Heh, this is such a loaded question.
I was taught that "Reiki does no harm" etc. etc. like many others. Through practice and personal research I believe this to be nothing but a myth and ironically a rather harmful one.
To begin with, "harm" is subjective and so this poses problems right off the bat. Reiki is UNIVERSAL Life Force Energy, the energy inherent in EVERYTHING in our Universe. It's arrogant to assume it works for OUR Highest Good, or should I say, what we BELIEVE to be for our Highest Good - no, it works for the Highest Good of the UNIVERSE. Now from my point of view, this is the Highest Good of absolutely everything, including ourselves, but the problem is that some people may not agree. That's their prerogative, and I why I feel it's important for us as practioners to understand this so that we can inform our clients.
For example, I so often see requests to send Reiki to a dying loved one... even going so far as to request that we heal them and save them from death. Death is a natural part of the cycle of life, it is necessary. We cannot remove the necessity of death through Reiki. At a point Reiki becomes a means of comfort in the time of death, a means of pain relief, a means of helping someone come to terms with their life and death and finding meaning to it and acceptance, and even an ACCELERATOR to this natural process should the person request it.
Many people treat the dying with Reiki without understanding this, and even try to miraculously heal them... this is not helpful to anyone, and is not fair to the uninformed client. Really, it's not fair to the uninformed practioner, either. From a Universal perspective, this is not harmful, but to the individual who didn't understand that there weren't going to be healed, and continued to deny their death rather than find closure prior to it, and who perhaps even had the process sped up through Reiki, they might see it otherwise.
Since ULFE sees no bias and all things are equal, what then happens when we have, say, a bacterial infection. Most people wouldn't even consider this... it's bacteria, non-living, a disease... but in reality they are living beings with their own place in the Universe and it is only our innate arrogance, our sense of superiority, that causes us to overlook this important reality. What if it's for the Highest Good that Reiki favour the bacteria?
So I suppose I agree that Reiki does not harm if we understand that this statement is made in the Universal sense. But since so many are uninformed it DOES cause harm. Arguing over whether it's Reiki or the practioner or whatever is just pointless, it will go on forever... if Reiki treatment results in a healing crisis and the client was not properly informed of this possibility beforehand, then from that person's perspective, it certainly did cause harm. From yours or mine, it was an irresponsible/uninformed practioner that caused it. Again, it's subjective and our perspective is no more "right" than that recipient's perspective.
I don't believe Reiki is an "intelligent energy" in that sense that it "goes where needed" no matter what. Our intent IS very important. I feel that methods such as Kundalini Reiki work because the intent is that it flow freely through the entire body to where it's needed. In Usui Reiki, though, there's a reason the hand positions have always been around, a reason he suggested treating specific areas for certain diseases, and a reason why he taught methods such as hand mudras for concentrating and directing the energy. We need to take responsibility for what we do. Since we CAN direct Reiki, I don't believe it's necessary, for example, that we speed of the natural process of death when it becomes inevitable - we do need to take responsibility as practioners, listen to our clients, understand Reiki and work with what we have. If a client simply wants pain relief during this time then that is what we can give them. If it is meant to be their time, we can't change that. But if the body is meant to heal, we can aid in that.
TL;DR.
Last edited by o0wabi-sabi0o on Sun Oct 18, 2009 11:30 am; edited 1 time in total
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