Reiki therapy is a way of guiding energy throughout the body to promote the recipient’s self-healing abilities, according to the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH). The Reiki belief system and that of the practitioner is that they don’t cause the healing, nor are they the source of that healing energy; they’re a channel for the energy — similar to the way a garden hose acts as a channel for water, according to a past review.
“I’m an open channel, and [the Reiki recipient’s] body takes that energy and does whatever it needs with it,” explains Vickie Bodner, a licensed massage therapist and Reiki master at the Center for Integrative Medicine at Cleveland Clinic in Ohio.
The word “Reiki” is a combination of two Japanese words: “rei,” which means “God’s wisdom,” or “the higher power,” and “ki,” which means “life force energy,” according to the International Center for Reiki Training.
“Ki is the life force energy that animates all living things,” says Joan Maute, a licensed Reiki master teacher who practices in Waikoloa, Hawaii, and Charlottesville, Virginia. Put together, and “rei” and “ki” mean “spiritually guided life force energy,” notes the International Center for Reiki Training.
Reiki is taught according to the Japanese tradition of the sensei (teacher), who passes the knowledge to the student through attunement, an initiation ceremony that is thought to help open the student’s energy channels to facilitate the flow of healing energy, and potentially help improve health, according to past research. Once opened, these channels remain accessible to the practitioner for the rest of their life, per the International Center for Reiki Training.
“[Reiki] is a spiritual practice, like meditation is a spiritual practice,” says Pamela Miles, a New York City–based Reiki master and researcher who has collaborated with the medical schools at Harvard and Yale universities to develop Reiki programs there. Reiki, despite its spiritual components and roots, may be and is often used therapeutically (more on this later), including in a secular way.
It’s not a religion and is not associated with religious practice.
Reiki is taught at three levels. First-level practitioners can practice on themselves or others through light touch; second-degree practitioners can practice distance healing; and third-degree or master level practitioners can teach and initiate others into Reiki, according to a literature review.
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