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 lineages and all levels. Reiki is a journey and not a destination, and on this Ready Set Reiki journey, I refer to myself as a guide rather than host, as I too am traveling, supporting others and learning on this Reiki journey as well. And with that said, I am your guide, tracy C Wright, and today I am honored to have on this journey Joan Mote. Now she is a lifelong teacher, coach of other skills, but, however, teaching Reiki is truly her purpose and her passion in life.
Speaker 1:As a surfer from the big island of Hawaii, she never could have guessed that her fitness training background would lead her to become a massage therapist, which would then lead her to becoming a Reiki master practitioner and then an ICRT licensed Reiki master teacher. She never imagined that she'd be ending up traveling different parts of the world to teach Reiki. Now Joan loves teaching Reiki and brings to her class a combination of excellent training, real-life experience, hard-earned wisdom, love, compassion, humor and grace. Because of her background, her classes are taught in a relaxed Hawaiian style. All her classes are infused with warmth and sacredness of the Aloha spirit, regardless of where they are being taught in person or online. She's practicing Reiki for nearly 30 years and is very grateful to be of service in this way, and to her it is truly a joy, an honor and a tremendous blessing to live a Reiki life to help others learn this lifelong skill that can use to heal themselves, their loved ones and, in turn, the world. Joan, welcome to Ready Set Reiki.
Speaker 2:Hi aloha, Thank you so much for having me All right?
Speaker 1:well, let's begin our journey together. So tell us a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 2:Okay, so I have been practicing Reiki for 30 years now and in the beginning it was kind of like voodoo, you know. Nobody knew what it was. It was like I don't know what you're doing. I don't want any part of that. But honestly, in the beginning I never heard of it. I had no idea. I never even heard of energy healing.
Speaker 2:Everything I did was very tangible, hands-on. Um, I was a fitness professional. I'm a certified horse trainer and equestrian coach. Um, I owned a landscape nursery. I'm a horticulturalist, you know. It was all just very tangible stuff. So I sold my nursery and I didn't know what to do. I was the plant lady, you know, and that was sort of my identity.
Speaker 2:And a friend of mine owned a massage school here on the island and said come and take some massage classes, you know, check it out. You already got the anatomy, physiology background. I thought, ew, I don't want to touch naked, oily people, you know that sounds icky, but there were some sports massage classes. So I took one and I thought, wow, this is really interesting. I felt kind of like Sherlock Holmes, you know, there's interesting. I felt kind of like Sherlock Holmes, you know there's you find out what the problem is, and in my naivete I thought it was like fixing a car. So you have certain parts, you have X amount of problems, you have a toolkit, you fix it done, you're good. Well, of course, it's not that simple. So I ended up going to the massage school as a year of training, just because I didn't have anything else coming up and I thought, well, this is a great skill. You know, it wasn't the big it, but it was something useful and helpful to do until, whatever the big it was, showed up. Through that experience I discovered that a lot of people who seem to like they should have healed and I think I was a pretty good massage therapist, I haven't done it for years now they would come back presenting with the same issue and I got curious about that, like why you know something's going on here that I don't know about and I want to know what it is.
Speaker 2:So the year after I got my massage license, there was nobody teaching Reiki here. I'd never heard of it, didn't know anything about it. And a friend brought a teacher over from Arizona and she said oh, hey, come take this class. It's really cool. You just put your hands on people and they heal. And I thought, no, hey, come take this class, it's really cool. You just put your hands on people and they heal. And I thought, no, I'm good, yeah, that doesn't sound right. And she kept pestering me and this was in the old Takata style, where the classes were separated, the levels were separated, so it was just level one. And I said, ok, fine, I'll just come and support my friend, you know.
Speaker 2:So I took the class and honestly, I thought it was total BS. I didn't feel anything. I thought it was a total waste of time. I was really kind of pissed off about the whole thing. But my massage clients started giving me different feedback that I hadn't had before, like, wow, the pain just disappeared. Started giving me different feedback that I hadn't had before, like, wow, the pain just disappeared, or how did you know to go there? I didn't know that was sore. Wow, your hands are really burning hot. And I thought, okay, maybe something's happening. But I didn't take it seriously.
Speaker 2:A couple years later, same teacher came back to do level two. Same friend, come and take this class. You get all these cool symbols and you know you can do all this stuff. And I had the same reaction. I was just like, no, I'm just not interested. You know I don't believe in it. So, um, she kept pastoring me. I finally went, um, still didn't feel anything, and I thought, you know, okay. And then the and this was in the tradition where master level is ten thousand dollars. You know we'll still charge that much and the teacher's talking about becoming a reiki master. But she made it sound like you had to live like a monk and I thought I, I don't want to live that way, I want to to have fun. You know, I want to have a glass of wine now and then I want to surf, I want to do fun things. And so I had no interest whatsoever in ever becoming a Reiki master and fast forward.
Speaker 2:Well, about over a decade, life as I knew it ended very abruptly and very traumatically. The universe sent me to Virginia and I'm embarrassed to say I had to look it up on the map. I knew it was on the mid-Atlantic, but I didn't know if it was north or south of the Carolinas. I totally forgot my geography. Anyway, you know how there's times in life where stuff happens and you think okay, I surrender. You know, just tell me what to do, I give up. Except I still want total control of this thing over here. Well, it doesn't work that way. Either you surrender or you don't right. Well, it doesn't work that way, either you surrender or you don't right. So at that point I was so beat up I just went okay, I give up, I surrender, I'm ready to be of service, just tell me where to go and what to do to worry about finding work immediately. Um, and I knew there was something there for me to learn, but I didn't know what it was and I thought, well, I'll just stay for a couple years and figure it out, you know, and then I'll come home. Well, 12 years later, you know who knew? Um, I finally moved home permanently.
Speaker 2:That was about three years ago, but weirdly the universe sent me to Virginia to find ICRT, the International Center for Reiki Training, and pretty much all along Reiki has been dragging me along this journey, not exactly kicking and screaming, but not on board with her, through friends. And so I had a friend neighbor who was having a lot of issues and I kept offering Reiki, and she had a Christian background. Yeah, ooh, no, devil's work. You know what I said. I'm not doing devil's work. She goes no, no, no, I'm good. So one day she calls me up and she says I really hurt myself really bad, can you give me some Reiki? And I thought, oh, yeah, sure, okay.
Speaker 2:As you know, pain is a very motivating factor and sometimes people get to the point where they're willing to try anything. So she came over, she couldn't walk on it, she hops in. I was very busy. I said, look, I can do maybe 10 minutes. I don't have time for a whole session. So we sat on the sofa and I put my hands around her ankle and they got burning hot right away and, as you know, that means the energy is really flowing right. So then, after probably wasn't even 10 minutes, my hands cooled off and I took them away and we both looked at her ankle and went whoa, the swelling was visibly down. The colors, you know, it was all black and blue and green, all those colors. The colors had gone way down. She stood up and she goes well, it hardly hurts, hardly hurts. Now I can do all this stuff. I said, no, no, no, no, it's still injured.
Speaker 2:You take care of it, go home and wrap it, ice it, you know, do all that. So that got her attention. And also what might have taken months or even a year to heal, because it was about as bad as you could sprain it. Only, it was less than two months and it was completely healed. So so she decided to take a reiki class and at that time I knew nothing about icrt. We had a licensed teacher near roanoke in southern virginia and she's since retired. But so my friend found that and took that class and then she was really excited and she was using Reiki on her family and herself and everything.
Speaker 2:A couple years later she wanted to do master and she said oh, come with me, it'll be really fun, we'll get a hotel room, we'll do all this stuff. You know, and I'm thinking what my previous Reiki master told me. You know, I'm like no, I don't want to be a Reiki master, first of all I want. I'm like no, I don't want to be a Reiki master, first of all, I want $10,000. Secondly, I'm just not interested. You know she goes no, no, no, it's like $1,000. I went, uh, no, I'm good. Anyway, she kept pestering me like the other one and I finally I went um and because I'd already had level two.
Speaker 2:I qualified for the ICRT master training and this was before we had Holy Fire yeah, that's when the light bulb went on. We had the fabulous manuals that William wrote himself. He's really quite a scholar.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And I felt the energy and it was really profound. I just thought, wow, this is the real deal, this is what it's supposed to be like. And I was talking to someone, a nurse, who had driven down from Michigan which was like I don't know eight hours or more all night to take the class, and I didn't know anything about the licensed teachers or you know any of that. And I said why didn't you just take something closer? I mean, there's Reiki teachers all over, right. Yes, well, I wanted to take a class with a licensed teacher and this was the next closest one that was available, because you know, williams classes in Michigan were all full. And I thought, wow, people are looking for this. It's not like to go out and try and sell it and market it, and you know. So in less than a year, I started teaching and I knew that that was my big it. And, interestingly, I started teaching at a community college in Charlottesville, which is in the south you know.
Speaker 2:But Charlottesville is pretty eclectic and I interviewed and they said oh, this is great, we've been looking for something like this for their adult ed, you know, continuing ed. So I did that for about a year and then got my own office and was working in a healing center and it was just fabulous. I loved it. And then I knew right away I wanted to go through the licensing program, which is three years, about 1,000 hours, and it's pretty intense. But I can tell you it not only made me a much, much better teacher, but it made me a better person in every way. You know, even my ex-husband says you're so much nicer than you used to be. So I said I'm glad you recognize that I've been working on it, you know, yeah. So then you know, I kept teaching there, there, and this is my only job. Really I don't have a job or anything. I see clients occasionally but I don't have a lot of time anymore. So I market, you know, sessions, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then COVID happened and you know we couldn't teach. Everything had been in person. Before COVID, nobody told me it wasn't traditional or effective or, you know, even acceptable. So we had to shift gears really quick. And I can't say enough about Team Reiki and what incredible people they are who run ICRT and what incredible people they are who run ICRT.
Speaker 2:I was talking to Colleen one day she and I are friends and I said, colleen, how did? And they came up with the whole online training program in two weeks. Yeah, they did right, I remember. Yeah, I said, how did you guys do this in two weeks? Because it's 40 pages of very detailed information. She said, well, first of all, we weren't working. Detailed information. She said, well, first of all, we weren't working. Secondly, um, it was very clear that it would had to be done immediately. They didn't have months to figure it out. So you know, yay, thank you for team reiki and um.
Speaker 2:But I was really resistant to teaching online. I don't know why, because I'm kind of a renegade. I I like things to be different, but anyway, finally, I practiced for a couple months with Zoom and all that and started teaching online and it's been an incredible gift. I have students all around the world now. It's just marvelous people who would never have access to this sort of thing and really anywhere in the the world, if someone has connectivity, they can learn reiki, they can take a class. So it's been an extraordinary gift that came out of the covid, you know, and then all of the um and the heal, the holy fire and all the holy fire upgrades we've had and all that yes wonderful.
Speaker 2:It's been a marvelous experience, and I was telling someone the other day I don't know how I'd live without reiki. Yeah, it just is so useful for everything. Yeah, I just had a car issue and reiki the whole thing, and it always makes it turn out better. You know, one of the things I tell my students is ask for whatever you want, be as detailed as you want. You deserve it, whatever it is you want, but don't be attached to the outcome and just say this is what I want or something better. So remember that out there, ask for what you want or something better, let the universe figure it out.
Speaker 2:You know we can't see the bigger picture, and there's, we're tapping into a realm of infinite possibilities. So why not let the universe give us something better? And I'm telling you, it happens every single time wonderful, what a journey.
Speaker 1:What a journey. So would you say that you found reiki or reiki found you pretty much reiki found me.
Speaker 2:I was not looking for it. You know, I didn't even know anything about it. So yeah, and that happens a lot people say, oh, I, you know, I just, I just it just happened. It just I wasn't looking for it. Yeah, so Reiki shows up when you're ready, right.
Speaker 1:So what systems of Reiki do you work with?
Speaker 2:Primarily Usui, Holy Fire, Karuna Reiki and Animal Reiki Beautiful, and I know there's lots of other forms of Reiki out there. It's just, you know, that feels like enough at this point. Sure.
Speaker 1:Beautiful. So you have been with the ICRT. You have been doing this for over 30 years. You've been out helping and mentoring others in their journey through Reiki. What is a common misconception about Reiki and the work you do?
Speaker 2:A lot of people think it's just a belief or something you visualize. They don't think that it's a tangible thing. The energy is real and it's very tangible, and when someone experiences it for the first time, they always go, wow, I can actually feel that. You know, um. And also then there's um people who have been misguided by their religion. Or you know online oh my gosh, social media, whatever. So much misinformation out there sure, bad evil, devil's work, whatever. Um, I don't even really google it anymore. I'm just shocked at what shows up and there's nothing we can do about it. Also, uh, some people think that you're using your own energy. There are other forms of energy healing that use the practitioner's energy, and Reiki absolutely does not. You set yourself aside so the power of the energy can flow through you. And because Reiki is self-intelligent, the more you get out of the way, the more effective it is, because it knows what to do. I could tell you dozens of stories about that. That's amazing. I can tell you dozens of stories about that. That's amazing.
Speaker 1:Well, you have been helping so many people on their journey when they've had these challenges or life struggles.
Speaker 2:But what has been the biggest challenge or rather struggle you faced in your own healing journey. So everyone has negative energy patterns and this is something, as you know, know that we learn in the master training. Um, we take them on either in early childhood or they can even come through from past lives. So we take on these patterns and, um, I had a family member who was very self-absorbed, maybe even narciss, narcissistic, judgmental, all of that sort of thing, very egotistical, and so I absorb this sort of pattern and so I would say, you know, healing the ego, which is probably a big reason why my ex thinks I'm so much nicer. Yeah, but it's really, it's been such a beautiful gift. I am nicer and I have more compassion and empathy and caring for people and unconditional love. And it took a long time to heal that judgmental pattern.
Speaker 2:And this came from my mom, who loved people, yeah, but she worked in the fashion industry and so she was always dressed. Even in hawaii she wore stockings and high heels, and you know that that was her, and so if someone wasn't dressed in a way she thought was appropriate, I would hear her make that sound. She'd go, oh, look at that person, don't they have a mirror? That outfit doesn't match, it looks terrible on them. You know on and on wrong color. Whatever it was that, why don't they tuck their shirt in? You know so when I was in my 20s, I saw someone she wouldn't have approved of and the mean, right away the thoughts start going. You know those negative energy thoughts, the loop, and I thought wait a second.
Speaker 2:I don't even know that person. I could care less what they're wearing, you know and then I went oh my gosh, that's mom in my head. I didn't know how to get her out. I didn't know, you know, how she got in or what the process was. So it's a work in progress. Process was so, um, so it's a work in progress.
Speaker 2:You know, healing your negative energy patterns are deepest issues and it's definitely possible, um, and it's definitely necessary if you want to evolve, to be a better person. I'm always striving to be a better person. I'm certainly not perfect, but it's a work in progress. And I would say the other issue which pretty much is resolved now is trusting in a higher power and that there is an energy in the universe or you could call it the universe or the divine or whatever that is benevolent and works with us and wants to help us and heal us. And so many people have a hard time trusting because they think, oh, that's just my mind making it up, or you know patterns where they they feel like they're not good enough, they don't deserve whatever. So trusting in that higher power is so important and you think it would be the most natural thing in the world, but it seems like the hardest thing in the world certainly is, isn't it? Yeah?
Speaker 1:so yeah. So what do you wish your younger self knew about reiki?
Speaker 2:pretty much everything. I don't think I could pinpoint one thing exactly. You know just what a powerful tool and gift it is for living life, for dealing with life's issues. One time someone said to me oh, you're Reiki master, your life must be perfect. I went no same stuff happens to me, but I have some tools and, you know, information that I can use to work with to just get through all those things more easily, right or effectively and more efficiently and um, and to learn, you know, from the challenges in life, instead of blaming people or oh, why did this happen to me? You know, whenever something really challenging happens, I just think, okay, what am I supposed to be learning from this? This really sucks. I want to get through it as quickly as possible and never happen again.
Speaker 1:Sure, sure it's amazing, like when I had a little health issue with my blood pressure and I always had like classic textbook blood pressure and it started going a little wonky. And my very best friend's like how you do so much Reiki, it should be fine and I'm like right, yeah, I'm a human and there's genetics and all kinds of other things yeah, you should.
Speaker 2:Your life should be perfect. You shouldn't have issues like well, we inhabit human form for a reason.
Speaker 1:You know, sure, sure like.
Speaker 2:When I was in virginia I had a horrific car wreck. You know I could have been dead. Someone hit me very fast, going on head-on. Hit me head-on. Whole front of my car was smashed and miraculously I only had injuries from the knees down which were pretty serious. But um, I wasn't angry, I wasn't happy about it. People kept, weren't you angry? Some guy was racing his Porsche on a back road.
Speaker 2:Boom you know, I didn't have any time to react and I thought well, he didn't do it on purpose. I'm pretty sure about that, you know. Plus, I made a soul agreement with him to have this experience. For why? You know, I didn't know in the beginning. Yes, thank you for the lesson and I never need to do that one again.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah, Make sure to put that in. Yeah, one and done, exactly.
Speaker 2:But a lot of amazing things came out of it and one of them was learning how to receive Right. I was always the giver, you know, and it was hard to receive graciously and, um, I had just joined a unity church there, really didn't know anybody yet it was only a few months and they announced it and they just stepped up. Someone organized meals for me because my housemate was always gone and and they'd come and hang out, help me do stuff. I couldn't walk for a while and, um, it was just miraculous. And then when I finally was able to go to a service, I was sitting in the back because I couldn't walk. You know, I had a walker and hobbled along and they said come, come up to the front. So I'm hobbling up, get the standing ovation.
Speaker 2:I started crying and just thanked everybody so much, and the person who organized the meals. I said I can't thank you enough. I don't know what I would have done. You know I couldn't like get up and make anything, sure. And she said oh no, we need to thank you. And I went what? Why? She said because you helped us remember what a gift it is to give. Well, then I really started crying. I was like oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:you know I never thought about receiving something from someone as giving them a gift. Sure, sure, graciously receiving whatever they're offering. Plus, I had tons of Reiki during that time, sent an SOS out to everyone I knew.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And then I had a lot of free time, so I was sending myself Reiki. But yeah. Beautiful.
Speaker 1:Wow. So when it's time for you to get an energetic tune up, what are some qualities you look for in a Reiki practitioner?
Speaker 2:Well, first of all, experienced. Secondly, although I have to say I've had some beginner students who were very gifted, but I like to work with someone who's experienced, intuitive, has had, has holy fire Reiki, just because it's so powerful, oh yeah, and um, you know someone, I know. I have so many um friends. You know the licensed teachers trade with each other occasionally but we're so busy, we just we don't have time to do that. Yeah, we have friends who have reiki and a lot of um master students who've gone through the whole program and are very good. So we trade when we have a chance. I've got a trade coming up, actually next week with one of my favorite students from new jersey. Oh beautiful wonderful, yeah.
Speaker 1:So what advice would you give someone who's just entering this as a profession?
Speaker 2:allow the reiki to guide you. One of the biggest mistakes people make in the beginning is trying to guide the reiki, to direct it. So keep in mind, the reiki is self-intelligent and it knows what to do and it will guide you. You will have an inner knowingness of where to place your hands, or you know you may even get messages or inspirations, and the more you get out of the way, the more powerful it will be. And also, um, the more you use it, the stronger it will get, because your channel gets clearer and more open and you can pass more of the reiki through you and um, it'll feel a lot more powerful. Plus, every time you give reiki or use it for anything, it's passing through you, so it's healing you too. So use it in everyday life. I use it for everything, literally and get into that habit and then just trust. Trust in the power of the Reiki. It just, it's totally life altering. It's just. You know that sounds so trite, but it's really true.
Speaker 1:Some good advice. So what books do you recommend?
Speaker 2:So there are a lot of good books and if you go to the reikiorg website, there's plenty of books there. Some are written by William Lee Rand and you know a lot are written by other people. I would highly recommend Reiki in clinical practice, particularly if you work in the medical industry at all, whether you're a nurse or do anything in that industry because it was written by Anne Baldwin, who's a researcher. Anne Baldwin, who's a researcher, and she did a lot of scientific studies and you know, like double-blind studies, and so there's proof that Reiki does work and it was done in hospitals. Also, laurel Gaya wrote a book about Karuna Reiki years ago and she was the one who helped William develop Karuna Reiki, one of the ones, and that's really interesting if you are interested in that or if you've had the training.
Speaker 2:Reiki and Children is a wonderful book how to work with children, and kids love Reiki, especially little kids. You know they haven't had it programmed out of them yet that, no, you can't talk to animals. There's no, fairies, there's no. They feel that. So small kids are just like animals. They don't have any boundaries or barriers. They feel the energy, it feels good and they want it, and animals are the same way. Well, this feels really good. Yeah, I'd like some of that. And children love to give Reiki too. So we have a new training developed by some of our licensed teachers called Kid Reiki, and I highly recommend that if you want to work with children and or if you want to teach people to work with children, because it's a teacher program and the only requirement is that you're a Reiki master. So you know, that's really great.
Speaker 2:William wrote a book called An Evidence-Based History of Reiki, and he made many trips to Japan to research the origins of Usui Reiki, because when he was young and studying Reiki, he trained with a lot of different Reiki masters and what he discovered was that there was no continuity, there wasn't any standardization. You never knew what you were going to get. There was a lot of conflicting information or even misinformation. Knew what you were going to get. There was a lot of conflicting information or even misinformation. So he took it upon himself to verify the information and he was able to go to Japan and interview twice this guy named Hiroshi Doi Doi Sensei, who is part of Usui's original organization, the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai, and Doi Sensei is the curator or manager of Usui's original archives of information, so just about as close to the source as you could get, and William was allowed to ask anything he wanted. And William was allowed to ask anything he wanted. So one of the reasons I love teaching this program is because the information is verified.
Speaker 2:The other thing is that one of the things I love about William and ICRT is that if something shows up that proves that whatever we've been doing isn't correct, there's no qualms about changing it. You know, we're not attached to what we're teaching. We know that it's valid and it's good. But if there's new information, yay, you know. So there's also a modern method for healing which was written by Hiroshi Doi. So that's really interesting too. And you know. So there's tons of books. So you could go on that website and that's obviously. There's tons of books elsewhere. I would suggest, if you see a book and you're drawn to it, get it and read it. Wonderful.
Speaker 2:So what other services or modalities do you offer? Do you offer classes, trainings, events? Master? That would be usui. Holy fire reiki master and also um holy fire karuna reiki master. That's an advanced master training you can take after your reiki master for six months. I teach all levels of animal reiki. That's one of my favorite things to teach. I love it so much. Um one and two and animal reiki master. I also have a group mentoring program called the deepening program. That's a four-month program for students who are interested in just going deeper into their experience with reiki, and I do private mentoring as well. Also, there's an online monthly Reiki share that anyone who has Reiki is welcome to join, and I'm developing a new training program for training teachers how to teach. I've had so many students who have asked for this In my first couple of years of teaching.
Speaker 2:In order to apply for the licensing program, you have to have already been teaching for two years, and I'll tell you, in those first two years I was not a great Reiki teacher. I just I was having to figure it out all by myself and made tons of mistakes and just kept trying to learn and grow and, you know, evolve my teaching skills as best I could, and so I've been teaching now professionally, full time, for 10 years and I can take a decade of experience and information and you know all the learning process, all the mistakes, and condense that into days, right, so nobody has to go through years and years of trial and error, trying to figure it out and eventually it'll probably be a longer program, but initially I'm still developing it. I'm going to make it a three-day training, just like our other master trainings. Keep it simple and then, you know, it'll evolve as time goes on. But I didn't think this up myself.
Speaker 2:I've been thinking about it for a while, but this year I got a mandate from the universe. You have to do this and you need to do it now. You can't keep waiting. This is really important. This can help heal the world, because if there's more teachers, they'll be teaching more people reiki, and the more people in the world that have reiki, the more peace there will be. I mean, think about it. If most of the people in the world had reiki, they'd want to help, not be hurtful. People would want to support each other, people would want to share resources, people would be kinder and more compassionate and just more understanding. You know there would be more peace. So this will be my little, teeny contribution to bringing peace to the world. Very good.
Speaker 1:How can we get in touch with you to find you, to find where your classes are?
Speaker 2:Risinglightreikicom. I've got a whole bunch of classes coming up, several more this month, karuna Reiki towards the end of the month, both levels of animal Reiki Next month. So because I'm in Hawaii, I can teach in in um australia, new zealand, asia and the time zones work. So all of november is in their time zones and um the other online classes are in us canada time zones and I even have a student in europe.
Speaker 2:now that was they were up kind of late, but you know they said they do it, yeah, so it's pretty marvelous wonderful yeah just check the website and it's got the other things on there, the reiki share and the deepening program as well, which actually starts in january, right and we can find you on reikiorg as well yes, I am listed on the licensed teacher page on Reikiorg All right, very good, all right, joan.
Speaker 1:That ends the first part of our journey and I'm going to continue to be your guide through the next question. So social media and questions from Reiki students. Number one what inspired you to name your business Rising Light Reiki?
Speaker 2:rising light, reiki, um as we evolve, our light rises, so to speak, and um into higher frequencies, higher levels of consciousness. And I was also kind of thinking about kundalini, where I don't really practice it, I certainly don't teach it, but that's another practice where, as you evolve, your light rises. Plus, I love sunrise, and then the logo evolved with the sunrise and the ocean. There had to be a palm tree on there.
Speaker 1:Beautiful, beautiful. So, number two, how can infusing the warmth and sacredness of the aloha spirit assist in a reiki session?
Speaker 2:oh yeah, that's a great question. Um, so, aloha, the real meaning of aloha, sooha, it's one of those words that can have multiple meanings. It can mean hello, goodbye, it's a greeting, but it always means with love. The word itself is infused with love. The literal translation is the breath of God. So it has the same sort of meaning when you use it in its true sense, like namaste. It has the same sort of meaning when you use it in its true sense, like namaste. I recognize the divine love within you as the same within me. So, um, and that permeates our culture here, of course there's, you know, not everybody feels aloha, but it's really different, and when people visit here they notice that's wow, everybody's so nice, pretty much, you know. And so when I'm working, it infuses everything I do, it informs everything I do. Just that loving kindness of the aloha Beautiful.
Speaker 1:So you have touched on this a little bit earlier in our journey, but we're going to circle back around. So you are an ICRT licensed teacher. Can you tell me how the ICRT program helped you in your Reiki journey?
Speaker 2:Well, as I said, it absolutely made me a better Reiki teacher. It helped me understand the Reiki itself on a much deeper level and, um, when you enter the program, you're assigned a mentor who works with you through the three years. Um, that actually didn't happen to me. I ended up with three mentors because of things that were happening with them, and that was really great to experience it through different people. It just, yeah, it just it helped me understand what Reiki really is. I thought I knew before that and it changed everything really, and if anyone is interested in seriously being a professional Reiki teacher, I would recommend it. With that said, they don't take everybody. The year I applied, they took I think they said over 100, or they had over 100 applications. They only took two, me and Tracy Sullivan. We started the same year and um, so there's a lot of requirements just to apply and they want to be sure that when they're putting all this time and effort into training someone that they're serious about, it's not just for someone who's curious or, you know, part-time or whatever.
Speaker 2:so um plus it's not cheap. You know it's expensive, so it's a total commitment, but if anyone's really interested in being the best possible professional teacher you can be, I would highly recommend it. Very good.
Speaker 1:Well, that was our last question and, as we've been talking, is there something you may have forgotten or something you feel called to share with our listeners? You can take that time now.
Speaker 2:the floor is yours, um gosh, I don't think of anything. We sure covered a lot of stuff. We did, we did. I guess I would just close by saying, um, reiki is such an incredible blessing to have in one's life and it really doesn't matter what form of Reiki you're working with, as long as it's legitimate Reiki, it will help you, it will heal you, it will bring blessings into your life, things that you can't even imagine. It makes life just flow better. It isn't such a struggle anymore. So I encourage all of you who have Reiki use it, use it all the time, use it in every way, and your life will just get better and better and better. I just turned 70 and it's life is better than it's ever been. It's really exciting, beautiful.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you, joan, for taking time out of your very busy schedule to join me on this Ready Set Reiki journey.
Speaker 2:Well, you are so welcome and thank you for having me, and you are a great guide.
Speaker 1:Tracy. Oh, thank you so much. Well, you're a great guest, so thank you. All right, my wonderful listeners. If you are interested in your question being featured on Ready Set Reiki, reach out at wwwreadysetreikicom, and if you're interested in a little bit of yoga and a little bit of Reiki or Reiki training, reach out to Feather Sister, wwwfeathersistercom. I'm Tracy C Wright and this has been Ready Set Reiki. Thank, you.