“Just because I cannot see it doesn’t mean I can’t believe it!”

~ Jack Skellington, The Nightmare Before Christmas

Reiki is an interesting subject to try to explain sometimes, especially to people who have no prior exposure to or knowledge of the concept.

Sometimes, trying to explain to someone that we’re all energy, and that through reiki, the practitioner simply channels the all-loving, all-healing energy of the universe and directs it with his or her hands…just doesn’t illustrate the awesome power and essence of this beautiful practice, and may leave that person with more confusion than clarification.

Even after obtaining my Reiki I and II certifications, I still feel a little jumbled when I try to explain what I do. One option I am left with is actually showing people what reiki is. I’ve done this through the traditional method of laying on of hands—channeling the warm, sparkling stardust (which is how I like to envision the awesome energy of the universe) so it can move through its recipients’ bodies and spirits to the places it’s needed most.

But I’ve also channeled this energy through another, more engaging method—writing.

I’ve experienced, time and time and time again, the awesome power of release and an actual sensation of lightness, of energy shifting, of a weight literally lifting from my body, during some of my more intimate writing sessions.

A little under a year ago, I picked up Julia Cameron’s quintessential creative’s bible, The Artist’s Way, and adopted the habit of writing “morning pages” every day. This practice requires composing three pages every morning. The point is to empty your brain of all the clutter and stress and negative nasties looming in the back of your head, just raring to activate themselves during the most challenging parts of your day (like, oh, I don’t know…going to a job you loathe, dealing with maddening co-workers, sitting in exhausting traffic jams…the usual).

The point of the morning pages is to unload everything from your mind before you leave the house. The writing doesn’t have to be good; in fact, it’s not supposed to be. It can be whiny, bitchy, completely segmented, full of run-ons upon run-ons, stream of consciousness, whatever—just as long as the writing process allows you to empty your head and heart of all the residuals that are blocking your ability to go about your day as the best version of yourself.

After doing these pages for a few weeks, I noticed something strange happening. By not focusing on making the writing good, I was writing more authentically. I was writing with a clarity and poignancy I hadn’t felt since my angsty teenage years, when all I did was write with heated passion and conviction. I wrote from my gut and started to clear out layers of debris that had settled from lack of exercise.

Actually, exercise is a great word for it—I started to exercise my energy, and thereby free it. I was writing my way through energy blockages.

Certain subjects would create tingling sensations within corresponding chakras. If I wrote about self-love and confidence, my legs and hands would start to tingle and become light, as if a heavy burden were magically fizzling away. Literally, I was allowing energy to be released from my root (foundation, survival, self-esteem) and sacral (creativity, self-expression, transformation) chakras.

If I wrote my way out of a problem, or answered a question I didn’t even realize I had asked, the middle of my forehead would tingle, clearing my sixth, or third eye chakra (intuition, psychic awareness, divinity).

Even as I type this piece, my fingers are becoming lighter with each keystroke. I’ve suffered from carpal tunnel-like symptoms for about a decade now, which I’ve attributed to endless hours of writing and time spent in front of the computer. This “occupational” pain, at certain points, has made it impossible for me to write or work.

My mother made a very interesting observation one day, saying that it could be my fear of success that is creating all of that pain. Before one of the most intense reiki sessions I’ve ever experienced, I came to the table with arms of lead, barely able to drive or hold a phone to my ear for longer than a minute. When I left the table, my arms felt light as feathers, nearly floating from my sides with sheer relief. The negative energy of fear had been lifted.

And now, when I sit down and write with purpose, speaking my truth with clarity and precision, this pain literally lifts from my hands and arms, shifting itself from a state of blocked tension to a state of liberated expansion.

The words that flow through me now have changed from anger and rage and pain to understanding and compassion and empathy and joy and love.

As I write, I write the truth, which allows me to truly see and understand whatever situation has me stressed or perplexed.

The simple act of allowing myself the freedom to write for the sake of writing and, more importantly, write with unrestrained honesty, my only goal being to release whatever energy needs exercising (because everything—our thoughts, our actions, ourselves—is 100 percent energy), has activated a process more powerful than I could have ever foreseen.

This simple, daily act allows me to activate and release my chakras and my energy, allowing me to, day by day, become a more authentic, loving, honest, genuine, compassionate, good version of myself. It allows me to move further and further towards my best, most wholesome potential, so that I may share and create and give of myself—the best of myself—and that’s what we’re all here to do, whether we realize it or not.

The act of writing and releasing is a direct portal to the divine in all of us. It’s like meditation—if we just sit and take the time to listen and get to know ourselves, we find the answers to the questions we didn’t even realize we had. We release the energy we didn’t even realize was blocked. We heal ourselves, and in the process heal others.

We’re all healers.

The omnipotent energy of reiki, the universal energy of love and healing, can flow through and be channeled by all of us, certified practitioners or not. All we need to do is allow it—through art, through creation, through sharing, through simply being present and aware. When we are living as the fullest, brightest, most compassionate versions of ourselves, when we share our gifts and light, we too become conduits of healing energy, of reiki.

I write to channel reiki. I write to heal myself and others.

What’s your personal method of healing? What’s your art? Find it, and when you do, live it.

Love it. Share it. Be it. Do it.

Namaste.

Like I’m not “Spiritual.” I just practice being a good person. on Facebook.

Assistant Ed.: Jayleigh Lewis