Personal practice Monday: Practice makes present

Today's Personal practice article comes from Pamela Miles' blog, Reiki Central.  The original post appeared August 29, 2009.


Do you approach Reiki as a technique to perfect or a practice to explore?

Maybe you’re wondering, What’s the difference?

If you approach your Reiki self-treatment as a technique, then you likely have some concern–anxiety even–about doing it correctly, or well, or even–perfectly.

Then on any day that your Reiki self-treatment doesn’t meet your expectations, you struggle with that internal yardstick of praise&blame, looking so hard for evidence that you’re doing it right and so sure that you’re doing it wrong–that you miss the big picture: the all important fact that you’re doing it, you are giving yourself a treatment.

This approach leads many students to stop self-treatment, because in their minds, they can’t do it “good enough” to make it worth doing.

If, however, you approach Reiki self-treatment as a practice, then the goal is simply to do it. On days when your experience doesn’t match your expectations (these days happen), instead of assuming some variation of failure, you recognize your expectations as just that–expectations–and direct your awareness to exploring your current experience, or to simply being with it.

In Reikiville, instead of practice makes perfect, practice makes present.

Welcome to Reikiville.

Any of this sound familiar? If so, please tell us how you’re discovering your present, or ask a question in the comment box below.

Thanks, Pamela! You can comment on this post both on Pamela's blog, and here, in the comments box below. If you would like to submit an article about personal practice, please send it in an email to bethlowell@thereikidigest.com and include the words "personal practice" in the subject line.


Pamela Miles is The Reiki Digest's editor-at-large.