My Reiki Experience

If you’re landing on this article and asking yourself, “what the heck is Reiki?”, go here, read, and come back. 

I have known about Reiki for several years and had a few dipping-a-toe-in-the-water type experiences. Everything about doing Reiki with Nicole felt different than my prior experiences. I was drawn to her after a mutual friend of ours died. We were sitting on her front porch, grieving together, and she held my hand for just a few moments and reflected back to me something I had been thinking long and hard about, but hadn’t yet shared with anyone. Needless to say, she piqued my interest. 

Nicole often says, “when you’re ready, Reiki finds you”. That’s certainly how it felt for me. I was around her quite often, yet all of the sudden one day I was drawn to ask her if she was working and if she could do a session with me. Her enthusiastic “YES,” was exactly the yes I needed. 

I was a bit nervous heading into the session. In some ways, it reminded me of going to any kind of therapy, where you know that things (aka feelings) are going to come up, but you don’t know what they are going to be or what it will feel like. I was also pretty excited. Both because it felt like I was truly ready for whatever this experience was going to be and because I have heard Nicole talk about Reiki enough to be excited to see her in her element. 

It was Wednesday, May 20, 2020. When I got there, the space was set and ready. Her massage table was dressed in clean, comfy looking linens and a cute blanket. The air felt clear and the room was well-lit. It was a very safe and welcoming space to enter. I remember Nicole commenting that she had been “channeling me” since the night before, when she realized she was feeling some anxiety that wasn’t hers. (I do not fully understand how this works, but I find it absolutely fascinating). 

I got settled on the table and she gave me a brief overview of what we would do — basically that she would start at my feet and work her way up my chakras. One thing that was different with Nicole versus the previous Reiki experience I had: she let the energy guide her rather than purely following a predetermined set of hand positions. She began at my feet. I began to focus on my breath and entered into what I would think of as a meditative state. 

And this is where it got interesting. Instead of trying to explain the experience, I will share this straight from the journaling I did following the session: 

Reiki with Nicole: things that came up…

At my feet: I want to be loved. 

I want to be good at things. Ok. What does it take to be good at things? 

At my root chakra: the phoenix. Time to molt. 

I had an image of myself in a flowy white dress (I’ve been looking at the wrong white dresses!**), trying to jump off a cliff, but it wasn’t quite right. I couldn’t actually jump, it felt like there was a barrier that wouldn’t let me fall. 

Part of me needs to die. 

So let it. 

Part of me has to die so the rest of me can live.

I started crying. I saw shadows of myself leaving me and floating off the edge of the cliff, but my solid form remained standing. It was intensely emotional and sad to see them leaving me. Gut-wrenchingly sad. When they were gone my body went so still I almost couldn’t feel it. It felt like I was dead. I saw and felt myself in a grave with dirt on my chest. On the table, my entire body felt numb. I could breathe easily, but felt little else. As feeling started coming back into my body I saw I was lying in a warm field of tall grass, surrounded by wildflowers. I felt so much energy buzzing through my body that I opened my eyes for a second. 

I am not broken. 

While in most ways I feel that trying to fit this experience into words does not fully do it justice, I also can feel it and see it all over again while I transcribe it here. 

Afterwards, Nicole and I shared what came up for each of us. I found it so interesting to learn that we had entirely different experiences, but that everything she mentioned also felt very relevant. It felt like I went through what was most pressing and needed for me, while she felt more of the surrounding stuff and other things that were not even on my radar yet. She was immensely patient and supportive in taking the time to process with me after. 

I have truly felt different since this day. Discovering and accepting that part of me needed to die with my friend left the rest of me feeling lighter. Feeling like I can go and really live, not just as a shadow drifting by, but as a vibrant, full human being. By no means do I think this is a one-time, “I’m fixed!” kind of experience, but rather an incredibly powerful tool and a person that I now know can help me process challenging experiences and feelings as they occur during my life. 

(Side note: ** I had been drawn to looking at white wedding dresses for a few weeks prior. I thought it was weird even while I was doing it, I’m not one to sit around and fantasize about having a wedding. I haven’t looked at one since doing Reiki.) 

Photo by Patrick Langwallner on Unsplash

Originally posted July 14, 2021