Dealing with Today's Pressures
Today, people find themselves increasingly challenged. Because of demands on our time and societal pressures, creating and maintaining satisfactory relationships is becoming more difficult. Add to this ever-increasing expectations and the end result is people who feel pressured, dissatisfied and stressed. These feelings manifest themselves in many ways: emotionally as anger, frustration or helplessness; physically as illness or dis-ease and intellectually as confusion and uncertainty. Our bodies speak to us all the time but most of us don't hear, or don't listen to what they say.

Change is a feature of our lives - it always has been - but the pace of change is itself changing. Our reaction is often to resist change; to stay with what we know, even if it is potentially, and evidently, harmful or painful to do so. The effects of change will not go away, so we need to look to ourselves to find ways to live in tranquillity with them. One way is to find an internal balance that comes not from a static resistance or lack of movement but rather from the courage, confidence and inner calmness to live in harmony with the complexities of life.

There are many routes to this inner peace and most of them take discipline and time. Reiki, or the application of energy through the hands of a practitioner can greatly assist this process.

Tera Mai^™ Reiki & Seichem
In the last century, an ancient healing system was rediscovered by Mikao Usui, a Japanese scholar and Buddhist monk. He named it Rei-Ki (which means something like Universal Life Energy) and many people today are Reiki practitioners (ie they practise the specific techniques taught by Reiki Masters).

It is now believed that Usui and his immediate successors did not pass down to their trainees the full initiations to the Western lineage of teachers. Originally Reiki encompassed at least four healing rays corresponding to the elements earth, water, air/ether and fire. What we call Reiki today is the earth element and Seichem (pronounced Saykeem) is the name given to the four-fold combination of Reiki (earth), Sophi-El (water), Angeliclight (air/ether) and Sakara (fire). Kathleen Milner, an internationally acclaimed healer and author of Reiki & Other Rays of Touch Healing is responsible for this system which she calls Tera-Mai™. It is now trademarked to maintain a consistent standard of attunements for the future.

What's the Difference?

People often ask: "What's the difference? There's all these types of Reiki about and now there's Seichem! I don't understand." My answer is that Seichem is an advancement on conventional Reiki. It is not the final version, just a more developed one. There are an every-increasing number of different healing modalities and this is just one that has proved very effective for many people.

There is no 'right way' or 'only path'. We are faced with more and more choices so we have to differentiate and decide the most appropriate direction for us at any moment. There will always be teachers who can help us learn and remember but it is now up to us to discover, with discernment, what we can from whomever is appropriate. This means that we have to carry the responsibility for our own learning and advancement. The increase in the number of alternative therapies is a small manifestation of this, and Reiki a microcosm of that.

Speak to a wide selection of people, read books, get leaflets from a number of Reiki or Seichem teachers and then if it feels right, go with the person who most attracts you. Inside, you will know the right way - just take the time to be, and you will hear your own inner guidance.

Who Should 'Learn' Seichem?
Reiki initiations, or attunements, raise a person's vibrational level and give them a clearer access to the healing energies. Seichem attunements open people up even more. Anyone can attend a course - all you need is the desire to help yourself and others to heal.

Using Seichem in your everyday life is simple … as the best things always are. Anyone who already works as a 'physical' therapist (eg Reflexology, Aromatherapy, Cranial Osteopathy, Massage, etc) will normally find that the effect of their hands-on work and sensitivity to the client's state will be significantly enhanced.

Seichem practitioners do not claim they can cure. They simply leave the universal energy to effect the best possible outcome. As the healing energy comes from Universal Source, practitioners are not drained of their own energy; we are but the facilitators.

Once you have been initiated and all the time you work with the highest intention for good, you will have access to the healing frequencies. It is also unlikely that you will ever be quite the same again. People tend to feel calmer and more positive, and students often say they have found new levels of confidence and the incentive to change things they had been avoiding.

What Happens on a Course?
There are three levels of Seichem. Seichem 1 is now a two-day event and normally takes place on a Saturday and Sunday. It consists of an introduction to Reiki, Seichem and Tera-Mai™ and how they fit together. The attunements themselves follow and the afternoon is spent on practical experience of the energies in healing. Seichem 2 takes a weekend and as well as the attunements, includes practice in the use of symbols, distant healing and an introduction to psychic surgery.

Level III, or mastership should be undertaken when you feel balanced and have the maturity and will to teach. Some people take the third level training just for their own development and with no intention of teaching. This is fine and to accommodate these people, I now run a Seichem III course that does not include the extensive instruction on how to teach required by the Seichem Master Teacher's course.

Dates of courses and current rates change from time to time. As a rule, I do not teach Reiki alone as Seichem offers so much more.

After each initiation, most people go through a 21-day cycle of cleansing, normally three days per chakra. Please ask for your own guidance as to whether you are ready - those who are not can find this clearing very hard. Normally people need to wait a number of months between each level.

Appointments for Treatments
A healing session is very simply performed. The practitioner places his or her hands upon (or in the aura of) the person to be healed with the intent for healing to occur and the energy begins to flow. The energy has its own intelligence and thus manages its own course to and within the recipient. It can work at a physical, emotional or mental level. Exactly that amount of energy which the recipient's higher self dictates is appropriate at that moment is drawn through the healer.

People feel Seichem in different ways. Often during a treatment the energy is experienced as warmth. Some feel a mild tingle, as when an arm or leg has "fallen asleep"; others feel a throbbing or pulsing sensation. Some people don't feel any physical sensation at all but describe mental or emotional changes such as a sense of calmness or peace. Nearly everyone experiences a treatment as deeply relaxing. A session usually lasts an hour and normally a course of three sessions is found to be a good start.

The Reiki Federation
There is a new group in the UK that are cooperating to bring Reiki to a place where we hope that the Government will acknowledge it and allow its use in the National Health Service. It is called the Reiki Federation.