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REIKI - the wisdom of gaining and holding onto illness
What purpose does illness serve?
People often ask the question what is the meaning of illness and sadness? Are they really God’s punishment, the finger of fate or something else? For most people the concept of illness is too much to contemplate and have no desire to look at illness straight in the eye and ask it why are you here? Instead of this people seek to fight against it with all their strength in attempt to destroy it.
In reality illness has been the bane of mankind since ancient times but only a few have been prepared to become aware of it. Some faiths have looked upon illness as a curse from God, science look upon as an invasion of bacteria, poor living conditions and other similar things. Spiritual wise men went a step further as for them illness is a sign, a message to the soul of a man sent to show him how to continue his spiritual growth.
Richard Bach (1886-1936) thought of it in this way: “Illness is neither a brutality nor curse rather a weapon with which our soul warns of mistakes. Illness is a blessed message that seeks to protect us from even more heavier mistakes which cause greater damage and lead us forward on our journey of truth and light”.
It is a journey of recognizing and creating life as well as creating inner unity with all beings that exists. Illness is an advisor, a teacher, who tells us that we have left the way. Thus it does not work against us rather for us. Illness is a lighthouse that shows a way in the dark of night.
Just think that from day to day you forget to water the plants even if you have them placed before your eye. The one beautiful day the pot falls on the floor right in front of your feet… surely you will then lift it up and realize that it is time to water it. In the same way when illness “falls” before us it seeks to warn us that from day to day we are living too much for ourselves and have fallen from the way. It always is trying to tell the sick person what his priorities should be and how he should be able to resolve the issues more quickly. In the absence of conversation with those dearest to us an illness will manifest as an illness in ones throat or something similar.
The human body is a visible reflection of ones inner state and if you have caused an internal imbalance sooner or later it will come out as an illness. When you heal a headache with an aspirin tablet you have done nothing more than forestalled the valued message from within. Instead of asking yourself what the pain is trying to tell you by force you are quietening the message with the tablet… no, believe us when we say that your body will again send you a similar message if you ignored the first one. If we desire a true healing we must allow the illness to “come to a resolution”, that is we must become deeper involved with the message, its advice and eventually include it into your life.
The story of Reiki
Dr Mikao Usui was the leader of a Christian seminary in Kyoto in Japan at the end of the 19th century. One of his students was interested in what type of healing Jesus Christ had used in the miracle healings he did. Considering that he did not know how to answer this question he decided to make a trip to Christian counties in order to find the answers. He studied a number texts but it all proved to be in vain. After his return from America he came across, in a Japanese Zen Buddhist monastery, old Buddhist sutras that had marks and symbols in Sanskrit and it seemed to him that they could be the answers to his questions. He studied these scripts intensely and decided to remain for 21 days on the mount at Kurijama in order to meditate on this question of healing energy.
At dawn on the 21st day he noticed that a light wind came closer to him. When he went toward it an invisible force threw him to the ground and in that moment he saw in the sky the symbols he had found in the sutras written in various colors. When he returned from the mount he tripped on a rock and injured hi toe. Spontaneously he placed his palm on the bloody toe and in a moment the pain halted and the bleeding stopped.
Usui met many people who had different problems and he relatively quickly realized that his hands, if placed on the part of the body in pain, blessedly effect the mood of the sick person. The signs of illness that disappeared after the therapy in most cases reemerged, some sooner, some later. In order to keep ones health longer he would advise the people initiation into the art of Reiki that he had lived and learnt on top of the mount at Kurijama. When Usui became aware that he was at death’s door he passed on the Mastership of Reiki to Churigu Hajashiri who would go onto to take care of the continued development of Reiki. Hajashi formed a clinic in Tokyo where he helped heal people exclusively with this method. He healed the Hawaiian Havajo Takata and she became so taken by Reiki that she herself decided to learn it. In 1938 Hajashi passed down to her the mastery of Reiki and after this she brought her knowledge to the west.
After the death of Havajo Takata her work was continued by two great masters of Reiki. One was Phyllis Lei Furoumato, Takata’s niece, who in 1982 founded the International Reiki Association, and the other being Barbara Ray who founded the American Reiki International Association which does not strictly follow the traditional principles of Reiki. In Pooni, an ashram of the spiritual teacher Osho was the one that developed the more traditional form of Reiki called Osho neo-reiki.
Extracts from the book REIKI- The Wisdom of Gaining and Attaining Health.
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