I taught Reiki 1 today. My student came from Daytona, about 90 miles away.
The situation surrounding this class was very interesting. Don's wife had taken Reiki 1 the weekend before from an instructor in their area. He works every other weekend and was unable to attend that class. He signed up for that teacher's Reiki 2 class, and came looking for a Reiki teacher to take Reiki 1 from so he could be ready for the Reiki 2 class.
Don also had a lot of questions, some came from hearing about the training his wife took, the rest came from the tons of materials he had read.
One of the things he had asked about was attunements. He asked if I had ever heard of a failed attunement. Now, this was something I had never heard of, and could not see why it would fail. The only reasons I could think of for it failing would be if the receiver blocked it.
I was very curious, and was finally enlightened. Don had been a victim of a failed attunement, but that attunement had been done remotely, a remote attunement.
I had heard about remote attunements a while ago. The problem is that I really don't trust it. Now, I have a friend that has received a distant attunement. She can feel even the most subtle energies. She felt the attunement when it happened. I assume that most people can't feel these, but that could be incorrect. When Don received his attunement, he did not feel it.
There are three things that concern me about distant attunements. The first is trust. Someone tells me that they will attune me at 8am on Monday morning. Something happens, and they oversleep. The problem is that you trust someone to do the attunement from somewhere far away. You don't know whether they do it or not. Is it a case of the emperor’s new clothes?
The second concern is ability, the ability of the practitioner to attune over a distance. First of all, I have my doubts that this can be done. My teacher does not believe in them at all. One thinks that if Reiki can be done at a distance, why can't an attunement be done that way? And adding to that, I think about astral projection (AP). Since I can do anything energy-wise through AP that I can do in person, why couldn't I attune someone that way? I guess I still feel better with the actual physical touch.
The final concern is the ability of the receiver to feel the energy of a distant attunement. If they can't feel it, then how do they know it happened?
Enough soapbox.
Don was concerned that he would not "get it". While he was doing the self-healing part, he didn't feel his hands getting hot, nor did he feel he was really channeling the energy.
I was very concerned. I really felt that he was blocking the energy. I 'looked' at him, and it was like he had jar lid over his head that was letting very little in. I reached over and forced an opening in that lid, and saw the energy flow stronger. Unfortunately, he didn't notice a difference.
After self healing, and a short break, I led Don through a meditation to strengthen his resolve to learn Reiki, and wipe away any negativity that he had created. I figure that after the failed distant attunement, Don was afraid that he wouldn't be able to learn. This put up subconscious blocks that were stopping him from channeling. I tuned the meditation to counteract that.
As part of a Reiki 1 class, each student gets a healing. Usually, it is students swapping as they learn. I had asked James, a friend and Reiki master, to come and play 'victim' so Don would have someone to work on besides me. I like to do that because sometimes students get nervous when working on 'the teacher'. Even though James is a Reiki master, and other friends are that have sat in as 'bodies', I still preferred to do Don's receiving of Reiki. I did a complete, although quick healing, then I switched places with him. I had him start a Reiki healing on me. I had him do the crown chakra, then the third eye. While he was working there, I did something that I started doing with each of my students a while ago. I extended through my third eye (probably some sort of AP) and opened paths up each arm, and up through his crown chakra.
Now, before I had done this, Don was doing good Reiki. Strangely, he was generating heat, yet his hands remained cold. This is unusual. Once I had traced his paths, the energy went from the strength of a strong garden hose, to the strength of a fire hose. There was so much Reiki pouring through him that I was laying on the table shaking. That's when I had him stop so he could work on James. James looked at me with his eyes wide. He told me that he was just about to ask how I was able to handle all the energy Don had been sending in. He said he could see that I had been dumping off the ton of excess I was getting. I wasn't consciously dumping off the excess, I must have been doing it automatically.
Well, there was no doubt that Don was doing Reiki. When he worked on James, the energy was spectacular. Don finally admitted that he was starting to sweat. This also happens to Reiki healers.
Well, I think Don will be ready for his Reiki 2 class when the date comes. He also expressed interest in coming back to me for Reiki 2. I hope I can offer him something more than he learns from his teacher down there.
At any rate, it was a very interesting, very fun afternoon. It was another positive day for what is turning out to be a very positive weekend.