Reiki hand positions have been a bone of contention for years.  Which is the right set?  What do you need them for?  Limits not boundaries.  The list goes on.

Here is your definitive guide

Hand positions are taught as part of Reiki 1 – indeed, hand positions are the basis of the Reiki One class.  Traditional teachers, who give Reiki classes over two days, usually follow their own routine of attunement; teach a section of the hand positions; practice; feedback; rinse & repeat.  This generally involves giving an “attunement” followed by teaching a portion of the hand position routine, which students then practice by giving and receiving the treatment.  They then describe the experience, putting it into words, thus anchoring both the routine and the experience in both sides of the brain.

Reiki Hand Position Routine

The protocol gives every student a common place to start their Reiki treatment and practice.  When a student comes to Reiki they often have so little knowledge of it they don’t even know what questions to ask.  Approaching the teaching and learning of Reiki from the point of view of “hands on: Reiki on; hands off: Reiki off” with a demonstration and practice allows the student to experience for themselves that Reiki flows, giving them confidence and motivation.

Think of is this way – although obviously it’s not the same – when you call up for technical support for something, the person on the other end of the phone will go through a number of questions designed to find out whether you’ve turned whatever it is on; whether you’ve plugged it in; is the fuse blown and a few more basic questions – they have a routine.  What is an annoying routine in tech support is reassuring when talking about and practicing Reiki.  Students coming to Reiki for the first time are taught a routine for giving Reiki and feedback from their practice – it gives them the confidence to practice on their own afterwards.

Hand positions are recognisable.  When attending a Reiki share or gathering, Reiki people share Reiki.  They share Reiki with the basic hand positions which everyone is taught at Reiki 1.  Got Reiki hand positions, will travel … and be welcome wherever they’re sharing Reiki.

Kinda.  There is some “debate” about hand positions, so what sensible organisers do is a quick run through of “hand positions we will be using during this share” at the beginning.  No negotiation.

On the other hand, one of the easiest ways to spot someone who has had only a “distance attunement” – if they haven’t already volunteered the information – is when they don’t have a hand position routine.  Just sayin’.

Basis of Reiki Scanning

One of the things people don’t really think about is that the hand positions are the basis of Reiki scanning.  It is in practicing treatments with the hand positions that we gain experience in the way Reiki talks to us through Byosen – Reiki’s feedback mechanism.  When we practice “intuition” in the place of the hand positions, it may just be imagination – Byosen takes practice.

Reassuring to Clients

This is a bit controversial: the Reiki hand positions routine is reassuring to clients.  They come for something they’ve seen described on websites, brochures and through friends.  They have expectations of what a Reiki treatment looks like.  That means that they’ll be disappointed and put off from having a Reiki treatment again if their expectations are not met.  People are polite, so they tend to vote with their feet, rather than say anything.  Something to think about.

Whole Body Treatment

The basic foundation treatment is a whole body treatment.  The hand positions are designed to cover all the major organs of the body and, in the longer versions, the main joints too.

People store emotions in their bodies – it’s even in the language: “a pain in the neck”; “giving the cold shoulder”; “carrying a heavy burden”; feeling “liverish”; “venting the spleen”; “vomiting bile”; “gut feelings” … this is not an exhaustive list.

For the scientists among us, the emerging science of Epigenetics suggests that every emotion is represented in the body by a type of chemical called a peptide.  Cell walls have receptors for these peptides.  When we feel an emotion, the body is releasing peptides.  Experience the emotion often enough and the cell walls start producing more and more of the relevant receptors to give the peptides an anchor point.  Which is great if you’re happy all the time.  But most of us feel angry, sad, afraid or grief stricken from time to time.  When we talk about “letting go old baggage” we may well be talking about physically letting go of the peptides and cell receptors representing those negative emotions in the body.

Each time a cell divides or is renewed, these receptors are recreated in the new cells.  They become part of our genetic program.  Pretty soon we have receptor sites on the cell walls in a particular area of our bodies demanding specific peptides.  It becomes a physical feedback loop that can create enormous problems in a particular body area.  You can find more information about Epigenetics in Dr Bruce Lipton’s The Biology of Belief.  A Reiki treatment – or a course of them – helps us “change the channel” in our bodies.  Giving a full body treatment using all the hand positions supports the healthy parts of the entire system, while harmonising the unbalanced parts – the parts with all those peptides with their cell receptors causing the problem.

You’ll also hear and read people talking about Meridians.  It is my belief that Reiki uses the Meridian system to go where it’s needed.  So much more useful to give an entire whole body treatment that accesses all the meridian points, rather than just guessing where to put the hands to have the most beneficial effect.  The full hand position routine gives enough feedback, so that were a little more Reiki is needed in a particular place, the practitioner can stay there longer.

Some people prefer to talk about Chakras, although that is not part of Japanese culture.  But still, the full Reiki hand positions routine covers all the Chakras, too, using that energy system to convey the Reiki where it needs to be.  Best to cover all the bases, rather than just a few.

Takata and Hand Positions

Think about this too: Takata encouraged her students to spend at least half of their time during a treatment Reiki-ing the abdomen area – the area of the body responsible for absorbing nutrients.  When this area is working properly, the body is much better able to heal itself.  If the presenting issue isn’t in that area, simply Reiki-ing the area with the presenting issue means we aren’t helping our clients as much as we could.

We are more than just our bodies.  However, we experience the world and other people through our bodies.  Therefore the Reiki hand positions, designed to treat the whole body, really are the Foundation Reiki treatment.