I am totally new to Reiki. Actually, although I like to think I’m open-minded, I am pretty cynical about most alternative therapies. This post is by no means to share my knowledge on the subject, more to share a genuine story and see if anyone has experienced similar and might know what happened.
A few years back my Mum booked me a Reiki session — she saw an advert for Reiki at her doctor’s surgery — being the lovely, thoughtful person she is, she booked a session for me as she’d seen that I’d been a bit stressed over the previous months. She was also quite curious but didn’t want to have it done herself, I was happy to be a guinea pig :).
I had no prior expectations. I vaguely thought it might be some sort of massage type treatment. I bundled out the house, at the time the kids were young enough to need a babysitter, we’d just got a puppy, my Dad wasn’t well, job was stressful, it was a tricky time.
The lady was lovely. We chatted about life, my new puppy, she told me what to expect. She explained that the lights would be low, relaxing music on and she would talk and hover hands over me to release blocked energies. To be honest, all this stuff about hovering hands and energies didn’t have me convinced, but lying still for a bit was a very welcome break from the pace of life at the time, so all was good with me.
With the room set, she began. She started at my head, I closed my eyes but couldn’t fully relax, she started to tell a nice story about walking in nature but soon, I did start to notice things.
My eyelids were fluttering really erratically — I have noticed this one other time when I tried a guided hypnosis thing.
Then I was experiencing colours in my mind’s eye that would turn into flowers or big birds that looked like eagles. I was pretty unaware of the lady at this stage but she was carrying on down my body. I felt the sensation of a weight on my legs but she hadn’t touched me at all.
This continued the whole time — finally, she was back up at my head and I noticed my ears were wet. I thought that was a bit odd but then, as I came round a bit more, I realised I was crying, I’d like to think quite serenely at first but then the sobs came. I was a bit mortified :-) The session had ended and normally I would be making polite goodbyes and paying the lady but instead, I said ‘you made me cry’ (trying to joke and crack a smile) but continued to sob big, shoulder-wracking tears. Well, I didn’t expect that.
She was completely unphased. She said it was normal, even good, and was to do with the release of blocked up energy and that that was what caused my flickery eyelids too. She said some people laugh hysterically or get a really runny nose. Aware that she likely had another customer waiting, I gathered myself together, thanked her, and left, a bit perplexed.
I was drained — the afternoon and actually the next few days that followed, I felt done-in. She had said to expect this and that it would lift and I’d feel better for it. Well, it did lift and I did feel brighter. I honestly don’t know what happened there — maybe there is something to this energy build-up idea? Why did it make me cry though and what about all the colours and shapes?
Subsequent session — I do think that the experience you have is very much down to the quality of the practitioner — my Mum got me another session a year later, but this time with a different practitioner. Well, this lady was completely different, she talked all the way through but it was chit-chat — she was telling me about her bunions and a disagreement with her son. Needless to say, my energy stayed firmly where it was and I didn’t experience anything I had with the first lady — it was just a general chat really whilst I lay on my back and she waved her hands around!
Do you have a view on this? Experienced anything similar? Would love to know.
Originally published at https://www.swaplifetips.com on February 9, 2021.