This is ReadySet Reiki, a podcast about Reiki, universal energy, life force, from the curious beginner to the seasoned master teacher. We welcome all systems, all lineages and all levels. Since Reiki is a journey, not a destination, we call ourselves guides instead of co-hosts. So you're going to hear us refer to each other as guides, and we do this because we are on a journey as well as we ourselves are being guided towards Reiki. So, as we walk, guide, support and learn and encourage each other on this Reiki journey. So I am your first guide, tracy Searipe.
Speaker 3:And I'm your second guide, Millie.
Speaker 2:Pampina, and today we want to welcome Catherine Griffin, so she is our lovely guest today. So she is a vision therapist at the Vision Development Institute in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She holds a real estate license in the state of Pennsylvania and loves to help buyers and sellers move through one of the largest life transitions in a positive way. She was first introduced in the 2000s to energy healing work and she started work in the Quantum Healer in 2017. So I would like to welcome Catherine Griffin to ReadySet Reiki Hi everyone.
Speaker 4:How are you?
Speaker 2:doing Wonderful. How are you today? Great, perfect. So let's start off. I told our listeners a little bit about you, but tell us about yourself. We just love to hear it in your very own words.
Speaker 4:So I started working with this Quantum Healer years ago. I was in pain and I used Reiki as a tool. I saw Reiki Master for four or five years and it really helped. And then I started working with a Quantum Healer who really changed my concept of health and healing and how Reiki can really guide us. And then I moved into energy medicine and that was just a fascinating experience, to really start to understand how the intricate touch of not just Reiki but points holding meridians, points on your body, can really help to heal and open channels in a new and different way. And that has led me to where I am today just practicing Reiki and becoming an energy medicine practitioner certified.
Speaker 2:Wonderful.
Speaker 4:So tell us, when did Reiki come into your life? Probably back in the 90s is actually the first experience I had with Reiki. It was right after I got out of high school and I had gone to an event and had a session and it was like wow, that was just eye-opening how I felt even after that. But my main change and how I really felt about Reiki was working with a practitioner over a longer period of time. It was about three or four years and very consistent, and I just saw changes in my body that I did not expect changes in my pain level, changes in how I felt emotionally after sessions, and just working with that was phenomenal.
Speaker 2:Sounds wonderful. And here you are today still working with it. So you caught that reiki fever, yeah. So what are some of the common misperceptions about your work?
Speaker 4:I think some of it is that people feel they have a need to have me be the healer, but really it's their experience and them being coming the healer themselves. It's their body moving energy. I'm assisting in the way I hold my vibration and how I maybe hold my hands over an area, but their body is really doing the work themselves. I'm just kind of a conduit there, right, and I think that people don't realize that they're the ones doing the healing, right.
Speaker 2:They don't. They are coming to you as the healer, but they're healing themselves you really are Beautiful, it is, it's a beautiful thing. And that's when you just get so excited about it that you want everybody to try it, and then you have to start explaining it. But trust the process, trust the process. So you are out there doing reiki, quantum healing, what is some of the biggest challenges this industry is facing today.
Speaker 4:As a healer, I think some of it is that, as practitioners, there are so many different people teaching and the material that comes out is not always consistent everywhere you hear about it, and I wish there were more consistency across the board in the industry, somehow with information and how people talk about their client turning on their own healing. I wish there were consistency about that. Otherwise, I think it's phenomenal that people who are in this industry can take the time with each person. It takes a lot of time and I love the fact that reiki practitioners are willing to take the time to just be and to just hold and to just stay, and how beautiful that is across the board. Like that's one thing that I love about reiki we're all in that same space.
Speaker 2:Right, we all have that same goal of service, healing and love and love. So you've been in this for a while. So what do you wish that your younger self knew about this profession?
Speaker 4:I wish I knew I was a healer for myself. Even in the beginning I never really understood that, and it wasn't something that the practitioner imparted to me when I first started. Right, I wish I would have known that, right, because I think it would have made the journey so much more beautiful in the beginning. Right, right.
Speaker 2:And it's often challenging because you find many things online. There's a nice variety of courses that you can take, Some as cheap as I've seen 9.99. Yes, and in that and I've bought them in addition as a nice resource it's a wonderful resource to have, you know, but when you're going to someone, go to a teacher first and learn at least that level one, because in that level one you're getting those 21 days to work on yourself and that's so important, Instead of rushing through the process, moving faster. You know, we just want to get to that end result. You know, and we've talked. I got to see William Rand this weekend. He is with the International Reiki Center and he had said that you know through his guru that he worked with. There's no there. There's no there. You just keep going, you know, and when you get there, there's still a little more to go.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, last year I taught a Reiki class for Reiki masters to deepen their experience, and one of the most shocking things to me as we sat in a group and kind of talked, was that there you go through the classes and you learn the techniques and you first start working on yourself, but then when you start working on other people, you almost stop working on yourself sometimes, right, right, and that's probably one of the most important lessons I learned was that you really have to work on yourself on a regular basis, right? And? And trust that you working on yourself will help others heal as you're working on them.
Speaker 2:Right, and it's an ongoing thing too, because it doesn't mean 21 days. I am perfection, right, you're going to continue walking and you'll see it. It's cumulative. You may not realize it at first, but then something will happen. You're like, ok, wait a minute, I have the tools to handle this, you know. And then placing the hands on the heart and letting the Reiki flow, taking that moment. So it's so important to get those little tuneups, checkups, you know, check in on yourself, and that's so helpful with that. But yeah, so it's great, it's wonderful. But here you are now, you found it now and you can help, you have service to others. So, when it is time for you to go to a Reiki practitioner or to get a little tune up for Reiki, what do you look for in a Reiki practitioner?
Speaker 4:I always look for somebody who works on themselves. That has become one of the most important things I work. I look for in somebody and I look for somebody who really knows and understands how to ground themselves and I look for somebody who can really just hold space, because that's where I feel like healing happens, when you can hold space and just allow. Those are the things and I go to. I see a Reiki practitioner mostly once a month, sometimes more if I can. I am also certified in Eden Energy Medicine and so I work with other Eden Energy Medicine practitioners at least once a month or more, because even as a practitioner in that myself, I have to do self sessions every day or every other day and I have to see somebody to keep myself at a very high vibration and to be able to hold that space to allow others to heal.
Speaker 2:Right, right, and also with healing yourself. And I tell my students it's kind of it's like working on a muscle right To get it stronger. You got to keep using it. And so they would always laugh when I'd say, well, when you pick up that bottle of water, give it Reiki. Yeah, reiki to your doorknob, give it to your keys. When you're sending that email, send Reiki. And they think, well, this is so silly, but this is how it becomes a part of your life. As you're brushing your teeth right, as you're drinking the water, as you're eating your meal, as you're putting the dog food down, make it a part of your world and that's going to get stronger as well, and it builds your intuition as a practitioner too.
Speaker 4:Right, build your intuition. If you can build that in yourself, it will build it in others.
Speaker 2:Correct, wonderful, wonderful. So you have been teaching, you get your checkups every month, you're working with others, you're collaborating, you're supporting. So what advice would you give someone who is entering this profession?
Speaker 4:If they haven't taken a class, it would be find a live in-person class, because those are the best ones, where you're going to get the most practice and you're going to get one-on-one time with a Reiki teacher, and that's really important in your first session, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's why I always tell people you see all these wonderful things but it's $14.99 and I can save so much money. But you're kind of going at your own pace with the videos. But that's again a good supplement to have as a resource in addition to what it is. You know, a lot of those videos have really great information on it. It's like wait, I remember watching that, I can go back and refer to it as opposed to going through my notes or reading the manual. But it's always good to just get that physical person to help guide you and support you kind of on this as we're on this Reiki journey. Yeah, definitely. So what other you mentioned, if you through the interview? But what other modalities do you work with? Just let us know everything that you do.
Speaker 4:So I am a certified Eden Energy Medicine practitioner and I did that because I wanted to learn acupressure points, I wanted ways to build my immunity differently than Reiki, and I wanted a way to support a high vibration.
Speaker 4:And so I took on Eden Energy Medicine. It's a two year program, yes, until you can be certified. We also carry there's a huge weight in our classes of ethics and I loved that. I love that there's a background in that area. And then I'm now in year three. So I became certified and I entered year three, which is really exciting, and we do a lot of work with cancer protocols.
Speaker 4:We do a lot of work with heart issues, where we're working with those acupressure points. We're working with the five elements and seeing where things can be stored in the body, because your body keeps a score, right, yeah, it does. We can look at all the seven layers of each chakra, the seven layers of the aura. We can go into each one of those layers and see where the trauma is stored, how it's stored, what meridian it's stored in, and I love the intricacies of all of that work. And so it was like taking Reiki to the next level almost in some sense. And so I've really loved that journey, especially in a journey of healing myself. I say to myself all the time I remember when I saw chiropractor literally once a week or twice a week. I haven't seen chiropractor since year one of my classwork.
Speaker 2:Wow, wonderful.
Speaker 4:It's been a beautiful, awesome experience, wonderful. I love it. I also, as you mentioned, I hold a real estate license and I work at Century 21 Fairways in Irwin and I do real estate. I love it. It's so much fun to see the process of people getting into their house and selling it and just kind of watching the process.
Speaker 2:Wonderful, wonderful. So this is our question about books. Do you have any books that you recommend?
Speaker 4:Yeah, my most favorite book is Donna Eden's Energy Medicine book. Oh, wonderful.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I really I picked it up right before Well, it was maybe a year before COVID hit and I read through it and I understood nothing in the book other than these are points and here's how you can hold them. And here's how you hold neurovascular to calm your body, because I read through it so fast and there was so much vast information in it. Yes, but when you really take it apart chapter by chapter, even if you're not an energy medicine certified practitioner, you can do the work on yourself. Yes, it took me a little bit to understand that, but once I did, it was fabulous because I could use that book to start the work on myself before I even took the classes.
Speaker 2:Wonderful, wonderful, yeah, so it's a great book. So our last question where can people find you if they want to book a session? How do they get in touch with you?
Speaker 4:So I have a website. It's theenergymedicinconnectioncom. They can also call my cell phone at 724-519. 8129. And then you can also book a session at Soul Space in Murmeseville, which is great. Jesse Wagner has a space with all kinds of different healing modalities and we all come together and serve and it's a wonderful place.
Speaker 2:Perfect, wonderful. Well, thank you so much. So this ends our little session of our little journey. So thank you for taking the time to answer the questions and I'm going to pass it on to my co guide, Millie Panpina. That's going to walk you the rest of the way to the journey. So, thank you so much, Millie. The floor is yours.
Speaker 3:Alright, thank you so much. I, catherine, I just enjoyed listening to you so much. I'm going to have to get over there to Soul Space and take advantage of this, because this is a lot of things you were discussing are completely new to me. You know, I hear a lot about a variety of modalities and I always think, oh, should I, should I be doing that? And I'm beginning to completely realize, through self treatment and self healing and into intuition, you know, hygiene that some things are better left to the experts and I need to stay in my lane. So I find that very interesting what you're doing and so exciting to have somebody on that's from Pittsburgh, as I am, so we can get together and, you know, explore that a little bit further for myself and for others.
Speaker 3:As Tracy mentioned, we do have a set of questions we have. We invite our listeners and our viewers to please send us questions for our guests so that we can, you know, address some of the concerns or questions they have. You might have already addressed some of this, but I just want to make sure that we give everybody a bit of a fair shake here when it comes to, you know, being able to ask their questions, because frequently we don't know what we don't know, so we don't know what to ask. And also, you know we don't get an opportunity to see such a diverse audience. You know a diverse set of, I guess, practitioners and also these, these different modalities. It's wonderful. So thank you for joining us tonight. And the first question I have is I am new to Reiki. Can it help me reduce my stress level? So I heard you say a lot of things about that. Especially, you didn't have to go back to the chiropractor, so maybe you want to expand on that a little bit for our audience.
Speaker 4:Yeah, when I started seeing a Reiki master, I actually went because my stress levels were very high and I didn't know what to do. But I knew sitting in front of a psychologist for me wasn't the right answer, rehashing and retalking about everything wasn't it for me. And Reiki gave me a chance to just calm the mind and calm the body for 45 minutes to an hour and I left with more answers than when I went in and I was better able to handle situations that came up throughout the day, even if it wasn't about the situation that I was working with, the Reiki master, with, and, I think, energy medicine in general. When I took Donahedan's classes taught me that even more, that tuning into your body, tuning into your soul and just grounding yourself will provide you more answers than anything else. And so, yes, that's the. That's how I started relieving my stress.
Speaker 3:Wonderful, you know. What's also interesting is is, you know I always try to guide people to healing and help them understand something you said right in the beginning that I love. You know you're not healing them, but you're giving them. You're passing through the power and the tools and the ability to do that, and you know I always tell people you need to accept and that you want to be healed or you may need to be healed. You need to accept the process of healing, which is, I find, a lot more difficult sometimes for people to grasp than anything else, and then, of course, share your blessings with gratitude with others. So it's, you know, it's just always something. Thank you for enforcing that and making me feel good about my decision to discuss.
Speaker 4:Also I always one of my favorite stories that Donna Eden uses is, you know, back in like the 30s and 40s and 50s, when people would like go, oh my goodness, and they would grab the top of their forehead or you'd see it in shows or movies and stuff. Well, they're really. That was a natural response right to calm your body, because all the blood starts to move gently from the floor brain back when you can't think. And when you do this you're bringing all the blood back into the brain where you can think and feel again without having that heighted fight or flight. So I tell people that story because when you're in a stress mode, really all you have to do is bring the body back into calm to be able to think again, just kind of like you said.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I find that if I try to at least remain calm and give the impression that I'm I'm working through things, everybody else brings that same feeling into the situation, space, the room, the problem, and if I'm all over the place, so is everybody else. So I thank you for sharing that and I like that. I get that all the time.
Speaker 4:So grab the forehead and lay down.
Speaker 3:I love it, so let's see here. Our second question is what Reiki principle do you struggle with? That's the first time I've heard this one Tracy, so I love it. What Reiki principle do you struggle with?
Speaker 4:That's a hard one that might require more deep thought than we have for conversation. To be honest, I think at different times in my life, or at different times in my practice, I probably have struggled with different ones. Mm-hmm, right, because I'm also myself in a process of healing and sometimes we don't pay attention to every principle when we're in the midst of things until we come back to it later on, right? Yeah?
Speaker 3:Yeah, we're only human. We're only human, and we're dealing with a bunch of human beings out there that are also only human and no, but that's still a great answer, because what we're seeing is you're saying that you know, you go through the list and then you have to bring yourself back to that. I always tell people if you don't have a plan, if you don't have a list, how are you gonna get back to it if you fall off tracks? So I think that's a perfect response that you struggle with a variety of them at different times.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I mean, if you think about I will not be angry. When in your life can you honestly say like I've never been angry? There are just times in your life when you lose sight of things and it takes a moment to come back to your heart again. Right, and it's a lot about bringing yourself back to your heart and back to your soul, but sometimes you need that minute. You need that time to put your hand over your head or put your hand over your heart and just be, so that you're not angry. The same thing with worrying. When is there a time in your life when you've never been able to worry about something? Right, it comes and goes and it flows, and so I think that's like it's hard to say.
Speaker 4:There's one principle that you know I struggle with the most. You're just gonna struggle at different times in your life being thankful for all your blessings. There's not every day. Every moment that I go through that I'm so grateful for my blessings. But the point of Reiki and what I see is that you're taking time every day to tune into that and it helps with all the other situations, but that doesn't mean that every moment of my life I'm grateful for every single thing, like if I get hit by a car. I might not be grateful in that moment, it might take me till the next day to go. Oh my gosh. Well, now I know why I got hit by that car, right, and the intuition of the hit comes to you and you go. It means I need to slow down in my life or it's telling me something, right. It takes a moment to tune in. Why did that happen to me and what do I need to tune into? What is my life trying to tell me?
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I like in the analogy too. That's great and that's great feedback for folks, because I think sometimes people struggle that if they fall off on one they can't climb back on. And you know, and honestly I always say, you're not always in my mind, you're not always having a situation present itself that challenges you to you know, resolve it and walk through it. So when they do come up, it's a beautiful life's lesson and you know, as hard as it may be at that point in time it may just be the right thing happening to you to help you to you know, counter blessings. That's what I always say.
Speaker 4:My favorite space. When I'm in my favorite space, when I'm just by myself. My favorite saying to myself is everything happens at the exact moment, in the exact time in the exact space it's meant to.
Speaker 3:Very good.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:I don't always. I'm not always there in the moment, but I always get there every day. Once a day Good.
Speaker 3:Well, that leads into our last question. Here we do select three from the month number that we do receive. And the last one is how often do you receive a Reiki treatment for yourself? I know you talked about this and you know what you might even include when you give yourself Reiki.
Speaker 4:So you know that it's a daily experience because, I'm always doing stuff to myself.
Speaker 4:It's really important for me to take that time, whether it's right before I go to bed, when I wake up, in the morning, sometimes at lunch. I'll just take five minutes and hold my hands on my heart and then put them up into the heavens and then bring them back down and hold my hands to my heart, because bringing you back to that space is what keeps you in the mindset of being a practitioner and also living a good, healthy life, of staying in tune with your body and yourself.
Speaker 3:Wonderful and you know seeing other practitioners. Do you see a variety of different practitioners that you like to go to to work with their styles, or are you pretty tuned into? You know one or?
Speaker 4:There are four or five Eden Energy Medicine practitioners that I go to. There's not many in Pittsburgh, but I will travel even out to Ohio to see an Energy Medicine practitioner. When it comes to Reiki, there are only two people that I work with on a regular basis and we do trades all the time, and so I kind of stick with them and I love it.
Speaker 3:Wonderful, wonderful. That's great. Well, that's the questions that I have from our social media, and we thank everybody who submits questions and we thank you for answering those Again. Generally, what I like to always tell people when I wrap up this particular component of our discussion is I use the tagline to see beauty and everything is a choice, so please choose wisely. It sounds like you are, so, thank you, love that Much, and let me turn this back over to my co-guide, tracy.
Speaker 2:All right. Thank you so much for being a guest on Ready Set Reiki. It's been such an honor to you know, get to get your feedback and answers that can help someone on here on their journey to Reiki. So, friends, look for us online. You can find us at wwwreadysetreikicom. We have monthly Reiki shares. And check us out, and I'm going to take you right back to Amelia again because she has something else she wants to share.
Speaker 3:Thank, you, Katherine. I saw that you maybe had a few additional.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I just wanted to mention, if you're in Pittsburgh and you're at the CM a part of the CMU Oshers School, there will be an Eden Energy Medicine class at the Oshers School in November and December. Than I'm teaching and I'm opening a practice in East Pittsburgh and I also have I forgot about my space in Greensburg. I have a space in Greensburg, so it's a wide variety of covering the Allegheny and Westmoreland counties.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much. We appreciate that. That gives the audience you know more opportunities to engage with you, and that's what this is all about. We want to give people the opportunities.
Speaker 2:And do you do online sessions as well for those who are listeners who are not local?
Speaker 4:Yes, I can do online sessions. They would just either use my website to contact me or they can contact me via phone for online sessions.
Speaker 2:All right, perfect, perfect. All right, my friends, that is it for our Ready Set Rakey episode. Check us out online and make sure to get those questions in, and maybe you'll be fortunate enough to have it on our Ready Set Rakey show. So take care, friends. Thank you.