This is Ready Set Reiki, a podcast about Reiki, the universal energy life force, from the curious beginner to the seasoned master teacher, welcoming all systems, all levels, all lineages. Reiki is a journey, not a destination, and on this Ready Set Reiki journey, we refer to ourselves as guides rather than hosts, as we too are traveling, supporting each other and learning on this Reiki journey as well. And with that said, I am your guide, tracy C Wright, and today joining me on my journey is Diana Maria Chapin. Now she is a professional energy healer, heart math certified trainer, organizational consultant and public speaker, based in beautiful Belfast, maine, with over two decades of experience in behavioral wellness and a decade in studying and practice in energy medicine. Her mission is to empower individuals to find their inner peace, navigate life's challenges and embrace their true potential. She helps organizations improve cultural coherence and employee wellness through resilient training and the art of science of heart-brain coherence.
Speaker 2:In addition to her private practice, she is the president and founder of the Healing Garden, a mid-coast Maine-based educational nonprofit dedicated to removing financial barriers and creating greater access to holistic wellness, education, training and care. Now a scientist by training and a lover of words and communication, she has devoted herself to mastering the intricacies of numerology, energetics, biochemistry, related to stress, trauma and healing. She is passionate about translating complex concepts and relatable, practical and accessible knowledge for people of all walks of life. As a professional speaker and organizational consultant for employee wellness, she shares the cohesive advantage and evidence-based heart math the Institute Resilient Program that offers naturally easy, heart-based tools and techniques for individuals and groups with a power of heart-brain coherence. Now Diana guides people to improve their emotional self-regulation skills and access their best decision-making abilities, tune into intelligent, intuitive power of their heart and enhance overall well-being. So welcome Diana to Ready Set Reiki. Thank you, tracy, I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 2:All right. Well, let's begin our journey together. So, after this introduction, tell me about yourself.
Speaker 3:Well, I have.
Speaker 3:I love that you refer to the journey as a Reiki journey.
Speaker 3:I've been on this journey for going on nine years now, but previous to that I worked in behavioral health and previous to that I was trained as a scientist, an environmental and horticultural scientist and so I grew up in love with nature and felt that I was very spiritual being.
Speaker 3:But I was raised in a religious culture that did not understand Reiki and even, you know, didn't consider it anything favorable.
Speaker 3:So in about nine years ago, I started experiencing, in meditation, energy moving in my body that I couldn't explain, and so it just launched me on a process of coming to terms with the model of reality that I inherited through my education and my religious upbringing and my family culture, my local culture, and I had to confront some very difficult things to. I had to dismantle some beliefs that I had held and learn new information based on my own personal experience, and I began feeling, in meditation and throughout the day, energy that I couldn't explain, and I just got more interested in that and less interested in what I had learned previously in my life and just decided to take that as my truth and began, you know, learning about the chakras, studying a bit of Eastern mysticism, and eventually I met my Reiki teacher, mary McCormick, and she taught me Reiki to the master teacher level and that journey just led me into the world of quantum physics and heart coherence and yeah, a whole bunch of great stuff. And, yeah, a whole bunch of great stuff.
Speaker 2:So when did Reiki come into your life? Did you find Reiki or did Reiki find you?
Speaker 3:Yes, I had.
Speaker 3:As I mentioned, I'd been experiencing a lot of what I would have then called really weird and wonderful energy in my body and it was starting to get a little overwhelming and I didn't have words or language to put to it.
Speaker 3:And I happened to go to a women's health conference with a friend and went to lunch with her friend, who I'd never met before and her friend is my teacher, mary and over lunch, when she said she was a Reiki practitioner, I said what's Reiki? And she told me and I was like, well, get this, this is what I'm feeling in my body. And she let me just gush it all out and she said well, you really need to learn Reiki, because what you're feeling is energy and Reiki will really help you understand what it is you're feeling and how you can use it, because you are a healer in this world. And so that was just really awesome for me to hear that there's some hope for understanding what I was experiencing. And Mary really helped me get my mind wrapped around what was going on with me. Wonderful, and so I would say it found me.
Speaker 2:Perfect. So what system or systems of Reiki did you study?
Speaker 3:I am in the Mikau Usui lineage.
Speaker 2:Wonderful, wonderful. So you are out working in this field, this energy work, and helping serving others as you're out navigating what is a common misconception that you find about Reiki, or rather energy work, about Reiki, or rather energy work that it's not real, that it's imaginary, which I feel like is.
Speaker 3:I welcome that challenge from anyone because I've studied the science that informs the practice and I can really speak to what's happening from a heart coherence and a quantum physics point of view, and it's so easy now for me to help people understand that their own intuition guides them to the truth of energy management within their own body and they do have some sense that it's, you know, coming from this place of the heart, and the heart possesses this consciousness beyond the cranial brain, it has a loving consciousness, and that we're sharing Reiki all the time when we hug each other and when we reach out and touch each other. People just never thought of it that way, and so it's just such a tendency, I think, in our culture to dismiss or even demonize something we're not familiar with or something that we can't explain. But I really use the science to help people demystify the spiritual things that they do know intuitively are true.
Speaker 2:Beautiful. Now you have helped guide people improve their emotional self-regulation skills. You help them with their best decision-making abilities. You help them tune into their intuitive power. You help them with their struggles and challenges on their healing journey. But what has been the biggest challenge or struggle you faced in your own healing journey?
Speaker 3:I would say, separation from my family, my core family, my family of origin.
Speaker 3:My dad passed away when I was in my mid 30s, suddenly one afternoon, and my mother, five months, months later, started a 12-year experience with sinus cancer, a very rare cancer that really created a lot of disruption in her life and in the course of what I thought my life would be like. And then, you know, I've had a very challenging relationship with close family members and had to do a lot of work that you know, to process what I would call, you know, wildly challenging personalities and the grief that's involved with separation, either through transitioning or through just coming to terms with relationships that are no longer healthy to me. Right, and that's been, you know, as you know, I'm sure it's like those are the most challenging experiences and also our best teacher. So I have really, you know, as I've navigated through it, it's been really deep and daily work putting to practice what I share with other people. And so there's, you know, a level of mastery in that where you become aware that the only thing, and the only one you're mastering is yourself.
Speaker 3:It's a great way to look at it, but what a blessing that you've had these heart based tools and techniques to work with and the heart is the center of our energy anatomy, as you know, and what science is now showing is that our heart has its own nervous system and this nervous system, along with the afferent and the neurological pathways in our body, is actually regulating the activity of our brain, where the model we inherited would have us believe that we have to analyze and get logical and rational and that everything's happening in our cranial brain.
Speaker 3:But cardioneurology is now showing that our heart has this brain that is complex, that is influential and that remembers, learns, knows and is a great guide. And so the tools of heart coherence and my training with the HeartMath Institute, which is a great nonprofit online that offers people you know, lots of free tools for engaging in the practices of heart coherence. Through practice, the heart memorizes these states of peace and optimal functioning. Implement some of these tools, then. We're teaching our brain, our cranial brain, to be more focused, to have greater levels of cortical functioning and to soothe those emotional centers that can really drive some drama in our lives.
Speaker 2:Beautiful. What a wonderful tool, so fascinating. So what do you wish your younger self knew about Reiki, or knew about the heart coherence advantage.
Speaker 3:I wish my younger self knew how to love herself.
Speaker 3:I was raised in an educational and religious paradigm and a cultural paradigm where self-sacrifice was really, you know, to be a martyr was like the highest possible pursuit for a human being, and so I lived many decades in that model, and I now know that because I was conditioned to fear and shame and guilt, I deprived myself of that natural inclination of my heart to be in love with myself and my life and the collective.
Speaker 3:I thank goodness that I was raised on a farm, I grew up on a sheep farm and we had big vegetable gardens and lots of outdoor space in the woods, and I spent most of my childhood and I spend a lot of my time now out in nature, and so that's my landing place to come back to nature, and I think that when I think about my younger self, she was very much in love with nature, and so that's my landing place to come back to nature, and I think that when I think about my younger self, she was very much in love with nature and throughout my life, being in touch with plants and other beings has taught me, you know, the stability that comes with being in love with the things close to you, and so I would definitely want my younger self not to develop habitual patterns and addictions around fear, shame and guilt.
Speaker 3:It's a lot of work to overcome, and I wish I taught my children that too. My children were very young when my dad passed away and I hadn't heard, I didn't know anything about Reiki, and I didn't really know anything about Reiki until they were in their late teens and early twenties. But I feel like, oh, I missed that opportunity to teach them love. I mean not, you know they are very loving creatures and beautiful beings on this planet, but I would have parented different, is what I'm saying, and I'm so happy to see, you know, a movement toward conscious parenting happening right now, and so I hope I'm contributing to that in my work as well for humanity in general to create a more loving, self-loving humanity.
Speaker 2:Yeah well, thank you for being part of the solution to our world here. So, when it is time for you to get an energetic tune-up, what are some qualities that you look for in a Reiki practitioner or energy worker? What are some qualities that you look for in a Reiki practitioner or?
Speaker 3:energy worker. I trust my heart in this realm and I feel into whether I can trust that person deeply, and so I have a few close people who I share energy with and, in reciprocity, we do trades and we're all we're women who take care of each other. So, um, it's really a heartfelt thing. Uh, it's not really at in any way, shape or form, a certificate that hangs on the wall. It's not any formal, you know, educational training. It's not you know what they know, or or? Um, I think, more than anything, it's how they talk about energy, how they, how they experience energy, and is there synergy there and how, how we're experiencing, you know, being to me, being dedicated to infinite intelligent love beautiful.
Speaker 2:I'm glad you have that support group you know, not too many people have that. What a blessing. It really is. So what advice would you give someone who's just entering this profession of healing?
Speaker 3:I would say allow your gifts to develop in you and really honor that your gifts are your gifts in you and really honor that your gifts are your gifts. And if other people have really fantastic gifts, bless them and enjoy your own tremendously and develop them and let them just develop organically, without rushing or pushing Each step of the way. When we engage with the natural healing capacity that we have and we engage deeply with that and learn from it, we're bringing gifts that I imagine we can't even measure. You know, just really influencing, through relational energetics, everyone, but also through developing our wisdom and our connection to the gifts that we possess. I know that and I'm always incredibly fascinated.
Speaker 3:My teacher, mary, for example, is really clairvoyant, and I am not very clairvoyant at all, I'm clairsentient. I feel the flow of energy and what she experiences in energy is just fantastic and she can talk about it really really well and extensively. It's so beautiful and she taught me and I thank her for this that I'm not clairvoyant and I'm just fantastic anyway, and so I just think, you know, it's so tempting to be like, oh, I wish I could see things like that. Or I wish I could feel things like that, or I wish I heard angelic music all the time, but it's just like.
Speaker 2:Well, if that's not how you're experiencing energy, learn about yourself, because I'm sure there's something in there that is needed in this world, sure, sure, and it could be a possible you know, not yet right, maybe that's going to develop in time. So be open to it. So you may not have it at that exact time, but it may unfold in the journey. So, yeah, so what books do you recommend?
Speaker 3:Oh, I have so many favorite books on my bookshelf over there. My top book in the world is Dr Joe Dispenza's Becoming Supernatural. I love his work. I'm a member of his global community. I love what we're doing in the world who are being're being. Highly recommend that. That's more on the sciency side of things. Another great book I really adore is James Nestor's Breath. It is a really great read and really changes the way I relate to my own breath and really is so helpful in understanding how the body works and how the breath works in the body and, historically, why humans have changed the way we breathe in relationship to our lifestyle choices. And then I love MetaHuman by Dr Deepak Chopra, who I've followed since. I think Dr Chopra was probably the first book I read on. Actually, I read Bill Moyers had a PBS special in the 1990s around mind-body medicine and that just opened the door for me. And then Deepak Chopra's Perfect Health launched me when I was 18. I read that and it sent me on a path of being interested in mind-body medicine.
Speaker 2:Beautiful. What other services do you offer? Do you offer any classes, events, trainings?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I am doing a lot. I offer private sessions, of course, and I offer people tools around heart, heart, brain coherence. I'm trauma sensitive practitioner with the HeartMath Institute and a a resilience trainer with a program the HeartMath Institute and a resilience trainer with a program the HeartMath Institute has called the Coherence Advantage, and that work is fascinating. To get into community groups and businesses and help people understand the power of the heart and relationship to engagement and culture, shifting emotional regulation and stress reduction culture, shifting emotional regulation and stress reduction.
Speaker 3:I love to teach Reiki.
Speaker 3:I am so grateful to be part of the Usui lineage where, as a Reiki master teacher, I can, you know, embellish the training, and so I offer people a lot of the awareness around the heart and quantum physics and some of the Eastern models of mysticism and how how neurology and endocrinology interface to create a state of being.
Speaker 3:So in my Reiki certification I'm always layering a lot of that material in and it's super fun. I love to see people spend one day immersed in in Reiki and to leave totally set on a whole other highly energized path. And in addition to all that I am you mentioned in the intro that I am one of the founding members of the Healing Garden and we're a nonprofit, we're all volunteers and we are trying to. We are creating a whole new medical model of care based on heart coherence and connection and storytelling and collaborative care. So we're working toward a model of having a sanctuary space here in Midcoast Maine where we can have providers of different kinds traditional allopathic medicine as well as holistic medicine where providers collaborate to get people the best care you know, free of financial barriers.
Speaker 2:Beautiful. Where can we find you? Are you online? Are you in person? How can we reach you to book a session or to sign up for a training?
Speaker 3:People can look at my website. It's, and I do, mostly in-person and remote sessions of Reiki these days and workshops only locally. So remote and in-person Reiki sessions and in-person training.
Speaker 2:Beautiful. Well, that ends the first part of our journey and I'm going to continue to guide you to the second part, which is questions submitted by listeners and Reiki students. So let's begin Number one can you tell me about the Coherence Advantage an evidence-based heart math institute resilience program?
Speaker 3:Yes, I'd love to tell you about that, but it makes sense, I think, to talk a little bit about what the heart mechanically, neurologically, hormonally and electromagnetically communicates bidirectionally with the brain. And basically what the science is showing is that the heart is influencing the activity of the brain in profound ways, and in fact I'd mentioned decision making and focus and intuition. But really the most profound way is when, when we engage in tools around heart coherence, individually and as a group, we are affecting outcomes in a positive way. So stress management is improved, emotional regulation is improved, group decision making is improved, creativity is enhanced and overall engagement and general happiness and joy are expanded. So it's delightful to work with individuals and teams and businesses to craft a sort of a unique presentation of this material in a way that is tailored to their needs for what they're going on, and it's really beautiful to watch people shifting culture and feeling happier at work and feeling more creative and empowered. So yeah, Beautiful.
Speaker 2:So our second question is as a scientist, how do you explain energy healing to someone who doubts the benefits of energy healing?
Speaker 3:Well, in my work, I always start with the science of the heart, and for most people in fact everybody I've ever shared this with is just intuitively known okay, yeah, there is something going on with the heart, consciousness. And when I can then tell them, you know, there's actually this map of a human being in this universe, that is, these energy centers, and in Eastern mysticism they were called chakras, and we now know that those are places where nerve plexuses emerge from our spine and there's this spiraling phenomenon of energy flowing into the body and in this electromagnetic universe, energy flows. And so we're using our body as an instrument of consciousness to facilitate the flow of energy, and oftentimes I'll even, you know, remind them of the model of being human that they, that we all inherited, which is like this body is a collection of systems. And if we look at the systems, well, there's, there's organs, and what are organs? They're tissues, and I, I take them down to the atomic level, and at that level we're just space and there's an energy exchange, particle wave and energy matter. So, you know, just inviting them to understand that there's more to reality than the physical body and that we inherited a model that is, I think, now obsolete and we're learning through quantum physics that we have this inherent birthright to enjoy observing ourselves as energy.
Speaker 3:And the best teacher of that, of course, is to invite people to have an experience. And then, when they lay their body down on my table or we have a remote session and they experience the movement of energy or maybe they're seeing something in their third eye or they feel this massive release in their solar plexus or a lump in their throat then we can have that conversation about you know, yeah, people feel lumps in their throats and stress in their solar plexus and they go to the doctor and all the specialists and nothing can be found in the material world because it's energy, and then they experience that healing through Reiki and they, through the experience, can authenticate for themselves that it is real. I will say that I think a lot of us in this culture still are somewhat secretive about if we have an energy healer, because it is in the environment that I'm around. It's not mainstream in any way.
Speaker 2:It's getting there, it's getting there.
Speaker 3:It's so great, I'm so excited. Yeah, it absolutely is, and that's why I'm so excited about the work of the HeartMath Institute and Dr Joe, because they're really studying it and it's. It's so undeniable when you, you know, you hear the hear the results of you know studies with 1000s of people.
Speaker 2:now, Right, and this is perfect because that's our third goes into our third question. So can you tell me a little bit about the HeartMath Institute and what was the appeal for you to move forward with working with them?
Speaker 3:Well, the best way to understand the work of the HeartMath Institute would be for people to go right on their website at heartmathorg and look at the various opportunities to learn. There's a tab on their website called the HeartMath Experience, which is a series of short videos in total under two hours to really understand their work. But what happened to me was back when I discovered Reiki. I was basically. I now know that I was dismantling all of those models that I'd learned and because I had a fair amount of distrust, given the religious culture I was raised in and I no longer was a part of that. I just wanted to honor what my body was giving me as my truth and that that was a very courageous move on my part, considering how I grew up and what I was a part of. So I made that shift to trust my body and that's where I started experiencing a lot of things. I met Mary and then, when I read Dr Joe's Becoming Supernatural, I was like, oh yes, this man is real, because I felt this all first. I was like, oh yes, this man is real because I felt this all first. And then he's explaining to me in scientific verbiage what that is and along the lines there somewhere. You know, I was just tuning into the energy of my body and space and I was developing this meditation practice that I thought was unique and wonderful. And I said to a friend who does Tai Chi oh my God, I'm doing this super cool meditation. I just sort of suspend myself in that state where my mind is awake but I lost track of where my body is. And it's so amazing, everybody should be doing this. And he said, yeah, but he's been doing that. That's yoga nidra and people have been doing it for thousands of years. And so in my practice accidental practice of yoga nidra, I then read about yoga nidra and I discovered that what I was just doing intuitively was feeling into the space of my chest and tuning into the energy of my heart and having this wordless dialogue in consciousness with my unconscious self. And I don't know if that makes sense, but, like in meditation, the door between the conscious and unconscious mind opens and you, you know, you receive information from your unconscious body, mind that is so personal and healing. And then I learned about the HeartMath Institute and I was like those people they've got it, because I felt that.
Speaker 3:So I guess in my journey I like learned in reverse than most people. Like most people go out and learn and then they have an experience and I I feel greatly blessed that I had the courage to just go out and interact with myself and inquire to my own body and my connection to infinite divine love, like what's right for me. And then it feels so incredibly grateful to have stumbled upon Dr Joe and the HeartMath Institute and some others. I love Bruce Lipton and Greg Braden and Shemani Jane and they're HeartMath Institute and and some others like I love um Bruce Lipton and Greg Braden and um Shimani Jane and like they're all. It's like oh, all right, we're like all. All of us are members of this, this super organism of humanity, and we're all doing our part and we're evolving in consciousness and I I was receiving that because I'm resonant with it. It wasn't like I made new discoveries, I'm just resonant with this movement and consciousness. That's an evolving humanity, more moving toward more heart-based culture.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you're on the journey and look at all the wonderful things you've collected on the journey, and those who have helped guide you in that direction. So how wonderful is that. And you're keeping going and sharing your gift with others so wonderful. Well that was our last question as we were talking. Is there something you may have forgotten about or something else that you want to share with our listeners? You can take the time now to the floor is yours.
Speaker 3:I guess the only thing I would encourage people to do is to really feel into the reality that what we're thinking and feeling with our quote unquote individual body is deeply meaningful and makes an impact. I think that we're living in a time where people feel a lot of charge over separation and competition and impact. I think that we're living in a time where people feel a lot of charge over separation and competition and division. And we've been trained to look to the world outside us and, you know, let that guide us or let that drive our emotional states and we think that if we become part of the right group of people, we will make change.
Speaker 3:But what energy is showing and what science is showing is that it's actually the change in our own heart. It's the way we interact with our own thoughts and our own feelings that's vibrating out into space and affecting things relationally. So I just encourage people to really believe and practice that what they think and feel is deeply meaningful and profoundly effective, in fact, to shift humanity. So if we look outside us and we see things that are distressing, the response that we can condition ourselves to is to look within us and to move into our own heart and activate a feeling of love and gratitude and we will feel better in our body and relationally. We will be affecting others with that and that's what I think reiki is. Reiki is is a group of people across the planet who are really good at getting coherent and being in love and in in that practice we are. We are positively influencing other beings into their own coherence and hopefully leading them to center in their own heart and develop their own ability to get coherent and and create the life they want.
Speaker 2:Beautiful. Well, thank you for sharing that and thank you for taking the time out of your very busy schedule to be a part of the Ready Set Reiki journey You're welcome, tracy.
Speaker 3:Thank you for having me, it was fun.
Speaker 2:Wonderful, wonderful. All right, my wonderful listeners. If you are interested in your question being featured on the podcast, reach out at wwwreadysetreikicom or check me out on social media. Also check out Feather Sister Yoga and Reiki. That offers a variety of Reiki classes, reiki trainings and yoga classes as well. I'm Tracy Seawright and this has been Ready Set Reiki. Thank you.