Welcome to the latest Reiki Blog Hop
THEME: GUIDED BY REIKI?
Jay Cassels set the theme for this hop, he offered the following prompt:
How do you approach/answer or discuss the topic of Reiki Guides, is it something that you’ve encountered, do you believe that as masters or as students that we are guided when it comes to Reiki?
When I decided to start teaching Reiki, I made a decision right from the off that I would only teach one to one… that I wouldn’t overtly advertise and that the people who I’m supposed to work with will find their way to me and that has been a decision that I have stuck by and have no plans to change in the foreseeable future…
Upon reflection, I think one of the main reasons for this choice was the subject of guides… the other main reason is that I like to have time to fully gauge someone’s level of understanding and background experiences… When I’ve been on the student ends of things, I’ve had too many experiences that I don’t want to inflict on other people… so when the subject of guides comes up with my students, they’re not overly surprised when I start to list all the things I don’t like about the subject… things like when the dynamic of a room full of people takes a weird turn as some odd version of top trumps breaks out… someone proudly announcing that their guide is present gets interrupted by someone else saying that 2 of their guides are there… ah well… only 6 of mine came today, 3 of them brought gifts from Atlantis… I may or may not be embroidering a few poetic licenses here for the sake of storytelling… likewise I may or may not be embellishing the truth when I tell you that someone once stood in front of me and in all deadly seriousness told me that their Reiki guides were Mother Theresa, Princess Diana, and Michael Jackson… Wow! That sounds incredible, but it’s not that impressive really when you realise, no… not that MJ… this MJ is a deceased pet cat…
I mock slightly, but you know what – good for you! If that’s what you believe and you can use that to make the world a better place without causing harm to others, then you go knock yourself out… call your guides what you like.
The issue I have is with the one-upping… or the attitude of “I art more spiritual than thou” doubly so, if the best use you can put your guide to is saving you a parking space outside the supermarket door… I was brought up forced to eat meals and leave no waste because there were starving children in Africa…
Another issue I have is with sheer stupidity and taking leave of common sense… thankfully not from personal experience but witnessed first hand… let’s just say. if you ever start seeing golden flashes repeatedly in one eye, then get to the optician and confirm it’s not a detached retina rather than listen to your medically unqualified Master who advises you show gratitude for the clear signals your guide is sending…
So basically, I guess my approach is to roast the idea… because in finding humour, then it’s easier to drift into exchanging ideas openly, recognising that all beliefs have an inherent level of ideas that others would find crazy… At the end of the day. it comes down to personal choice and personally, I tend to be falling on the side of thinking that your guides should be kept private… I’m not entirely sure why people need to talk about their guides with other people… I’m not entirely sure why saying you work with a guide would qualify your work as being any better than someone’s work who says they work do not work with a guide…
I was in a workshop recently and I wish I could tell you what it was about but unfortunately, the exercise was so confusingly explained that I have no idea other than it was something about connecting to guides… I queried the teacher, who reacted in a rather interesting way by saying that they didn’t know what I asking and that no-one was forcing me to stay in the room, so if I didn’t want to do the exercise then feel free to go… I told them that I wanted to do the exercise but that I was not clear on the aims or objectives or when/how this practice would be useful… They shouted –
DO YOUR OWN THING!
Then marched off… There was a hushed silence that fell upon the room and all eyes were on me… A smile spread across my face… Ah! Yeah… fine, I’m an old hand at doing my own thing, now I get it! I picked up my pencil and doodled away… so… I know no more about guides than when I walked in here but hey ho that was an excellent demo on how not to teach… I thought long and hard about this odd reaction and I’m inclined to think that this person did understand my question but didn’t have an answer to it…
My belief is that when students ask questions, is it because they want to broaden their understanding… it’s not always about getting definite answers but about exploring ideas… and as a teacher, it’s ok to simply say – I don’t have an answer to that…
As a teacher, I don’t want you to slavishly follow my word… I want you to think and experience things for yourself… When I’m asked if I work with guides, well my answer is that for the sake of convenience I say that I do not work with guides…. but yeah… I have guides and I have no real interest in knowing their names… my intention that I set with guides is akin to the intention I set with people and all experiences in life… that the right things turn up, at the right time, in the way that it will be most useful to learn from them… When I try to nail down the details of guides, it only opens more questions… maybe they exist… or maybe they are the ramblings and outpourings of a bicameral mind attributing the inner workings of the brain to an external existence and connection to a sense of divinity…
Or briefly put and in a non-shouty and loving way…
Do your own thing…
Go study, explore, experiment… don’t stay in the echo chamber of ‘like-minded’ people… take your lessons where you find them… There is no great gain in devoting your time to trying to find guides if you blind yourself to the abundance of guidance that comes from day to day living… and if you are still seeking guidance then you could do far worse than return to the basics…
Be kind to others…
Click on a link to visit my neighbours…
The pure and blessed way 
I have those experiences as well, from an observer point of view I once heard my own words parroted back to the ‘teacher’ by the time they had got three people down the line from me, and on other instances I have heard the most amazing ‘tales’ of wonders and experiences. However as a teacher, I encourage my students to as you say do your own thing, and walk it through to discover what it means for them.
I do have guides and I work with them but these days I seem to embody the work that I am doing rather than watching it. Thank you for taking the time to write this up, I love your honesty ❤
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When it comes to working with guides I think this is why I’m if you’ll excuse the pun, increasingly drawn to working with art… it opens up the energies for people take from it what they want, without the need for or inconvenience of words…
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So true and laugh out loud funny as well. I think I agree with every single thing in this post. And I’ve met most of those people too!
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Phew! It’s not just me 😂
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