14 shoes and he actually apologized for being so big and hard to work on! Did I mention that meditators are a little bit mind readers? Something had to change.
That day, the third room woman and I were locking up and leaving at the same time, and I asked her, "What do you do in your room?"
With a huge smile that shined in her bright blue eyes she answered, "I do Reiki!"
Immediately I told her, "I want to do that, too." I wanted a practice where people laughed a lot, and where I came out looking as fresh and happy as she did, not all tired out like I felt at the end of the day.
"Ok," she told me, "I make a class."
And she did. My good fortune again was to have met a Reiki Master who could teach me. At the time I had never heard of Reiki, so to have met a Master was what we at the center recognized as Grace, aka pure good luck.
Krishni held the class for four of us at our mutual friend Carol's house, across the street. I remember very few details except getting hooked up to this exquisite energy that made me feel high, relaxed and connected in a way I never had. The last day of class I had to drive down to the airport in NYC to pick up my kids, who had been staying with my parents in Georgia, so I bid Krishni an early farewell. She was returning to Sweden that afternoon, I was moving back into "real life" as a single working mom, I had this amazing gift and in all the hubbub of regular life, for the next eleven years, I forgot all about it! I didn't see Krishni again for ten years; Reiki awareness and practice dissolved into the fabric of my extremely busy, struggling and often overwhelmed single mom life.
Stay tuned for Part 2, where I meet the Reiki Master of my Dreams and reconnect.
From the third room on my side, all I heard was laughter. Delighted ribbons of laughter pealed out of there, while the Alexander guy kept his stiff perfect serious posture and I rubbed away on the big sore muscles of the guys from the building crew.
Mine was hard physical work; no one had ever shown me or taught me that we could relieve tension in the body in softer, easier ways. I did what I had been taught, and one day I was working on a guy who was about 6'4" with size 14 shoes and he actually apologized for being so big and hard to work on! Did I mention that meditators are a little bit mind readers? Something had to change.
That day, the third room woman and I were locking up and leaving at the same time, and I asked her, "What do you do in your room?"
With a huge smile that shined in her bright blue eyes she answered, "I do Reiki!"
Immediately I told her, "I want to do that, too." I wanted a practice where people laughed a lot, and where I came out looking as fresh and happy as she did, not all tired out like I felt at the end of the day.
"Ok," she told me, "I make a class."
And she did. My good fortune again was to have met a Reiki Master who could teach me. At the time I had never heard of Reiki, so to have met a Master was what we at the center recognized as Grace, aka pure good luck.
Krishni held the class for four of us at our mutual friend Carol's house, across the street. I remember very few details except getting hooked up to this exquisite energy that made me feel high, relaxed and connected in a way I never had. The last day of class I had to drive down to the airport in NYC to pick up my kids, who had been staying with my parents in Georgia, so I bid Krishni an early farewell. She was returning to Sweden that afternoon, I was moving back into "real life" as a single working mom, I had this amazing gift and in all the hubbub of regular life, for the next eleven years, I forgot all about it! I didn't see Krishni again for ten years; Reiki awareness and practice dissolved into the fabric of my extremely busy, struggling and often overwhelmed single mom life.
Stay tuned for Part 2, where I meet the Reiki Master of my Dreams and reconnect.
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