An Introduction to Reiki

by Suparna

Most of the people who come to us to learn Reiki like to hear about how we got into it. Well, the story is not very exciting except of course for us!!!  My mother [Ranji] received her first initiation in 1997. One of her friends just called up one day and told her that a Reiki Master was giving initiations at another friend’s house and it was not very expensive and would she like to learn. Ranji said yes and received her initiation. However, for almost a year she didn’t practice it [she lost interest with the self healing bit after about three days, specially since nothing had been explained to her by her Master, and she had no idea what she was supposed to do or feel with the self-healing.]. From there, she moved onto Creative Visualization, The Silva Method of Mind Control and various other things till, in September 1998, she met her second Reiki Master, Mr. Brij Mathur, who had actually come to our house to return a gas cylinder that he had borrowed. [ He lived very close by]. Somehow, the conversation turned to Reiki and the next thing Ranji knew, she was back doing Reiki with much gusto! Actually, the first taste we had of Reiki came through my brother, Rahul, while he was in NID, Ahemdabad. He had to do a project on Tantra and he came across a Reiki Master during this time who gave him his First Level. This happened way back in 1994 or so. I wasn’t at that time very interested in it but Mom used to receive a lot of healing from Rahul and so did Dad.

When I was at NID two or three really close friends of mine went for a Reiki workshop and received their initiations. I received healing from them from time to time, but without much interest because the charges were too high for me to pay and, I am sorry to say, I was very put off by a spiritual system which would charge so much money to help someone in distress or someone who genuinely wanted to learn. At that time I was doing the meditation taught by Sri Sri Parmahansa Yogananda and during one meditation I told him that if he wanted me to receive Reiki he would just have to arrange it for money that I could afford to give. This was in 1996. I soon forgot about it and surprisingly, so did my friends. They too stopped practicing Reiki because of a lack of proper understanding of what it was and what it could do for them..

In 1998, I came back home still doing my meditation. An interesting thing happened with my meditation, I realized that whenever my father had a back ache or some pain or something my hands would heat up and I would subconsciously ape Rahul, by giving Daddy the “heat” I  was feeling in my hands. Looking back, I realize that it was energy  I was channeling, but at that time I was totally unaware of it. When Mom met Brij Mathur in September, she asked me at that time if I would be interested in talking to him. I said yes and we both received our initiations from him, as did Shweta and Nikki [my younger sisters]. For all the initiations that the four of us received we paid a really small sum of money, that we had to practically force onto Uncle Brij! So I guess it was meant to be and I am so very thankful that Spirit didn’t write me off as an egoistical, judgmental twit so many years ago!!!! After receiving the initiations the “heat” in my hands increased noticeably and almost immediately I started having experiences with my Spirit Guides and so on.

Interestingly enough, when I became a Reiki Master, one of my friends who had learnt Reiki in Ahemdabad, relearned Reiki from me right upto the Karuna Masters levels. She is now teaching Reiki in Ahemdabad. The best thing about Uncle Brij was his childlike enthusiasm and absolute faith in Reiki, as well as his constant encouragement to us in our learning. We used to go to him almost everyday to discuss our experiences and he would get even more excited about them than us! Though he never sat down and explained anything to us, he did guide us to read books and helped us to understand the value of experiencing Reiki in our own way; which is what we try to do for our students to the best of our ability.

Another important aspect to our learning was the fact that Uncle Brij left for Canada soon after we received our initiations from him. So we have had to rely on Reiki, our instincts, experiences and various other sources for our learning. This has made us trust Reiki Maa and our own relationship with Her much more than we would have otherwise done. We call the Reiki energy “Maa” because we feel the energy nurtures, loves, protects, sustains and takes care of us in all ways. Please don’t let this confuse you as it is only our way of looking at the energy- you can relate to it in whichever way you wish to. The notes that follow are a combined explanation of how Mom and I have experienced Reiki in our lives and how we feel you can apply Reiki in your lives. We would like to tell you that the notes we have written are our way of looking at Reiki and we do not wish to force them onto anyone. Always use your own discernment to decide what is good for you and discard what isn’t.

With best wishes and love

Suparna Gibbs