The first time my friend introduced me to Reiki I was very skeptical. And that is putting it mildly. I'm not exaggerating when I say that it didn't mean anything to me and that I felt it was of no use to me. I will never forget the legendary words I spoke to my husband later that evening, after we had visited our friend:

The same resistance, the same disbelief I see in a lot of people who hear about Reiki for the first time or who know someone who has completed a Reiki course. I have also encountered a lot of resistance and doubts in my students over the years. This has helped me learn how to deal with this aspect, because I knew better than anybody else what it felt like to go to such a course. I was even a bit scared at the time…! Because I had no idea what was in store for me.

The Reiki course I took in 1994 was the first alternative course I participated in and I have been fascinated by energy and the Reiki method ever since. Apart from the fact that Reiki has become a natural part of my daily life, I have studied it extensively and I have taught Reiki courses for seven years.
I discovered the simplicity of Reiki and how easy it was to use it. I also discovered that in the alternative world a lot of unnecessary extras have been added to Reiki. Finding that the essence of energy touches all aspects of your life and does not require a special gift feels like a breath of fresh air!
If you intend to take a course and, like me, you are skeptical and investigative, you may want to find a teacher who knows how to deal with resistance and doubts. Because you cannot convince anyone with words alone that Reiki actually works. It is the Reiki experiences that convince people, not the practitioners or the teachers, no matter how hard they try.

I have been a part of the Reiki world for quite some years now and my resistance against Reiki has disappeared completely. It is a beautiful supporting method of working with energy! By simply taking in energy from the energy field, like daily food for your energy system, you boost your self-healing ability, both at the physical and the mental level.

Reiki has had, and still has, a big impact on my life. For me, Reiki is one of the most important steps I have taken in my life (and I have had to take many important steps and decisions in my life). It is a daily and vital means of support in my life full of limitations.
Reiki has helped me regain my strength and as a result my inner happiness no longer depends on external factors or other people.

I wish it on everyone to have the ability to take in energy from the energy field. Whether you do this using Reiki or some other technique is not important. Reiki is however an easy way to reconnect to the energy field, it opens the door that you can gradually open wider.

It is up to you what you do with Reiki (and whether you use it at all). It is also up to you what you do with this book. I hope you will enjoy reading it and that I can be of service to you in some ways. Even though we will all have our own opinions and beliefs, we are all talking about the same thing:

ENERGY

Els Valkenburg-Walsteijn