But also lovely will be next Saturday morning when I’m teaching Reiki 1. Teaching Reiki is like sharing the keys to a magical kingdom, where so many new and wonderful things can happen. As my student Donna, (now also a friend and colleague) said the other day after teaching her first class,

It’s like sending ripples out into the world.  Not only does the person you’re teaching benefit, but so do all the other people they share Reiki with.  You’re really starting something big.”

I love to hear stories of how students are feeling different and better about their lives and themselves, and also about how they’re helping others.  I hosted a Reiki share this week that was entirely my students plus a “grandstudent”, who Donna had just taught.  They were talking about how and why they use Reiki and what happens.  One noted with awe several changes that had happened, including a new role.

Since I’ve been doing Reiki, people I don’t really know have started coming to me with their stories and problems. It’s as if they can instinctively tell I’ll be a safe person to talk to.  I don’t even need to have any answers, just to listen, but I do offer to send them Reiki.  Then they come back and tell me how things are better.  It feels really good.”

All this has just quietly happened since he learned Reiki. He’s just become a compassionate magnet who can help people nearly effortlessly.  Several of the other people at the share echoed similar experiences.  Reiki is all about compassion, wisdom, openness and valuing who people really are – ourselves included – so we’re going to naturally be more grounded, better listeners.  The people who get listened to and helped will also feel more grounded and kinder.  Imagine if everyone in the world was like that.  Things would go so much more smoothly!  By sharing Reiki through teaching, you get to start that ripple effect.

It’s not just helping people start a Reiki journey.  Helping – and watching – people develop along their path is a huge pleasure too.  Some students I’ve had since Reiki 1 and have got to see them blossoming all the way through Master and even Karuna Reiki; others come part-way through their journey. Some have started businesses, others fallen in love, everyone has a clearer, stronger sense of themselves.

It’s also wonderful when students move beyond you.  One did her Master training with me, then learned Karuna Reiki at the same time I did. She’s now working her way through Lightarian Reiki and expects by summer to be teaching it.  She’s also working on plans for a Reiki cafe. I taught Karuna to two others and they have gone on to explore Kundalini Reiki and others energies.

Another huge pleasure is how your world can open up to new people when you teach Reiki.  I have met so many interesting people through teaching Reiki and through the Reiki shares, especially the Master ones.  Lots of people I have become friends with.  There’s a certain solidarity and shared understanding.  Because Reiki is all about becoming more of your true self, people instinctively relax around other Reiki people, knowing they can be themselves.  This was beautifully voiced at the Reiki share the other day.

I’m not always confident speaking to other people, but here everything just flows and it’s easy.”

How amazing is that?  By teaching Reiki, you can introduce people to a land where they can really feel at home, discover how to feel good about themselves and their life.  And you get to be there as people discover this, especially if you keep in touch with them.  Another student I taught hadn’t ever experienced such a supportive environment before, where she felt valued for herself.  The Reiki courses and surrounding community were a revelation to her, and she’s now pursuing her passions more confidently, and keeping in touch through emails and meeting up for coffees.

Of course, teaching Reiki is a wonderful gift to be able to share with your friends, family and colleagues too.  If your friends are feeling down or stressed, you can send them Reiki or give them an in-person treatment, but to really empower them to feel strong and happy, you can teach them Reiki to use for themselves. It gives you something else in common and you can always ask them for Reiki when you need a boost too.

If being a Reiki Master feels right to you, check out our Reiki Master courses.

Winding roads that take time like life

I was out for a coffee last night with a friend who also does a lot of development of projects and services, both in his day job and after work.  We were talking about all the things that are dependent on other people that you have to wait for, and the things that take a lot of work for us to develop ourselves, and he said, “It all takes time.”

That phrase was still ringing in my ears when I got home and was indulging in an evening off.  While it could be voicing frustration, I felt that “it all takes time” is actually a gift.  If you know whatever you do is going to take time, you can just enjoy it, budget for it, and give yourself and others the freedom to make good use of that time.

As someone who has far more ideas than are ever likely to be viable to put into action (at least until I have a large team and giant client base), this thought was quite liberating to me.  Instead of being frustrated that I can’t deliver all my ideas, I can just savour the process of a few.  One of the Reiki principles is “do your work earnestly” or in other translations “mindfully”.  If you know it’s all going to take time anyway, and you allow for that, then you can sink into the process, be fully present, enjoy the details of the process – and not feel bad that you’re not finished as quickly as the idea came about.

It’s not just projects that take time, but many other things in life – relationships, Reiki, our own development.  I came across an interview awhile back with a guy who advises women about relationships. He talked about the dreaded “instant relationship” girls can drift into expecting almost as soon as they meet someone.  He also pointed out this is actually equivalent to a guy assuming a girl wants to sleep with him as soon as they meet.  Maybe the other person does want this, but the stage of actually getting to know people is a rich one that it’s a shame to miss.  Doing that does take time, but it also develops the habit of continuing to discover new things to enjoy about someone, which means you don’t get bored with them.

Suzy Allegra's Long and Winding Road heart

If you can look back at how friendships and other relationships have unfolded over time, it can really give “it all takes time” a very positive slant indeed. And it means you get to enjoy where you are with someone.  While mulling this over last night, I looked up and saw a wee reminder stuck to the wall, which says, “Var vi än är, är precis var vi behöver vara just nu” – wherever we are is exactly where we need to be just now.  It was an insight I had during a rough point in 2005, and I later spotted it echoed in the second line of St Theresa’s Prayer. It’s really powerful.

When Reiki was first taught nearly 100 years ago, it is said to have taken a year to complete level 1. Now we can do it in a day.  Part of that is evolution of the attunement process (huge thanks to the people who developed it!), and part is that that a Western Reiki 1 course is the beginning of the journey instead of the whole journey. You can always keep developing and discovering new depths, subtleties and approaches.

Since I moved up to Karuna Reiki last year, I have been dying to share it with everyone because it’s so good… But you have to be a Reiki Master first (albeit only Master Practitioner for Levels 1 and 2 of Karuna), and then wait at least six months for those energies to settle in. My friend Jess has recently been working her way through the Lightarian Reiki attunements, which seems amazing and very appealing indeed. For that, you have to have Karuna or Kundalini Reiki first.  There are several stair-steps that all take time. It could be frustrating, but I also see the point that the higher vibrations are more subtle, and you won’t take them in or perhaps notice them without letting the last level settle in.   So again, it’s a case of savour where you are as you move along your path.

With this perspective of “it all takes time”, I’m launching some slower courses – both to make them easier to fit into people budgets, and also to test the gentle unfolding of energy and learning.  If that appeals, check them out.

Wherever you are on your path, enjoy the time it takes. It’s all a gift.

A curious phenomenon snuck into my life last autumn right after I’d done my Karuna Reiki training. I met an interesting half-Swedish guy with a band called Wake the President, which it turned out was exactly the sort of music I love.  Having drifted into mostly only hearing therapy music, it was so nice to listen to something for fun.  In fact, I’ve ended up listening to their music a lot. Whenever I hear it, it seems to seep into my soul and get to work rearranging things. It’s been so powerful and insistent that I’ve kept asking myself, “What IS this??”  One of my Karuna students in November passed on the message from one of my spirit guides: “It’s complicated.” Ah.

I think I’m unravelling the answers now. Aside from helping integrate my love of Glasgow with my love of Sweden, I think the music has been “waking up” lots of good things in life that I had put away to be better able to relate to people’s problems. Fun, pleasure, success. We often think of Reiki and other personal development or even employability tools as addressing problems or weaknesses in life. But what if we thought of them as revitalising fun?  (The band actually has a song called “Remember Fun.” How good is that?)

At last week’s Reiki Master share, we did Oneness Empowerments, mostly with Karuna Reiki. “Oneness” sounds very quiet and serious, but I have to tell you I went quickly from feeling exhausted to glowing with joyful merriment, and I had a very happy time in the pub afterward, chatting in Swedish with two Reiki Master friends (who do speak Swedish, if you’re wondering!).

It was such a merry and refreshing experience that I decided to try the Oneness Empowerments every day, despite my no-discipline policy over the holidays. This joyful, merry feeling was too good to miss! I also sent Reiki to my Hogmanay night out. I’d been looking forward to it anyway, but figured a little extra goodness would be handy to make sure everyone had a good time.

The result? What an amazing good time it was! It was a huge, conscious pleasure to enjoy my friends, to laugh, to let the live music sink in and dance loads to the djs’ good mix of songs, familiar and new.  It was SO good – the kind of warm-hearted, life-works-out-amazingly-well good that can only be the work of Reiki.

So all this is making me think, why not make 2012 the year to convert our work ethic into a fun ethic? What if instead of focusing Reiki on our problems, we focus it on what we want to be sure to enjoy? Fun, after all, is motivating and creative and makes life far more satisfying.  Enrich your sense of fun first and the other things in life are far more likely to fall into place. The Reiki principle “Do your work earnestly” is about mindfulness, which is effectively aproaching work with love, so fun would just demonstrate you’re really succeeding with that.

As I’m thinking about leaving my two wks of relaxation and getting back to work on Monday, I’ve had to ask myself what Light on the Path is all about. I was relieved to realise it’s actually about helping to increase the fun in life.  Whether it’s through learning Reiki to let good feelings work in your life, work placements in other countries to give you whole new insights and new friends, or the new EGUIDE tools we’re going to start offering from the end of the month, it’s all about enriching life… and making it more fun. Which makes it fun for me too. To focus on that – and make time for music and other leisurely pleasures – has got to make for a more balanced and richer life.

So here’s to a fun-filled 2012!

If you fancy expanding your musical horizons, the guys at Wake the President also run monthly club nights at Mono in Kings Court through We Can Still Picnic, with the premise that you can always enjoy great music no matter what’s going on in the world.   And they organise Radio Magnetic to introduce you to all sorts of interesting music.  Enjoy!

Daily morning walks along the Kelvin with my neighbour have been a common thread - gorgeous!

Seems like a quiet month since we’ve been looking for a new venue for the monthly workshops, but actually a lot has been going on…

Lots of Reiki shares with new ones popping up to meet growing demand

The Glasgow Reiki Meetup Group has been buzzing with activity the last few months, and we now have Sunday, Friday morning and Tuesday evening shares in different parts of town (the new Tuesday evening one is in the Southside, run by one of my students). We also have a Friday night Reiki Master share for empowerments and chilling out, which has full the last couple months, and a new Wednesday evening Reiki Master Teacher share that will look first at manuals and practising attunments.  With demand, there may also be daytime versions of the two Master shares too.

After weeks of waiting to hear back from Starbucks in Byres Road, to see if we could use their upstairs, I finally heard today that it wasn’t their sort of thing, so I’m looking at a couple of more holistic spaces that we’ll have to rent, but hopefully we’ll have something sorted out soon!  The next topics lined up are Using Reiki with Intention and Intuition in ways you hadn’t realised, and How the Chakras and Endocrine System Link Up (What IS going on under all that Reiki??).  More news soon!

Trade your dog walk for complementary therapies, creative workshops and coffee

In less Reiki-related news, we’ve been working on a couple of follow ups from our work placements in Sweden – we’re now hosting work placements here for German students in all sorts of sectors, and we’re setting up a social enterprise, called SHARE Abilities, which will include dog walking and dog Reiki, complementary therapies, and creative workshops.  We’ve got premises getting ready in Partick (near Morrisons and the train/bus/subway interchange) for the dog walking, and are speaking to the building manager next week about also having the complementary therapies and workshops there.   Just as the rainy, cold weather hits, dog walkers can opt for a warm and relaxing coffee or a massage (or Reiki) while my colleagues take their dogs out for the walk out in the rain… and then clean them off afterwards.  SO much better!   We’ll be taking bookings soon, so let me know if you have a dog and I’ll pass your details on to our dog specialist, Reiki Master Jim O’Rourke, who also worked in Sweden.   The services are open to anyone, and we will be starting a Time Bank option for people who can’t afford to pay for the services, but would like to offer their time instead.

German work placement students in Glasgow – maybe with you!

Out at King Tut's to see Wake the President with Marina, the lovely German student who stayed at mine in September

If you’re interested in the German work placements, we would be delighted to take on new accommodation hosts (you provide a bedroom and breakfast and dinner and we pay you) or work placement hosts (you get a trained and experienced apprentice for free for 3-6 weeks). My colleague Morag, who some of you may have met at shares or workshops, has been organising these, and we have been so impressed with what lovely people the students have been.

The accommodation and work placement hosts have been very enthusiastic too.  Morag and I have both had students stay in our houses and they were such a pleasure!  Want to find out more?  Have a look at the European Internships section of our website and contact Morag. If you or someone you know is interested in going on a European work placement next year, let us know that too, as we’re looking at funding applications over the next few months for such ventures.

Back on the Reiki front…

I’m developing ideas on how to spread and develop learning on new ways of using Reiki, or using Reiki in new contexts.   For instance, I’ve taught several people now who worked in dental offices and thought about the role of Reiki in putting patients at ease, and have a Reiki friend who’s afraid of the dentist but sends herself Reiki before she goes and is happy when she gets there.   I’d love to see these people working together, developing approaches tailored for a dentists setting, and then gathering case studies, before working with me to develop some learning materials that could be spread more widely.   If you’d like to collaborate with other Reiki people from similar backgrounds, or with similar interests (eg, Reiki for kids), please let me know, and I’ll see what matchmaking I can do to get you started.

Light on the Path is all about development, so you’ll no doubt be hearing more, but I wanted to give you a more rounded view about what we get up to and have planned, so that you can get more involved if you like.

If you haven’t already, please “Like” the Light on the Path Facebook Page, and we’ll be doing a lot of sharing of ideas, tips and networking there starting very soon.

Connectedness at a share - I need to take more photos over coffee

When I used to teach Reiki on the side of a full time job in consulting, I always felt a bit bad that people would have a great experience of learning Reiki but then go out into the world and have to use Reiki on their own, sometimes struggling for months or occasionally years to get their Reiki 2 casework done.  So when I became self-employed so I could devote more time to Reiki teaching and projects, one of the first things I set out to do was access a good Reiki share forum.   Fortunately, Fiona McLaren had set up the Glasgow Reiki Meetup Group and while it had gone quiet when its venue shut, she found a new venue and happily handed over the group to me.  What a gift it has turned out to be!

An appetite for camaraderie among Reiki people – My instinct that Reiki people should have camaraderie has been confirmed by the growth and enthusiasm of the members of the Glasgow Reiki Meetup. I remember one day in the early days of the Learning and Development Hour (which became the Japanese Meditation Hour).  We spent most of the hour sharing experiences that participants couldn’t share with their friends or family because Reiki sounded just too amazing to get their heads around.  “Oh, have you experienced that too?!” echoed many times that day.

The experience of coming together with people from a common interest and background seems to create instant glue, and it’s always a delight to me to watch people who may have never met before collaboratingn around a Reiki table and excitedly debriefing after a treatment.  And then there’s the chat that erupts between the Japanese Meditation Hour and the share – and the groups of people who drift off to An Clachan for a coffee together after a Sunday share.  People love to make connections, to be part of something bigger, to see people they’ve got to know over time and say, “Hel-lo! How have you been getting on?”   Smiles and warm hearts all round!

More shares, more people, more delights – Since we’ve had the Reiki Master Shares, the Weekday Reiki Shares and the monthly workshops, new people have appeared whose diaries allow for these other options, and the camaraderie has become interlaced between the different events.  There’s such warmth, familiarity and cosiness.  The peak of the month’s Reiki cosiness has to be the Reiki Master Share on a Friday night with nibbles, chat, cosy cats and loads of empowerments, all with the relaxation of a Friday night.  The Swedes have their “fredag mys” – Friday cosy, and I reckon the Reiki Master Shares have to be the perfect fredag mys for a Reiki person.   That’s why I am so delighted to teach more Masters and welcome them into the group… and the pleasures of doing Reiju empowerments at the normal shares.

Progressing with Reiki skills and experience – As well as the benefits of Reiki fellowship, the mix of events have given a lot of people the chance to develop.  So many stories of learning new tools, strengthened intuition and more peace in life, of greater confidence and moving forward. And those who were leaving other work to start therapy businesses have found they are taking off.  So satisfying to hear about – and to see!  I’ve been running the share long enough now to see people come along timidly at first, some not yet attuned to
Reiki, and then go on to progress to Reiki Master and Karuna Reiki.  Imagine how many lives are being transformed in this process!

It’s not just other people who have progressed, but me too!  I’ve had the chance to meet new people, learn new skills from the people who have led our workshops (many thanks, Jane Forrest, Lorna McLean, Fiona McLaren, Patricia Iris and Pauline Wilkie!) and from Graeme Leckie who’s always bringing along new things to try at the shares, including sharing Karuna with the Masters group.  My approach to Reiki has evolved a lot to incorporate these new things.

Personal progress since learning Karuna Reiki – Since learning Karuna Reiki in August, things are shifting usefully in my own life as well.   I’ve tidied up a significant relationship that was not quite working (my friends will know how giant this is!) and am enthusiastically looking at admin systems that will make things run more smoothly and help me overcome a bit of an aversion to paper and timesheets that developed in my last job.  The great thing about Karuna is that it’s got “emotional anaesthetic” that you can use to clear out old issues.  I have been quite amazed to see myself being unfazed as I take a different approach that I couldn’t have imagined being comfortable with before.  There’s a heightened sense of open-mindedness and curiosity to see how life unfolds.  I’ve also noticed stronger feelings of gratitude about people and opportunities that I’ve been blessed with, which haven’t been lost in my clearout.

There’s more on the horizon, but part of my new efforts to live better this year is to filter the loads of good ideas, and concentrate on the
satisfaction on bringing the most useful to fruition.  So watch this space (or better yet the Light on the Path Facebook page, which will have new things on it regularly now.)

And in the meantime, enjoy the camaraderie of the Glasgow Reiki Meetup Group and keep progressing!

The mystery enchanting flowers

For the last week or two my neighbour, Gerry,  and I have encountered a mysterious gorgeous fragrance at the top of the hill on our morning walk along the River Kelvin to the Botanic Gardens.   It’s hit us as we come out of the wooded path that rises along the river, as we emerge into the Botanics.  Every morning we pause and look around, sniffing anything that might possibly be producing the enchanting smell.  We’ve checked out rose bushes, hostas, and anything else that might possibly emit a fragrance.  But there are very few flowers visible in that particular spot, so it has remained an ongoing mystery… until this morning!

Finally, following my nose for the smell of Hawaii in the landscaped woods of Glasgow, I looked up.  There in what appeared to be a big but otherwise ordinary lime tree, were small pale, yellow flowers.  Aha! A potential solution.  After more sniffing, I finally spotted a low enough branch to grasp a little bud to sniff.  Sure enough, the mysterious had been coming from right over our heads the whole time!  We had just kept our eyes on the ground and missed it.

This revelation reminded me of a story I read several years ago that’s stuck with me.  A mum and son were driving past a church one day when they noticed the sign out front, which simply said, “Just look up”.   They commented on this to each other and went on.  Later they came out of a shop to discover the mum had locked her keys in keys in the car.  She was starting to panic when her son said, “Don’t worry, Mom.  Remember, just look up!”  She thought he was being philosophical in her moment of practical problems, but he had taken the sign at face value – and looked up.  Sure enough, flying overhead just then was an airplane with a banner advertising locksmith services!  They phoned the number and were soon happily on their way.  How cool is that?

I reckon there’s a lot to be gained from “looking up” in many aspects of life.  In Glasgow city centre, people often miss the amazing detail of the architecture because they forget to “look up”.  They are too lost in thoughts of everyday life at street level.   Similarly, when I’m out I’m often thinking and looking down as I walk.  I realised this morning that part of the reason that Gerry knows so many people that he can’t walk down Byres Road without meeting at least one person he knows, is that he looks up when he walks.  People I know have to wave their arms to get my attention in the street, but Gerry’s looking up and spots people.  The opportunities for him are greater because he doesn’t have his eyes glued to the ground.

Looking higher up also gives you different perspectives when you’re feeling down.  When I fly, I’m always struck by how clear the sky is above the clouds.  If you look up high enough – or even just know that clearness is up there – then you can see there’s much more sense to life than the clouds you’re experiencing.

In my Karuna Reiki training last weekend, we talked a lot about living through your higher self and letting go of hang-ups that aren’t doing you any good.  There are lots of tools in Karuna that make this process a lot easier if you put them to use.  As well as clearing out these blockages and negative beliefs, the Karuna symbols are also useful for manifesting what you need in life.  But they do it by helping you focus “up”, or rather drawing your upper (“higher”) self’s wisdom down into you.  Manifesting then produces what’s best for you with much less effort, instead our more traditional Western approach of keeping our eyes down and working hard until we’re exhausted and empty.  All that clarity that you see above the cloud level is available, if we raise our attention to what’s up instead of what’s down.

So whether you want to feel more positive at a philosophical level or you’re looking for more practical solutions like the source of heavenly fragrances or a locksmith, try looking up and see how the world opens up for you.

Yummy limonata

I’ve been drinking San Pellegrino limonata a lot lately, so perhaps it’s not just the Reiki that’s made me unfazed to have my website hacked and pages wiped.  As they say, “When life brings you lemons, make lemonade!”  So my new website and the chance to rewrite it must be as refreshing and flavourful as limonata.

I’m also getting to know the very helpful people at Glasgow International School of English Language who have spontaneously secured my site out of kindness – and been rewarded by a return of our discount on English courses for the next two German students coming on work placement* in Glasgow.  I see a long and collaborative relationship forming with them, when before it was only my colleague Morag who had worked with them.  Limonata already!

Wee hiccups are also handy for evidence that you’re in the flow of life – if you flow with them.   At the meeting this morning where I had checked my email only to discover the hacking, my colleague was amazed at how chilled I was and how focused on the meeting with our new partner in collaboration, despite the discovery that my database had been wiped.  After three days in a row of teaching Reiki, including Master level, I was very chilled indeed.  Always nice to discover you’re living the Reiki principles without trying:

• Just for today be free of anger
• Just for today, be worry-free
• Be grateful today
• Be kind to others
• Do your work earnestly

Fantastic!  Next weekend I get to learn Karuna Reiki, which is known for helping clear out emotional issues without the emotional pain of letting them arise to go on their way.  Sounds amazing… but maybe I’d better back up my phone before then!

*We’ll be having more students coming regularly over the next couple of years, so if you would like to get involved by hosting a student at your work or providing a homestay, please get in touch!  They’re usually around 21-23 and very polite, friendly and keen to learn.