Reiki is defined as Universal life force energy. Reiki is the life force inherent in all beings, sentient and insentient. It permeates everyone and everything. Reiki is naturally emitted from the physical body of all beings. Learning Reiki first and foremost makes you aware of the energy flow and enables you to channel this energy at will.

 

Arthur Gerstein remembers years ago when he decided to try Reiki for the first time. “I had no idea what to expect,” he says. “I had heard some Reiki practitioners say they healed you and took away your pain, and others said they were only channels for a life force energy but all that meant nothing to me. I just wanted my pain to stop.”

 

More people are discovering Reiki every day. Gerstein first discovered what it could do when he sought relief from a painful bruise he received from a fall in 2005. That fall left Gerstein limping in severe pain until his first Reiki treatment took away most of the pain. He has been amazed by Reiki ever since.

 

There are several approaches to Reiki. Years after his initial experience receiving Reiki, Gerstein first studied Western Reiki in 2005 and enjoyed working on his wife, friends and dog. He had even been involved in working on the world through group healing circles. He didn’t I had realize he had slipped into the category of Reiki practitioners that were saying “I can heal you and I will also heal the world.” Power is very seductive, Gerstein says, and it was easy to lose himself into the work and develop a well-intentioned arrogance… I have an important understanding, so therefore I am better, more powerful. 

 

Gerstein was assured by his Jikiden teacher Arjava and his organizer Mari Hall that true energy work initially is to work on the ego and surrender is the approach. Humility and being in the heart is the way forward. Gerstein says, “Experience has proved them right. Life brings us lessons. Mari says it’s because Life loves us.”

 

Gerstein took his first Jikiden Reiki Shoden and Okuden course with Arjava Petter in May 2012 in Norwalk CT. Jikiden Reiki is the original Reiki presented with credibility and clarity, entirely free of Western influence. Its roots go back almost to the discovery of Reiki itself. It differs from “Western” style Reiki in approach, attitude and ideas. 

 

This year Gerstein retook the Shoden and Okuden course again with Arjava and spent time with Mari Hall talking about the concept of healing, empowering and the collective task as practitioners of Reiki. Mari Hall has been a Reiki Master for 30 years and became a Shihan (teacher) in Jikiden this year. 

 

She says: “…The person receiving the energy is the one who is actually healing themselves, so empowering and inspiring. The Reiki energy helps us to remember our center point where healing and harmony take place.”

 

When Gerstein’s father-in-law was living his last few months in a nearby nursing home, Gerstein visited him several times daily. Since he was in a lot of pain, Gerstein suggested that Reiki sessions might make him feel better. After a handful of daily sessions, Gerstein’s father started to insist on Reiki. “He would hold my hand and thank me for what I was about to do and tell me he would phone me later,” Gerstein says. “Seconds after I put my hands over his head, he would drift off and call me a couple hours later to tell me how good he felt!”

 

Now a Reiki practitioner melding his art work (as color therapy) with his energy work, Gerstein is available for private sessions, workshops at client’s offices and other public workshops.

 

He is certified to teach Reiki, and will hold Reiki I and II classes. He welcomes readers to have their own experience and discovery of self-healing with Reiki. 

 

Arthur Gerstein, Man of Light, practices at 1 Danbury Road, Wilton. For more information, call 855-245-3060, email [email protected] or visit ArtEnergyHealing.com. See Community Resource Directory listing, page 54.