The Buddhist origins of Reiki (video)

Reiki Founder Mikao Usui

Mikao Usui (1865-1926), commonly Usui Mikao in Japanese, was the founder of Reiki, a form of spiritual energy healing used as an alternative therapy for the treatment of physical, emotional, and mental diseases.

He taught Reiki to over 2,000 people during his lifetime. Eleven of these students continued their training to reach the Shinpiden level, equivalent to the Western third degree or Master level.

Early life, family, and education

What is our energetic aura?

He was born in Taniai village (now Miyama cho), Yamagata district, Gifu Prefecture, Japan, now located near present-day Nagoya. His ancestors were the once influential Chiba clan of Hatamoto samurai.

According to the inscription on his memorial, Tsunetane Chiba, a military commander during the end of the Heian period and the start of the Kamakura period (1180-1230), was one of Usui's ancestors.

In 1551, Toshitane Chiba conquered the city Usui and thereafter all family members acquired that name.

Usui was raised as a samurai from childhood, specifically in the martial arts techniques of aiki (合氣術) or "Way of Aiki" = Aikido.

• A Shumei member recently told us that three Japanese men all belonged to an organization called Oomoto Kyo ("Great Source"). One went on to develop Reiki, another (Morihei Ueshiba) Aikido, and a third (Mokichi Okada) Jyorei energy healing and Shumei.
• Aikido Founder Morihei Ueshiba developed Aikido as a synthesis of his martial studies, philosophy, and religious beliefs. His goal was to create an art that practitioners could use to defend themselves while also protecting their attackers from injury. Aikido is often translated as "the way of unifying (with) life energy" or as "the way of harmonious spirit." According to the founder's philosophy, the primary goal in the practice of aikido is to overcome oneself instead of cultivating violence or aggressiveness against others.

Although there are many stories extant in the United States that Usui earned a doctorate in theology at the theological seminary of the University of Chicago, he never attended, let alone received any degree from the University of Chicago.

Career and activities

There is a universal life force (chi or ki)

As an adult, it is believed that he traveled to several Western countries, including the Americas, Europe, and China as a part of his continued study.

His studies included medicine, history, Buddhism, Christianity, psychology, and Taoism.

It is believed that the aim of Usui's teachings was to provide a method for students to achieve connection with the "universal life force" energy (prana, esoteric energy, holy spirit, spiritus, animating force) that would help them in their self-development.

What sets his teachings apart from other hands-on healing methods is his use of attunement (reiju) to remind students of their spiritual connection.

It seems that all of his students received five principles to live by and those with a further interest in the teachings became dedicated students.

There does not appear to have been a distinction between clients and students in the beginning though this may have changed at some point.

People began coming to Usui Mikao possibly for different purposes -- some for healing and others for the spiritual teachings.

Shugendō is a Japanese mountain ascetic shamanism that incorporates Shinto and Buddhist practices [15].

The roles of Shugendō practitioners include offering religious services such as fortune telling, divination, channeling, prayer, ritual incantations, and exorcism.

Shugendo was often used by family clans to heal disease or avoid misfortune [11].

Claims of Reiki's Christian origins

Hawayo Takata, a Reiki Master under the tutelage of Chujiro Hayashi (林 忠次郎, 1880–1940), lied about Reiki's history of development to make Reiki more appealing to the West [16].

To this end she made a relation of Reiki with Jesus Christ and not with Buddhism.

Buddhist origins of Reiki

She also falsely presented Usui as the dean of a Christian school. While he had obtained the knowledge of Reiki from the Buddhist religious book The Tantra of the Lightning Flash, Takata claimed that he had been inspired from the story of Jesus Christ, who had healed with the touch of his hand.

So Usui, it was said, had come to America to learn Reiki. She told this to spread Reiki among Christians, too, believing it would otherwise be extinct.

However, in 1994, the original manuscript was found, which claimed that Reiki had originated from Gautama Buddha, the historical founder of Buddhism [17]. More

• Healing in Buddhism: Part 2 (abuddhistlibrary.com)
• Original Reiki info the sources: Part 3 (stason.org)
• Reiki: Tibetan Buddhist Origins? (aetw.org)
• Reiki is not a religion: The 2003 CESNUR Conference: The "Quasi-Religion" of Reiki (Menegotto)

The origins of Reiki and the glory of India:  It's all prana (breath, spirit, spiritual-energy)

(Yogiraj SatGurunath Siddhanath) Nov. 22, 2015. Yogiraj Gurunath Siddhanath World Tour Schedule: siddhanath.org

• Dhr. Seven, Caroline, CC Liu (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly, Wiki; Yogiraj SatGurunath Siddhanath

How to BREATHE (through the nose)

Simple single-minded attention

In meditation, there is no need to control the breath or breathe a special way. But there is a need to breathe (except, strangely, in the absorptions, but no one believes that until it is experienced directly).

And that will be very difficult and derail a practice if the nose is blocked, the nostril collapse, the septum is deviated, the turbinates are swollen or inflamed, or air cannot easily get in or out.

My whole anapanasati (mindfulness of in-and-out breaths) to focus on the breath has been derailed by nasal, sinus, and septum problems. I'm not the only one. Old injuries, obstructions, inflammation, normal aging, it can all add up to snoring, mouth breathing, exhaustion, grogginess, daytime sleepiness, confusion, and an inability to progress with this practice.

Let go? Have it all. So-hum

(Secret Archive) One breathing secret that turns thought into wealth

So the question "How to breathe?" is crucial and essential for some and nothing at all to worry about for others, who do not know we're suffering from such a basic disability or frustrating obstacle to progress.

• VIDEO: Breathe correctly for a very long life
• ZEN: How to "do" Zazen (BMZC)
• Sitting 101: What to "do" to do Zen (jhana)

This company may have a quick solution. Longer term solutions may involve a medical specialist and a thorough check up. Why keep suffering needlessly? Look at Klein from KROQ's Klein Ally Show.

The Intake Breathing device

• Intake | The Magnetic Nasal Strip
• Sutra instructions: Ānāpānasati Sutta

Before Four Elements: Breathing Meditation

(Venerable Gotami)

I smoked weed. What now? (DMT, Aya)

• Buddha statue with incense burning | freepik.com AI image
• Psyched Substance, The Purple Lady on DMT; Dakota of Earth, Is Mother Ayahuasca Real [for Amazonian shamans]?; A Mindful Emergence, Do this after inhaling cannabis as plant medicine; Eds., Wisdom Quarterly

The Yogis of Ancient Egypt

Adam and eve is kundalini – Artofit

• Asangoham, Oct. 5, 2025; Dhr. Seven (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly

Plants are conscious: Scientist J.C. Bose

• Chapter 8: India’s Great Scientist, J.C. Bose - Autobiography of a Yogi (crystalclarity.com)

Autobiography of a Yogi, Chapter 8: India’s great scientist, J.C. Bose

Indian scientist J.C. Bose

“Jagadis Chandra Bose’s wireless inventions antedated [preceded] those of Marconi.” [Bose was the Tesla of India in England, with a lab at Cambridge, inventing the most sensitive instruments of his day. Marconi is credited with developing the radio and wireless telegraph.]

Overhearing this provocative remark, I walked closer to a sidewalk group of professors engaged in scientific discussion. If my motive in joining them was racial [Indian] pride, I regret it. I cannot deny my keen interest in evidence that India can play a leading part in physics, and not metaphysics alone.

“What do you mean, sir?”

Read the original first edition.

The professor obligingly explained. “Bose was the first one to invent a wireless coherer and an instrument for indicating the refraction of electric waves. But the Indian scientist did not exploit his inventions commercially. He soon turned his attention from the inorganic to the organic world. His revolutionary discoveries as a plant physiologist are outpacing even his radical achievements as a physicist.”

I politely thanked my mentor. He added, “The great scientist is one of my brother professors at Presidency College.”

I paid a visit the next day to the sage at his home, which was close to mine on Gurpar Road. I had long admired him from a respectful distance. The grave and retiring botanist greeted me graciously. He was a handsome, robust man in his fifties, with thick hair, broad forehead, and the abstracted eyes of a dreamer. The precision in his tones revealed the lifelong scientific habit.

If John Travolta were a genius (Phenomenon)

Journeys with Plant Spirits

“I have recently returned from an expedition to scientific societies of the West. Their members exhibited intense interest in delicate instruments of my invention which demonstrate the indivisible unity of all life.1 The Bose crescograph has the enormity of ten million magnifications. The microscope enlarges only a few thousand times; yet it brought vital impetus to biological science. The crescograph opens incalculable vistas.”

“You have done much, sir, to hasten the embrace of East and West in the impersonal arms of science.”

“I was educated at Cambridge. How admirable is the Western method of submitting all theory to scrupulous experimental verification! That empirical procedure has gone hand in hand with the gift for introspection which is my Eastern heritage. Together they have enabled me to sunder the silences of natural realms long uncommunicative. The telltale charts of my crescograph [2] are evidence for the most skeptical that plants have a sensitive nervous system and a varied emotional life. Love, hate, joy, fear, pleasure, pain, excitability, stupor, and countless appropriate responses to stimuli are as universal in plants as in animals.”

“The unique throb of life in all creation could seem only poetic imagery before your advent, Professor! A saint I once knew would never pluck flowers. ‘Shall I rob the rosebush of its pride in beauty? Shall I cruelly affront its dignity by my rude divestment?’ His sympathetic words are verified literally through your discoveries!”

“The poet is intimate with truth, while the scientist approaches awkwardly. Come someday to my laboratory and see the unequivocable testimony of the crescograph.”

What secrets do plants hold?

Gratefully I accepted the invitation, and took my departure. I heard later that the botanist had left Presidency College, and was planning a research center in Calcutta.

When the Bose Institute was opened, I attended the dedicatory services. Enthusiastic hundreds strolled over the premises. I was charmed with the artistry and spiritual symbolism of the new home of science. Its front gate, I noted, was a centuried relic from a distant shrine. Behind the lotus3 fountain, a sculptured female figure with a torch conveyed the Indian respect for woman as the immortal light-bearer. The garden held a small temple consecrated to the Noumenon beyond phenomena. Thought of the divine incorporeity was suggested by absence of any altar-image.

Bose’s speech on this great occasion might have issued from the lips of one of the inspired ancient rishis.

“I dedicate today this Institute as not merely a laboratory but a temple.” His reverent solemnity stole like an unseen cloak over the crowded auditorium. “In the pursuit of my investigations I was unconsciously led into the border region of physics and physiology. To my amazement, I found boundary lines vanishing, and points of contact emerging, between the realms of the living and the non-living. Inorganic matter was perceived as anything but inert; it was athrill under the action of multitudinous forces.

“A universal reaction seemed to bring metal, plant and animal under a common law. They all exhibited essentially the same phenomena of fatigue and depression, with possibilities of recovery and of exaltation, as well as the permanent irresponsiveness associated with death. Filled with awe at this stupendous generalization, it was with great hope that I announced my results before the Royal Society—results demonstrated by experiments. But the physiologists present advised me to confine myself to physical investigations, in which my success had been assured, rather than encroach on their preserves. I had unwittingly strayed into the domain of an unfamiliar caste system and so offended its etiquette.

“An unconscious theological bias was also present, which confounds ignorance with faith. It is often forgotten that He who surrounded us with this ever-evolving mystery of creation has also implanted in us the desire to question and understand. Through many years of miscomprehension, I came to know that the life of a devotee of science is inevitably filled with unending struggle. It is for him to cast his life as an ardent offering—regarding gain and loss, success and failure, as one. More (crystalclarity.com)

• Autobiography of a Yogi audiobook in English | Chapter 8
• Echoes of Wisdom, 2023; Kelly Ani, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly, orig. 6/27/24

What happened? Free LA Fire healing

Los Angeles' San Gabriel Valley suddenly feels like a faraway paradise beach

.

WHAT HAPPENED?

What is a sound bath for spiritual cleansing?

In PR Russia with its worker cooperatives, the nation hides a glorious imperial past. Leningrad is actually Saint Petersburg, and this is where the czar stored the booty from imperial Eurasian adventures and conquests in the forging of the USSR, a Soviet super-nation, now mostly disassembled. The great Central Asian "stans" where the Buddha grew up are remnants of that time as is Ukraine and places as far away as Mongolia. The palace is now a museum. One needn't travel all the way there to see it, just visit The Langham Huntington Resort Spa in residential Pasadena on Lake Ave., which becomes Oak Knoll as it flows south.

The Langham Huntington, Pasadena

All the Gilded Age gold inlay on the ceiling...anyway, turn left to the Georgian Room, apparently named after the country of Georgia, where 60 yoga mats were arranged in a flower pattern streaming out from a center, where all of our "philosophical instruments" (Tibetan and crystal singing bowls, Zildjian gong, tingsha, giant shamanic drum, muyu wooden temple drum) were set up. Enormous amethyst and clear quartz crystals formed a ring around our sacred space. Eager participants, many of them guests of the hotel, streamed in and found a place, arranging themselves on the ground for maximum comfort, socializing and hugging. Then Seven sounded the drum and brought their attention to the basics for the evening:

• total relaxation
• receptivity with palms facing upward (downward for grounding)
• diaphragmatic breathing
• placing the mind on the breath to remain in the present moment, knowing the human superpower of adverting attention to a safe default (resting home) position at the nose or belly button.

Slowly the other musicians, the Zildjian Mistress Linda Lau Cole and Dr. O'Connor and Linda with the bell and her husband with the rain stick wandered about, enchanting the audience. Some sat to meditate, others taking a supine position to exhale.

The instructions were simple. What? Be. Where? Here. When? Now. How? Breathe and stay with the breath already breathing itself. Be a mindful observer of all that is coming up, without

• fixing
• judging
• evaluating
• clinging to
• rejecting
• fighting
• or even choosing

The work of the shaman is healing.

the content of experience. Be here now. Stay present. Know the safety of presence as Byron Katie and Eckhart Tolle explain it. Be in the now. The room was very safe. People kept streaming in, finding a mat. The sounds became ethereal, echoing, softening hearts and soothing minds.

Dr. O'Connor voiced otherworldly notes, traces of Tibetan chants, a heavenly choir as the Mistress joined in. Seven gave reiki and a laying on of healing hands, transferring prana and whispering a sacred mantra, for those open to it.

Dr. O'Connor began the process of emerging, signaling the supine to slowly move their heads side to side and rouse themselves with tapping. Slowly they sat up, smiling, looking at one another with lovely eyes.

Raising open palms, we intoned three long "OMs" together to send out metta and positive energy to an aching world. Outside, the earlier rain had quelled the fires and begun the cleansing process. Inside, the vibration had been raised, and there was clarity and a wish to connect.

• The next FREE sound bath and healing event was announced (February 8, 2025, at 4:00 pm, at The Awareness Center, Pasadena.

Roses were distributed to everyone as was water provided by the spa. Some people cried tears of joy, free hugs were on offer, and plans were made to reunite as everyone was invited to the next event.

RSVP for the next free session

• Los Angeles Fire FREE healing session (2/8)
• Disclosure Project: LA FIRE FREE HEALING, sound bath, meditation for all impacted by disaster, Sat, Feb 8, 2025, 4:00 PM | Meetup
• PasaDharma: LA FIRE FREE HEALING, sound bath, meditation for all impacted by disaster, Sat, Feb 8, 2025, 4:00 PM | Meetup
• Nature Center: LA FIRE FREE HEALING, sound bath, meditation for all impacted by disaster, Sat, Feb 8, 2025, 4:00 PM | Meetup

Event details

Event flyer: Sound Bath.

Spend an hour or more with Dr. O'Connor and healers gathering for a sound bath, vagus nerve release, relaxation, and meditation.

Dr. O'Connor and Dharma Buddhist Meditation are offering a complimentary sound bath and emotional healing to support Los Angeles residents affected by the recent fires with our very own Seven and Devorah Anderson.

• COMING SOON: We will be at The Awareness Center yoga studio in Pasadena, providing this healing event to the community. See Dharma Buddhist Meditation (Meetup) for upcoming announcement details.

These Santa Ana winds are driving me crazy!

Using Tibetan singing bowls, Indian harmonium, shamanic drums, and a Zildjian gong, this healing session promotes deep relaxation, breath work, emotional release, de-stressing, and physical renewal.

Let the soothing vibrations help begin to restore balance, ease stress and strain, and bring about peace from within during this time of recovery.

WHO MAY ATTEND? This is for any LA resident emotionally, psychologically, or physically affected by the fires. (That means you).

There is good scientific evidence that sound stimulates the vagus nerve and can therefore positively affect our wellbeing.

• FREE meditation, spiritual healing, sound bath
• Georgian Ballroom at Langham Spa Resort Hotel
• 1401 South Oak Knoll Ave., Pasadena, California
• Monday, January 27, 2025, 6:15 pm
• Space is limited to 60. Sign up as guest to register:
• na.spatime.com/tllax/5684945/activity/activity-view/11679295
• Also please RSVP free here or here:
• Disclosure Project: Dharma Buddhist Meditation
• PasaDharma: Dharma Buddhist Meditation
• Nature Center: Dharma Buddhist Meditation
• Dr. O'Connor, Dhr. Seven, Ananda (Dharma Buddhist Meditation), Jen B. (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Sex: Forbidden Fruit? (Robert Sepehr)

The Forbidden Fruit: Robert Sepehr

(Robert Sepehr) In the Bible, the forbidden fruit is a name given to the fruit growing in the Garden of Eden, which God commands humankind not to eat. Historians have speculated that it may have been a pomegranate, fig, grape, apple, or [entheogenic] mushroom. This presentation addresses the esoteric interpretation, and its occult significance passed down by various mystery schools and secret societies.

[A "mystery school," according to Dr. Ammon Hillman, is essentially a drug cult teaching the "mysteries" of ecstatic union with the substance or with a divinity through practices and the substance. The dedication of adepts is around a goddess or deity, in which initiates are introduced to reality through plant helpers and divine beings.

Yin yang at the center of the bagua

Taoism, founded by a divinity named Lao Tzu, is perhaps the oldest of China's three main religions, rounded out by Buddhism and Confucianism.

Celibacy is an excellent way of conservation of energy for spiritual purposes. But Taoism and Tibetan yoga might also suggest tantric sex with semen retention to cultivate the forbidden "fruit" of internal energy.

It is a powerful practice with the power to awaken our divinity if undertaken properly and with guidance. It is a significant component of esoteric Tibetan Vajrayana Buddhist practice by its yogis and yoginis.]

Tibetan sexual yoga?

Vajradhara and consort union

[Female deities like Vajrayogini, sexually suggestive and streaming with blood, overturn traditional separation between intercourse and menstruation [19].

In some forms of Buddhism, tantric sex is strongly associated with the practice of semen retention, as sexual fluids are considered an energetic substance that must be reserved for higher purposes.

Many Buddhist tantric texts direct the focus away from sexual emission towards retention and intentionally prolonged bliss. More]

• Internal Alchemy for Women
• Lilith and the Sacred Serpent
• Consciousness, Vril, and the Human Aura
• Flame of the Light Bearers
• Elixir of Life and Secrets of Immortality
• The Fourth Way to Enlightenment

ABOUT: Robert Sepehr is an anthropologist and author (amazon.com). Thanks for support on Patreon: atlanteangardens and buymeacoffee.com/robertsepehr. Links: linktr.ee/RobertSepehr.

• Robert Sepehr, Jan. 2024; Pat Macpherson, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Monkey Mind w/Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

(A Joyful Mind) Rinpoche is subject of Western research by American professor: Impact on the brain

Understanding the Monkey Mind

This gear measures meditating brain.

(Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche) Tibetan Buddhist teacher Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche discusses how [bare] awareness is central to [Buddhist] meditation. He elaborates on how the recognition of awareness is the very foundation for one’s meditation practice.

Reflection question: What do you do in your daily life that helps you remember to recognize awareness?

• 'Bird brain' is a compliment? Crows perform yet another skill once thought distinctively human

Recognizing Awareness

Who is Ven. Yongey?

This rinpoche is a Tibetan teacher from Nepal and a master of the Karma Kagyu and Nyingma lineages of Tibetan Vajrayana Buddhism. He is a star in the West because he is or was neurotic (a worry wart) and is very user-friendly and has written five books on the subject of meditation.

He oversees the Tergar Meditation Community (tergar.org), an international network of Buddhist meditation centers.

Royal family line

Who's Tibet's Guru Rinpoche? Padmasambhava

Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche was born in Nepal in 1975 [1] as the youngest of four brothers. His mother, Sönam Chödrön, is a descendant of Tibetan King Songtsen Gampo and King Trisong Deutsen. His brothers are Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche, Tsikey Chokling Rinpoche, and Tsoknyi Rinpoche, and his nephews are Phakchok Rinpoche and the reincarnation (tulku) of Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, known popularly as Khyentse Yangsi Rinpoche.

From the age of nine [1], his father, Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche [1], taught him Buddhist meditation [1], passing on to him the most essential instructions of the Dzogchen and Mahamudra traditions. More

Join Vajrayana Online, a virtual space with courses and resources to explore Vajrayana (Esoteric) Buddhism with practical guidance from Mingyur Rinpoche with online webinars and recorded teachings. Learn more at learning.tergar.org

• Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche books
• Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, tergar.org, ajoyfulmind.com; CC Liu, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Breathe into new states of consciousness

I'm starting to feel prana (chi) move in braincells

If one is on a journey that is lowering stress levels (Who isn't in 2024?), odds are one has come across the term "breathwork."

Unlike everyday breathing, breathwork involves [being mindful to modify, adjust, alter, and] control breathing patterns to improve mental, emotional, and physical states.

O, I see it now. It's starting to kick in. Oh wow!

Taking things up a notch, there is also Holotropic Breathwork, or HB for short, which utilizes accelerated deep breathing, stimulating music, and a tailored setting to help participants enter a nonordinary state of consciousness that activates the natural inner healing process.

From inside the mind, the healing activated by HB can potentially help alleviate past mental and physical trauma or mental illnesses such as depression, anxiety disorders, and substance use disorders, for example.

Curious to learn more, we emailed Director of the Institute for Holotropics and Grof Transpersonal Training Cary Sparks.

For reference, Grof Transpersonal Training (holotropic.com) through the Institute for Holotropics is the only organization in the world that can certify Holotropic Breathwork facilitators.

What is Holotropic Breathwork?

Holotropic Breathwork was created in 1974 by Stanislav Grof, an American psychiatrist, LSD researcher, and one of the principal developers of transpersonal psychology; his wife at the time, Christina Grof, was a psychotherapist, teacher, artist, and student of Mythologist Joseph Campbell.

• What is holotropic breathwork, the 'non-drug alternative' for entering a different state of consciousness?
• What is breathwork, and do I need to do it?
• A champion of psychedelics who includes a dose of skepticism
• Is breathwork a therapy?
• Not a placebo: Study finds meditation offers genuine pain relief
• VIDEO: Meditation: Can it really rewire our brains?
• I go to bed at 8:30 pm and sleep in a cage: One woman's quest to live to 150
• How the brain's inner chamber governs our state of consciousness
• Is hyperbaric oxygen therapy the key to treating fibromyalgia?
• TOXICITY: Forget incels, meet 'femcels,' the generation embracing toxic femininity (Females are taught all their lives what to expect from men, never how to treat them like men)
• Graphene oxide and chitosan sponge found to be ten times more efficient at removing gold from e-waste
• Tripping on nothing