Reiki Notes

COLORADO, MAY, 2007.

The mountains call to us. They are ancient beings, ancestors. Here in Colorado, in Rocky Mountain National Park (Estes Park), location for recent Avanti Healing Arts Reiki Classes, there is sun three hundred and eight days a year. Coming after Maine at sea level and weather which, like the Pacific Northwest, involves vast quantities of rain, it is a welcome pleasure to be here above tree-line, contemplating 14,000 foot peaks, meditating in the thin pure air. There are elk everywhere and the spring flood makes an awesome sound as the Big Thompson River thunders down the gorge.

It is inspiring and bittersweet to be here (the extremes are the most challanging and yet wonderful aspects of life). I came to Colorado to be near my mother in her last days. She passed in March of 2007 and I stayed on, in the mountains that were also so dear to her. Hiking in the Roosevelt National Forest, I experience the fragrence of Ponderosa Pine and the whistling of the Golden Marmot, hear the hummingbirds swooping in their dance and the roar of the spring flood in the river. It is a healing place.

The people of Colorado are much like those in Maine: they love the outdoors. And best of all, there are no black flies! So if there are mountain lions around while hiking, invoke the power symbol and project the thought form that there is room for us all. Or when tenting off the trail, and a black bear wanders by, remember that this shy creature only wishes to walk the land of its birth, to do what is to be done on the Earth. The way of Reiki is to project vibrations that accept all into harmony. However, the girl scout code applies here: Be Prepared. Reiki is great but I pack a whistle and pepper spray too, and hang my food high in a tree.

It was not easy to have left my beautiful retreat in Maine to travel here and there to teach Reiki, but it was time to move on. People are curious about why. It actually was a spiritual quest, beginning with a persistent message (replete with technicolor visuals) to go out into the wilderness of Siberia with a cart and a donkey. At first I thought it meant to literally be out there bumping along with my cart doing who knows what. Then I thought, "oh, it is a past life I am seeing", or a metaphor, so I relaxed into the idea that I did not have to make any big changes, just to understand the message. Later, seeking a simpler explanation of life in the moment, I thought it was a manifestation of my recent farm-sitting experience with horses and donkeys (see article Reiki on the Farm on News page). Finally, I realized that it meant that I needed to actually do something, not just dream of doing it! So here I am on the road in my cart (my trusty steed, the Subaru Outback with the Thule on top), being an itinerant Reiki teacher, giving treatments as the opportunity arises. No, it isn't easy, but it is the right path.

It is not where we are located, or what we are doing in the moment, that matters--- it is what we are, what it means to us to simply "be" one with outselves and with Spirit. Yes, people have said this over and over, we all have, but living it is another matter all together! Sometimes I don't do very well at this but it helps to remind myself that I am only a human and to offer it up. It is an enormous challange for me to be in big towns with so many cars and people and noise after the peace of my tranquil place. This is a reminder to me to not miss daily Gassho (in Japanese "two hands coming together") meditation.

It is also a reminder to go on Retreat if I am losing my center. Two days spent at a Benedictine Abbey (St. Walburga) in Virginia Dale, singing the psalms from morning to night, gave me back my self that had become overshadowed by the stressful car trip across America from Maine to Colorado. As I entered the Chapel, peace descended upon me immediately, and I felt the unmistakable presence of Spirit. One of my favorite things to do is to invoke Reiki during Mass and feel the amazing connection with my highest guide, a blessed combination that never fails to bring me to where I need to be, and cannot find alone.

No matter how lonely, or hard the path, there is joy at the center of our being, awaiting awakening. There are many ways to center oneself. I have a friend who is often depressed. His "chapel" is his camera. He takes macro photograhs of only the smallest little things, no matter where he is, and it helps him to always be mindfully looking for that special image hiding somewhere, waiting to be uncovered and noticed. These little discoveries take him out of himself, and bring him happiness, by putting him in touch with the tiny places of beauty that exist everywhere, if only for a moment.

The day after my mother passed on, I found a scrap of paper floating around in the bottom of a drawer, written to her on her 16th birthday by my grandmother. It was a stanza of a poem by Charles Kingsley: "Be good sweet maid and let who will be clever. Do noble deeds, not dream them all day long. And so make life, death and the great hereafter, One grand sweet song." I had been hearing the first line of this for three solid years in my meditations, without having the vaguest idea where it came from or what it meant. Now I know that it was my grandmother, who I never knew, telling me to get out there and manifest my dreams.

And that's what it's about today: Walking on the right path. This day. 5/27/07

NEPAL, November, 2006.

Reiki in Nepal this year was offered enroute to and from the Annapurna Sanctuary, and the Master class finished up in Kathmandu. It was your usual unbelievably beautiful October mountain scenery, the friendly and open spirit of the people, and the land that called me back. When we travel, we do not see the real people unless we take the time to try to speak with them in their language. Sign language is good (I had a wonderful deep tissue massage in a tiny mountain village by a very professional Nepali massage therapist who was deaf and non-speaking---but who understood much more than needed to be said intuitively and spiritually).

When we communicate using our sensation and perception, we hear the real stories: the stories behind the mudslide that killed an entire village; the loss of crops that resulted in families having to leave homesteads hundreds of years old; the cultural confusion surrounding the introduction of "civilization" into a country that until 5 years ago had only one road running between the two largest cities of Kathmandu and Pokhara; the intrusion of foreign violence; the question of how to protect the environment and still meet the needs of a burgeoning population.

And also the joyful things: the extended families living under one roof with their goats enjoying the same shelter; the solitude and peace of silence alone on the trail; the laughter and comraderie of the village coming together to dance; the simple pleasures of sharing what food we have among many. We don't have to go away to Nepal to have this, though it is compelling to believe that it is different elsewhere. Truly, our needs and gifts are the same no matter where we live. What we learn is that everyone shares the same feelings, perceptions, consciousness.

Then, shockingly, while we are happily sharing snapshots of our families, one of our group is robbed on the trail and suddenly nothing is the same. The Nepali people helping us run countless kilometres across the mountains to try to apprehend the robbers--- they are so upset to think that one of their own has done this. And they find them!!! If only we in the United States could mobliize that kind of grass-roots response to our own violence perpetrated against others....it used to be so, before so much changed.

Sometimes I bemoan the fact of change, sometimes I welcome it. There is no holding back what is happening now. But we can influence the future by our intention for what is to come. Meditating for peace is one way to do this.

Or, with a small donation. In Nepal, there is a monastery in Pokhara where they have more Tibetan refugee monks coming, but they cannot support them. If you wish, I think it would be good place to help buy books for education. At this time, all grades are in one room. We visited the Shree Gaden Dargayling Monastery and could see that they had practically nothing. During the occupation of Tibet by the Chinese, and the subsequent exodus of Tibetans from their homeland, Ven. Tulku Lobsang Jamyang, the head lama, was asked by HH the Dalai Lama to establish this modest monastery in Tashi-ling Tibetan camp in Pokhara, Nepal in 1984. There is a need for classrooms, books, a facility for a teacher (there is no place to house one), food and clothing, and medical supplies for the young monks who are being educated there.

There are thousands of causes in the world for peace. There is a powerful mantra being created that reverberates around the planet, that will lead each of us to the place we are supposed to be helping to heal. This mantra calls us to support those in the world who have less than we do. Even if we do not have much, it is necessary to be part of the sharing. Look for what is right for you---and do not neglect to look in your own community. If you are interested in helping in Nepal, email: sgdling@fewmail.com.np.

In the mountains, in the Annapurna range, which consists of at least 4 awesome peaks, the opportunity on our teaching-trek to have an attunement to Reiki was extraordinary. There were challanges, illnesses, losses and disappointments, but without these, there is no growth.

While the others went on to Annapurna Sanctuary, I stayed behind for 2 days at Macchapuchare Base Camp in a barren, freezing cold stone cubicle in my trusty sleeping bag, laid low by a virus that decimated my body's normally healthy ability to hike under any circumstances. I lay there and did self-Reiki for hours, slept, meditated, prayed, tried to eat soup (unsuccessfully) that people brought, drank a lot of water, talked to God, and did more Reiki. Eventually my trekking group re-emerged from the mountain mists. It was comforting to know that there was no need for anxiety or worry, because I had something to do to heal myself and was totally protected by Spirit. My growth was to understand how fast I had been going. I slowed down (the ultimate purpose of most illness).

Live life to it's fullest, welcome difficulty when it presents itself, don't worry about its "karmic" lesson, just know that it opens the path to healing and greater understanding of the soul journey we are all on.

The mountains remind me of my mother: she knew everything there was to know about mountain climbing (from books). The greatest sadness of her life was not being able to read any longer because of macular degeneration. I honor her by keeping her entire extensive book collection intact. Her journal entries detail the travails of the climbers, the angst and exhilaration. When she and I went to Canyon de Chelly and sat on the edge of a modest little butte to experience the power of Grandmother Spider's spire, she couldn't go near the edge. I had no idea until that time later in her life that this fearless mountain woman was afraid of heights.

We are always learning more about our families if only we ask the questions and listen to the answers. Don't wait. Do it now before it is too late. 11/26/06