Professionalism Question

Hi,
I've recently begun doing more healings for people. I also teach other spiritual classes and do readings. I'm finding a lot of people want to be my friend, but I am concerned about professionalism. I want to be warm, and I do care about them as people.

But I want to have healthy boundaries, kind of like a therapist. Especially the more my clients grow, I can't be everyone's personal friend that we do things outside of the healing, classes, readings, etc. I don't want to be mean, its not personal. Friends equally share their hopes, fears and problems, but as a practitioner that would be unprofessional and uncomfortable.

Also I rent a room, but its pretty lax. But hour healings are turning into 2 hour sessions because of talking, and again this is ok when its small, but I can't do that if I have more clients. I get impressions and information for clients during the healing and I don't want to not say those things.

Have any of you experienced this problem? How did you deal with it? What are your thoughts on it?

Thank you

well me personally no, and i've never been really close with my reiki teachers either, but i do wish the best for them. I've only healed people at reiki circles and even though the people are friendly I keep my boundaries

You just have to be firm about your boundaries. While I don´t know if there´s a "best" way to respond to invitations, you can take a look at this link: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolution-the-self/201312/can-your-therapist-be-your-friend

I don´t practice professionally but I have been an English tutor and the concept of "selling" my time and skills is the same. If I am scheduled for one hour with someone, I tell them right when the hour ends "it´s time" and end the session. If you feel that it´s necessary to include talking about your impressions during the healing then you must schedule this into the treatment time and charge for it. Giving Reiki is an act of generosity but if you are making a living from this you need to value your own time and skills. If you don´t do this, neither will anyone else.

Hiya,
yeah i know what you mean about the talking and talking.

you can let them know when they book the appointment that the session is for one hour (if that is what it is)
and then make sure the energy healing, reiki hands on part is finished within that time frame.
afterwards, let them know the key parts of the symbols and impressions, give them some homework if thats part of it. and say that you have only [number] minutes to wrap it up before your next appointment. if they have some more things to discuss you can make the next appointment to do that - and it might be a phone call later in the day/evening which they can pay half price for or something.

you may or may not have the next appointment with someone else. it could be that you need to go and groudn yourself and so your appt is with yourself, and thats ok. it helps to build the boundary that you're talking about.

i have never had back-to-back clients for the reason that if someone moves a lot of energy, they usually need to do a lot of processing. i'm not always comfortable letting them leave right afterwards.

to keep the boundary you're talking about - not sharing about yourself, and charging an appropriate fee should keep that in place.