Reiki Healing Ethics

This post is written from a Blue Fire Reiki perspective. This is an excerpt from Blue Fire Reiki : The Reiki I Handbook

With your combined Reiki I and Reiki I knowledge you should be able to heal just about anything for anyone anywhere. But just because you are able to doesnt always mean that it is wise or acceptable to do so. Although I will not presume to assume your moral or ethical codes for you, the following considerations should be taken into account when practicing Reiki.

Consent

Having your subject’s consent should be a consideration. Our energy bodies are just as personally ours as our physical bodies. Imposing your will upon someone elses energy bodies without their consent is no different than imposing your will upon their physical body so healing someone (or performing any energetic practice on someone) without their consent is paramount to rape. Although this can sound harsh, I suspect that comes from a society that does not teach energetic etiquette as the norm.

The underlying concept behind having someones consent is that they should be aware of what they are walking into and should have any information necessary to be able to make an informed decision about what they would like to take responsibility for in their own life.

For example, if your best friend is an alcoholic and with the best intention in the world, you decided to heal this persons alcoholism without asking their permission.

Because alcoholism is never just a surface issue, a good healing would begin to heal the underlying issues as well. Suddenly this person begins to change and doesnt understand the changes. Although these changes could appear positive from the outside, from the inside they can be bewildering without knowing where they are coming from. Because this person is not necessarily willing to give up alcohol (you didnt ask, remember) and that is their primary method of coping, they could be sent further into alcoholism and/or depression.

Your friend should have had the option of turning down the treatment from the start. Ideally, you would talk with the friend before hand and give them the information about what to expect and about what their part in the healing will be in the way of follow up. They would make the decision for themselves about whether that is something they want in their lives or not.

Every Action has a Reaction

Every single action has a reaction whether energetic or physical. The physical and energetic worlds are not intelligent in deciding what the intent was or what the intended result was it simply reacts appropriately to every action. This means that when we adjust the energy in someones body, there will be a reaction that ripples outward.

In the hands of a knowledgeable healer, this change will be positive and well predicted. However, even though your intent might be only to heal the individual, it is possible to have other effects that might be less desirable.

This could happen if a clients life is built upon their dysfunction. For example, healing a woman in an abusive relationship could cause her to be unable to live in that relationship any longer but without any other means of supporting herself, it could cause a sudden need to escape but a larger sense of helplessness.

This is a vague example but more specific examples have come up in my practice and it does happen that healing can cause seemingly undesirable results. The ethical healer must be as prepared as possible to carefully gauge the outcome and to handle any unseen effects that come up.

Often energy healing modalities are treated as if they can only help and not hurt. That is simply not the case. Energy healing is a powerful way of affecting change in someones life. Just because the actual session might not hurt, the outcome could be less than ideal.

Energy healing does not happen in a vaccum of natural law and is not the only place that this can be seen. It happens every day that a surgeon opens a person up and finds something unexpected waiting for them. Without the knowledge to handle this unexpected circumstance, the patient could die. Surgeons go through years of schooling and constant skill updates to prevent just that.

Nevertheless, surgeons sometimes lose patients just as even the most carefully prepared healer can cause undesired changes in the client. This is a possibility that every healer should be prepared to face before working with clients.

But As Long as my Intent is Pure

Your intent guides your Will and your Will guides your thoughts and your thoughts guide the energy and the energy affects change in the body and the change in the body affects change in the life. So yes, your will has some affect on the outcome. But just because your intent is pure does not mean that it is properly aimed.

Using a statement such as allow this healing to only be for the greatest good of this client, while helpful in aiming your Will at that goal, is not an insurance policy against possible fallout. Those words or that idea or belief does not in any way change the natural law of cause and effect. It serves only to buffer the person against the reality that an adverse reaction could occur.

Responsibility

Taking into account having consent and that every action has a reaction, what might become apparent is that your client is putting the responsibility for their well being as it relates to this healing into your hands. You should also allow them to take responsibility for their own healing by making sure that they are fully informed.

Healing can be an amazingly positive experience but it is not simply carefree. Take your healing seriously.

Confidentiality

While performing a healing, you are likely to uncover knowledge about the client that they might not want others to know. Healing sessions are intimate spaces, the contents of which should be kept as confidential as you would want your own secrets kept.

Walk the Walk

If you tell a client that they need to stop smoking and then step outside to have a cigarette, they are not likely to have much respect for what you tell them. Not only will a client have diminished respect for your advise and ability if you are falling apart, you will be less likely to be able to heal effectively if your mind and body are not performing well because of lack of proper care.

Surround yourself with truth, integrity, happiness and other positive energy, eat well, Reiki yourself regularly and be honest about your needs, desires and feelings.

Tags: healing, reiki