Because Kantō is the largest plain in Japan, it is densely populated and includes the large metropolises of Tokyo and Yokohama. Prior to this disaster, the founder of Reiki, Usui Sensei, was teaching his methods by himself, quietly in his dojo. As they say, ‘necessity is the mother of invention.’ According to one source:

It was due to this earthquake…that Reiki and Usui Sensei became well-known in Japan…Until 1923 Usui Sensei was the only teacher of the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai, his association that he incorporated in 1922. When faced with the incomprehensible devastation, he decided to change his ways: He gave eight of his senior students the Shihan (teacher) status, and taught them how to teach Reiki…Over the next year or so, they initiated thousands of people and…gave several hundred thousand treatments.

I really want to focus on the love and respect Japanese people have for the Earth and Nature. Before I do, here’s an excerpt from Usui’s Memorial Stone which was erected a year after his passing. Let’s also remember how perfectly Reiki blends with helping animals and plants, and enhances our food and water.

In September of the 12th year (1923 A.D.) there was a great earthquake and a conflagration broke out. Everywhere there were groans of pains from the wounded. Sensei, feeling pity for them, went out every morning to go around the town, and he cured and saved an innumerable number of people. This is just a broad outline of his relief activities during such an emergency. (Translated by Inamoto Hyakuten.)

Japan has produced a number of spiritual traditions and art forms. Almost all are either nature-based, or show a great reverence for nature. There’s a profound understanding of the inextricable link humans have to the natural world we live in. A complete accounting of the earthquake to hit Japan a few days ago hasn’t even begun. It was followed by a devastating tsunami, and the threat of nuclear radiation from ongoing repercussions at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

I hope my focus on the Earth and Nature in this post serves as a reminder to all of us to come into balance once again with the natural world. My heart-mind goes out to Japan in compassion, and in thanks for the great beauty it has given to human culture.

Shintoism is Japan’s native spirituality. It’s heavily nature-based and “was the communal response of the ancient immigrant dwellers of Japan to the stunning natural environment in which they found themselves.” (Stuart D.B. Picken)

Here’s a modernized excerpt by the same author of The Litany of Earth:

Leader — Think of how human beings first experienced earth bringing forth her fruits

Think of how earth was conceived of as a mother and revered for fertility, her abundant gifts, and her ability to nurture and support life

Think of the season’s as they flow by, the yellow and green of spring in all its newness and freshness

Think of mystery of the seed, how life is contained within it, and its creative growth

All — Our senses have been dulled and dimmed, and we see earth not as the environment of our life, but as a tool to be used

Our senses are blind to its mystery and meaning

Our senses need the purification that will enable us to see nature as our teacher and guide

Motohisa Yamakage who was born in 1925 and raised in a Shintoist family writes:

We [Japanese people] have felt that plants and animals, as well as mountains and rivers, have lived with us and have been deeply connected to us. This love and reverence toward nature is a quality that should be reinstalled in our hearts, if we want mankind and earth to survive the ecological crisis that has resulted from excessive materialism.

Recently some scientists, notably the British geophysicist James Lovelock, have rediscovered the notion of “Gaia.” In this view the natural environment of earth is not seen just as a mechanical system, but more than that, as a highly organic network created by complex relationships and subtle connections between all forms of life. Life has therefore neither passively adapted itself to the earth’s environment, nor been created by chance. Every life form, every creature has influenced the environment and helped to shape it. It has interacted with and depended upon all the creatures as a part of a harmonious cycle of creation. The world of nature is ultimately self-regulating and self-renewing, preserving its own order or homeostasis, restoring the planet’s balance much like the immune system of an individual organism.  We can therefore think of the earth as if it were a single organism, or the sum total of all living organisms: a self-regulating, self-rejuvenating biosphere.

Of late and we have heard extensive use of the word “co-existence.” This means that no creature can operate without regard for fellow-creatures. It can only exist and survive in a state of balance with other living organisms.  Nature is the constant interplay of living organisms. It is the continuous search for and restoration balance.

These perceptions of organic nature are identical to those that the Japanese have entertained and cherished deeply since ancient times. The islanders blessed with a rich natural world recognized intuitively that even plants and trees speak and that human beings could not live without mountains and rivers. In Japan’s past there was no thought of conquering nature or of unilaterally exploiting it.

Perhaps the best way to illustrate the play of Nature in Zen spirituality is with some poetry by Zen masters. If interested you can look up individual teachers to learn more.

All sentient beings are essentially Buddhas.
As with water and ice, there is no ice without water;
apart from sentient beings, there are no Buddhas.
Not knowing how close the truth is,
we seek it far away
—what a pity!
Hakuin Ekaku Zenji

Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken.
Although its light is wide and great,
The moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wide.
The whole moon and the entire sky
Are reflected in one dewdrop on the grass.
Dogen

When all thoughts
Are exhausted
I slip into the woods
And gather
A pile of shepherd’s purse.

Like the little stream
Making its way
Through the mossy crevices
I, too, quietly
Turn clear and transparent.
Ryokan

This is a woefully inadequate sampling. Search for “zen poetry’ or “zen haiku’ to get a full flavor.

Motohisa Yamagake writes, “Japanese Buddhist sayings, such as ‘mountains, rivers, plants, and trees will all become Buddha,’ or ‘the shape of the mountain and the sound of the valley stream are also the manifestations of Buddha’ are expressions, in Buddhist fashion, of this Japanese spiritual sense of nature.”

I’ll end with a thought by Thich Nhat Hanh who’s teaching today and while being a Vietnamese Buddhist monk and master, is prolific and receives worldwide recognition:

The situation the Earth is in today has been created by unmindful production and unmindful consumption. We consume to forget our worries and our anxieties. Tranquillizing ourselves with over-consumption is not the way.

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Heart Light
© Pamir Kiciman 2010
Click to view full-size

We are a community of men, women and children.
We live, breathe and exist together in our community.
Our community is our home, even though we also have a roof over our own family.
Gathered under such roofs, we form neighborhoods.
We leave our neighborhood in the morning and return to it in the evening.
What is good for us is good for the community.
To protect our own is to protect the community.
What is best for the family is equally good for the community.

We are fond of boundaries.
Me, myself, my family, home, country.
My goods and future.
My health. My food. My money.
My beliefs and views.
Me. Mine. My own.

It’s natural to love one’s own.
It’s natural to shelter one’s own.
It’s natural to care more about your own.

Then again, we fight with our families and ourselves more often than with others.

Community is inside as well as outside.
Community is a state of mind.

Our state of mind is our first community.
It’s from our mind and heart that we decide how much to blame others.
Blame others for our own troubles.
If in our heart and mind we would find peace, we would find peace in our relationship with all people.

Relationship is a fact of life.
There are those we want to be with and those we have to be with.
We are in relation with others in many ways.
Our thoughts, feelings, needs, money, beliefs, views put us in touch with others.
These others are individuals, and groups of individuals that function as companies, institutions and governments.
There is a web of life. The stranger we see at the bank has similar relations.

We also share the web of life with Nature and its lifeforms.

The tree’s shade and a pet’s warmth are cherished. Wheat and oranges nourish us.
We relax and play at the beach. The web exists so that life works.

Are you ever angry at an apple you enjoy?

What makes us angry with people whether they are those we want to be with or those we have to be with?

Anger disappears when we share instead of hoard.
Anger disappears when we see that our family is similar to another’s family.
Anger disappears when we notice that the fruit tree that feeds us, feeds a child whose name we may not even know.
The same cotton that we wear is on someone else’s back, the same material on our feet protects another’s feet,
and the same steel that makes our car makes the neighbor’s car.

The sun shines on us all equally.

Peace appears when we emphasize similarities.
Peace appears when we honor natural variety.
Peace appears when we realize that everyone seeks the love we seek.
Peace appears when we accept that health; happiness and financial security are available to us as a human right and not at the expense of another.
Peace is seen in the web of life when we tell our fear to grow up!

There’s not a single person who doesn’t want the basics of life that we want.
These basics include tangible things as well as success, happiness, health, acknowledgment and fulfillment.
Since we have to participate in life in similar ways to attain similar results, is it not more productive to join efforts?
Is it not more powerful to manifest dreams with collaboration rather than competition?
Who wins when one person or group wins? Only that person or group and everyone else are losers.

Who’s the loser when everyone wins? The obstacles!

Obstacles are created by us and can be uncreated by changing our heart and mind.
For that we simply need willingness and reason.
Reason shows us that cooperation brings results.
Willingness takes us into our heart and mind where we develop flexibility and compassion.
When reason is coupled with forgiveness, we have a winning formula for social and personal success.

Let us remember that the formula of reason plus forgiveness has to be applied by citizen and leader alike.
Afterall, a leader is a citizen and a citizen is a leader.
Those who are elected or rise to prominence in some way are sanctioned as leaders, yet their power is in the hands of the people.

Forgiving leaders paves the path to start afresh.
Leaders returning that trust with sincerity and unwavering commitment, solidify the path.
People taking a real interest and becoming active with the power they have completes the shared responsibility of community.
Then everyone is on the same path, heading to unity and a better life for all.

Pain, grudges, disappointment, injustice, prejudice, lack of opportunity, education or housing, poverty, ill-health as well as all the other challenges of life, and the real solutions for these are the responsibility of every single member of society.

We are the only ones who can bring order to chaos.

We are the only ones who can bring peace to conflict.

We are the only ones who can bring sanity to anger and hatred.

We are the only ones who can correct errors.

We are the only ones who can heal wounds.

We are the only ones who can monitor each other for the good of all.

We are the only ones who can use reason to see that the web of life is inclusive and not exclusive.

We are the only ones who can forgive and move on.

The past keeps us in the past. The future is ours to live. The present is where we act, assert and voice our common vision.

Mother, father, child, business owner, politician, teacher, student, professional and unemployed, WE populate our communities.

We are the only ones who can make it a place worth living.

We are the only ones who can create a new history.

We are the only ones who can…

◊ ◊ ◊

To see more of Pamir’s meaning-making photography, visit his photoblog.

Each post for the Reiki Help Blog can take anywhere from 1-5 days to write/research, proofread/edit, and post with an appropriate image and formatting. If you leave this space with any value, knowledge, joy or understanding, please consider making a donation of your choice.

Donate to this blog. Thank you!

Another micro-donating effort is being lead by @pistachio. She’s only asking for $2 donations to charity: water, an organiztion I wrote about here as part of Blog Action Day. $2 a piece to raise $25.000.

I’m writing this to bring attention to how easy it is today to be charitable, not just seasonally but at any time and how it can be meaningful and not just duty or admonishment. I would also like to speak to a certain thinking that is prevalent in spiritual communities. The thinking goes somewhere along the lines of “change in the material world takes too long; in truth poverty is nonexistent; what you focus on grows; we must work in consciousness to change the paradigm and not reaffirm poverty, but instill the truth of abundance that is our very nature.”

After fifteen years of working directly with consciousnes and spiritual energy, I’m viscerally aware of the power of transformation that originates in the inner planes. This has been called ‘subtle activism’ and it is indeed an approach that many still must adopt. Consciousness is primary, there’s no doubt about that. What changes in consciousness, changes out in the world. Yet my spirituality is a practical one and so I wrote the following open letter and offer it here for your consideration. I also encourage you to visit the links above and participate according to your heart.

We live in the dimension of form. Our origin is elsewhere. We are Spirit manifest in matter. To manifest Spirit fully in matter we have divine tools, and earthly tools. It’s the balanced use of both that brings success.

As the vanguard in subtle activism, we also have to consider how we frame our approach for the mainstream. Remember the tragedy that took place at Columbine High School? At the time many in the spiritual community said things like: “Those who passed chose to do so. They contracted to leave the planet. All is in divine order.”

It’s pretty obvious what the response would be from those parents, peers and school staff who went through that experience, if this was said to their face. It would be perceived as cruel, lofty, unrealistic; there would be backlash and outrage.

The existence of divine order behind seeming tragedies is a truth. That some of us ‘contract’ for certain experiences has truth in it too. But it can’t be said out loud, not until the general consciousness of society has reached at least a modicum of the paradigm that these truths espouse.

And we don’t know specifically what the subtle elements are; perhaps there’s order, perhaps there’s evil, in the act not the doer. Does it all come out in the wash in the end? Perhaps.

Point is, while some of us have an awareness, or even working knowledge of Reality, many are serious about how real reality is to them, and that’s fine. Matter does have a reality. It’s not the ultimate, but knocking your knee on a sharp corner really hurts! Even for us ‘elevated’ types, losing a child is not and should not be a small matter to be rationalized by clinging to our paradigm. We are Spirit and Human. Leaving the Human out of the equation simply doesn’t work.

As humanity finds itself in the midst of many tough and complex challenges, the teamwork of Spirit and matter applies also in the larger context of societal and global improvement. A paradigm shift necessarily takes place in consciousness, but it’s utterly pointless to stop there. That’s equivalent to promising you’ll do something and not doing it. Right thought and speech must be followed by right action.

Recently, Blog Action Day put a lens on Poverty. While it’s true that our true self and the nature of the Universe is like Goddess Lakshmi, i.e., there’s no concept of lack whatsoever, it seems implausible to expect an emaciated, under and malnourished child or mother to be comforted by or even consider this. We don’t live by bread alone but by bread alone do we also live. Even those of us who have the material necessities to be able to put aside time to contemplate and embody the lack of lack, often find that we aren’t able to.

What can be done? Join forces. First feed a hungry belly, then ensure the future supply of food, and then teach the underpinnings of a philosophy that will eradicate hunger permanently if enough people subscribe to and energize it continuously.

We congratulate ourselves too quickly for being the vanguard of a consciousness-molds-matter paradigm. Firstly, there are advanced beings very involved with the Earth plane who have been, since antiquity at least, wielding powerful subtle tools to dawn another higher age. So far it hasn’t quite manifested. When it comes to consciousness shaping matter in the dimension of form there can be considerable lag time. There is also Divine timing.

Secondly, we’re pitiful in our understanding of time. The wisdom of India tell us that the world is created, destroyed and recreated every 4,320,000 years (Maha Yuga). Ours is a materialistic age, the Kali yuga which lasts 432,000 years. While it’s important to vibrate to higher truth and hopefully be wayshowers, it’s equally important to take care of what’s in front of us here and now, because some of this is on a cycle that has its own clock. In the meantime people are starving.

One last point to consider is that when someone perishes from violence or hunger, the entire vibration of that experience remains on the Earth, and travels with that soul on its journey. Inevitably the soul reincarnates, bringing that vibration back into the Earth plane. In its nonphysical journey and when embodied again, this soul specifically passes the vibration of its demise down its bloodline to its family. This happens both in biological DNA and spiritual DNA. Thus there’s a very substantial and chronic vicious circle.

And thus we must join Spirit and matter in addressing all such concerns. Someone can pass over with a full belly or in peace, while the right consciousness emerges in the dust of this Earth. Physical, material action has a huge place in circumventing the vicious cycle as described above, and we are here to serve.

This is a prime opportunity to speak out about the importance of holistic health as a vital component of health care reform in the USA. If you’re a Reiki practitioner or maintain your all-around health and wellness through other natural and holistic or integrative ways you may submit your ideas directly at Change.gov in the Health Care Agenda section. Read below for some core ideas that you may want to mention.

First, if Reiki is important to you write as a health care consumer and not as a practitioner. State your preference that Reiki is reimbursed by insurance. Emphasize that you would like to have full access to Reiki Training and healing. Definitely mention that Reiki is already recognized by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the government’s health agency. Make sure that you include a link to the NCCAM’s Reiki Backgrounder.

You may then want to mention any or all of the following, as a way to start changing the health care paradigm:

1. Health care must promote health and wellness, not merely manage disease.
2. Preventive care is more than screenings. It includes a positive program of wellness, with a healthy diet, exercise, mental and emotional health, and natural methods that support the body’s inherent self-healing powers.
3. Health care must include full freedom of choice regarding health care options. Each individual should be free to choose from the full spectrum of health care modalities, without interference from the government restricting particular methods.
4. We must champion the needs of children in any health care program. Of particular concern is the increasing use of pharmaceutical drugs with children, rather than preventative measures such as good diet, counseling and assistance for at risk-children, and a full spectrum of educational programs that include artistic expression, physical exercise and creative play.
5. It is a matter of social justice that every citizen have access to basic health care regardless of financial status. However, universal coverage without reforming the way health care is delivered will endanger the economic health of the country. Cost containment is not simply a matter of eliminating waste and profiteering. It also requires a de-emphasis on high-tech “sickness care” and a new emphasis on health promotion.
6. A diversity of health care options, especially those that are holistic and preventative in nature, would actually lower our nation’s cost for providing universal coverage and result in a far healthier population.
7. Health care reform means ending medical discrimination against holistic health practices and natural health supplements, to allow truthful health information to be freely given in regard to the health benefits of natural remedies, to allow holistic health practitioners to freely practice without fear of prosecution.
8. Research funding for the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (National Institutes of Health) should be massively increased.
9. An Integrative Medicine Advisory panel should be created to advise legislators and policy-makers on ways to bring holistic and integrative medicine practices into any Health Care Reform legislation that is drafted. Such a panel should draw on the expertise of such organizations as the Preventative Medicine Research Institute (Dr. Dean Ornish), the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine (University of California in San Francisco), Duke Integrative Medicine Center, The Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona, Scripps Center for Integrative Medicine (San Diego), and other similar centers.

Go ahead and include your bullet points in comments here. The health care debate will go beyond December and we can build a unified set of ideas here, that can be used again and again in future communications with any administration.

In the meantime Click here to share your comments with the Obama/Biden team.

I credit Richard Katz and Patricia Kaminski for some of the points made here.

Bob Randall, a Yankunytjatjara elder and traditional owner of Uluru (Ayer’s Rock), explains how the connectedness of every living thing to every other living thing is not just an idea but a way of living. This way includes all beings as part of a vast family and calls us to be responsible for this family and care for the land with unconditional love and responsibility.

Also check out the informational & inspirational video below…

Largest Recall of Ground Beef Is Ordered

New York Times
By ANDREW MARTIN
Published: February 18, 2008

A California meat company on Sunday issued the largest beef recall in history, 143 million pounds, some of which was used in school lunch programs, Department of Agriculture officials announced.

The recall by the Westland/Hallmark Meat Company, based in Chino, Calif., comes after a widening animal-abuse scandal that started after the Humane Society of the United States distributed an undercover video on Jan. 30 that showed workers kicking sick cows and using forklifts to force them to walk.

The video raised questions about the safety of the meat, because cows that cannot walk, called downer cows, pose an added risk of diseases including mad cow disease. The federal government has banned downer cows from the food supply….(read the rest).

Cold water has its uses, as does hot water. Earth Ki is specific in its qualities, as is Celestial Ki. In Reiki we work with each specialty for our betterment. We also have the significant opportunity to blend the two, to become One. The perfect balance between the polar energies of Reiki leads to unity consciousness.

And this is where healing really occurs. Whether you’re practicing on yourself (hands-on or Reiki meditations) or another, that practice is not symptomatic relief, but the essential change of consciousness. Symptomatic relief is part of the package, but it’s a surface effect. Reiki often surprises people with its power. Knowing Reiki is spiritual healing in its purest sense brings its power into perspective.

Yet in the everyday practice of Reiki this high-minded underpinning is just that, operating subtly, not asking you to have assimilated any of the above.

Reiki is so very user-friendly. Its effects are palpable, it’s warm and compassionate, noninvasive and supportive, portable (consciousness and hands go with us everywhere!), widely applicable, carrying and bringing out wisdom, having no known contraindications, and always improving quality of life.

Reiki isn’t only a healing art, but a total enlightenment program. The previous material deals with this, and it will be addressed again.

Let’s now look at some of the more everyday applications of enlightenment in a Reiki context. These are just as important as satori or self-realization, because we have a world and populations to care for and be in relationship with.

Properly understood and practiced Reiki is an agent of social change. At one point I was relentlessly solicited by environmental organizations. Each day I would get 3-4 pieces of mail. This was before the advent of the Internet. After a while, I took all that mail and practiced nonlocal Reiki on it.

It developed a deep connection for me between all the troubled areas of the Earth, endangered species, and all environmental concerns. I was able to observe the whole planet as a living being; noticed the Earth’s ley lines; and the accumulated negativity in the Earth’s energy field.

Most remarkably, after a few weeks of nonlocal Reiki for the Earth, the solicitations, which had continued throughout, entirely stopped. Entirely!

I then knew that I had fulfilled my part. (Our part is constantly renewed–I still work with/for the Earth.)

Nonlocal Reiki is commonly practiced for individuals. It can be practiced also for the promotion of values, progressive ideas, ideals and visions, the empowerment of citizenry, social projects and cultural progress.

In all these areas, the groundwork obviously has to be done too, the activism, all the tangible components need to be in place. But at a meta level, through Reiki, there’s access to this power that heals burnout, opens minds and hearts, removes obstacles, stimulates and encourages, and deepens the good.

Reiki practice is born and honed in its meditation methods or hands-on application, but it doesn’t stop there. It doesn’t stop at all.

Related:
Reiki as consciousness Part I

Reiki as consciousness Part III

Each post for the Reiki Help Blog can take anywhere from 1-5 days to write/research, proofread/edit, and post with an appropriate image and formatting. If you leave this space with any value, knowledge, joy or understanding, please consider making a donation of your choice.

Donate to this blog. Thank you!

THE GREAT KAPOK TREE by Lynne Cherry. This one teaches about how nature’s balance is interdependent by using the Kapok tree as home to the many creatures who depend on it, and each other. It emphasizes preservation.

HOLES by Louis Sachar. A very unusual and original story about a kid wrongly accused, sent to a corrupt boys’ camp, with past generations in his own and other characters’ families adding to the richness. The movie is equally good, one of the best from page to screen.

HOOT by Carl Hiaasen. Don’t bother with the movie unless you’ve got nothing better to do. Superb, fast-paced writing, great humor, environmental preservation theme and empowering to kids.

A SINGLE SHARD by Linda Sue park. A new author we discovered. Story of the historically accurate fame of 12th century Korean pottery, involving an orphan boy living under a bridge and how he bests the odds, losses his best friend and finds a new family. Many cultural textures too.

THE FIRE WITHIN by Chris D’Lacey. Another author who’s new to us. It’s the first in a trilogy, with a fourth book now coming out. It is about Dragons with lots of fantasy, but it’s really about people, relationships, personal quests and integrity. The writing is top-notch, thrilling to read, humorous, and a very original voice.

Please visit the authors’ websites. I linked directly to the book page, but the sites have a lot of content, are educational, there are activities and other empowering information.

This is part of Nneka at Balanced Life Center’s 2007′s Season of Gratitude.

My posts in the series:
Grateful despite the news
Gifts of acknowledgment