Does the idea of animals leading reiki sound surprising?
Have you ever wondered how ancient practices such as yoga, herbalism, and tai chi were created?
This beautiful deaf boxer girl had come over to the UK from Romania at approximately 6 months old, her history not clear, and was first fostered by a couple with a handful of other dogs. It quickly became very obvious and worrying that she was a very anxious girl around dinner times, guarding her food and showing aggression towards the other dogs and the humans in her foster home. It became so severe that the couple had to take the heart breaking decision of handing her back to the rehoming organisation and, due to her aggressive behaviour, sadly she had to be looked after at a rescue boarding kennel while the organisation began the responsible and stressful task of finding the next right home for her. Prospects were unclear… who would take on a deaf dog who literally might bite the hand that feeds her?
Dusty was found after wandering the Arizona desert as a pup without identification or microchip. After a week of no one claiming him at the Humane Society, he was adopted by SARA member Gerianne. He lived a very happy 15 1/2 years with his special Reiki mom and family. He was a devoted family dog, meditation partner and lover of Reiki. Thank you so much Gerianne for honoring SARA with a donation in his memory. Fly free and in peace, Dusty!
SARA Practitioner Deanna Sava shares a little background on the video:
“I don’t remember Stuart’s whole story, but he came into The Buddy Foundation with socialization issues. He was feral or semi-feral. Volunteers have been spending a lot of time trying to socialize him and they discovered that he loves to be brushed. He was okay when other cats came up to his cage–even when his cage door was open so he could roam around the large cat area if he wanted to. However, he only tentatively came out after most of the volunteers left and it became really quiet. He recently started to come out of his cage when the volunteers were around, but as soon as anyone walked toward or past his cage, he would run back into it.
Today I went to an animal rescue sanctuary. I decided to sit down in an enclosed area that had pigs, chickens, roosters and two dogs roaming free. There were not any animals around me when I started, but I knew who ever needed the Reiki would partake in their own way. When you use Kathleen Prasad’s Let Animals Lead® Method of Animal Reiki, that is what happens.
I would like to welcome Cotton Branch Farm Animal Sanctuary to the SARA family! Cotton Branch has whole heartedly embraced the SARA way to support and heal their animal family. Cotton Branch is a safe haven for farm animals in South Carolina. Founded in 2004, the sanctuary is currently home to around 350 rescued farm animals.
I had the great pleasure this year of attending a Reiki III and Animal Reiki Teacher Training course set within Remus Memorial Horse Sanctuary in Essex. Remus isn’t just for horses, the residents are also rescued Shetland Ponies, Donkeys, Sheep and Goats. And not forgetting the cats whom roam the land and kept us company during our 3 days at Remus, together with Ollie the dog.
SARA’s mission is important because it gives credibility to what we are accomplishing, not just in our communities, but around the globe. We are making a difference in our shelters and sanctuaries, giving a voice where there is none. The code of ethics, the teachings, the spiritual practice, and support we receive as a group and as individuals from Kathleen and Leah is something that is one of a kind, and I’m honored to be a part of.
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I’m so grateful to be a member of SARA, to have found Kathleen, Leah, and SARA. I started with Reiki 18 – 20 years ago. I learned whatever was taught, usually Western style, but something just didn’t ring true with me. I would try, and I wouldn’t get it. Each time I would try to walk away, Reiki would tap me on the shoulder again to let me know something was going to happen.
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One thing that I think about a lot since I really got into Reiki years ago is that there are so many schools of Reiki out there, and there’s no regulation. I belong to another association where there are many practitioners from many lineages and nobody is practicing the same way, which makes things very unclear.
After my beloved cat, Chloe, transitioned in 2014, I became a self-taught animal energy worker by reading books and watching videos. Then, a friend told me about human Reiki shares, so after going to those shares for a little while I started my own Reiki training. I don’t remember how or when I discovered Animal Reiki and SARA, but it was a life changer.
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I was a Reiki practitioner for over 15 years before I heard about Kathleen and her work with animals. It was in Virgina for a level three training that I heard about Kathleen. I followed up by contacting Kathleen and doing two conference call courses with her, and then completed a level three training in Brighthaven, which was a great experience. Kathleen really transformed my life, and the way I approached and taught Reiki. It was a really beautiful gift for me and re-energized my whole practice of Reiki.
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I first started with human Reiki a while back, and after reading Kathleen’s first book, I immediately fell in love. I finally found a path that I could take to pursue deeper connections with animals, and that was because of Kathleen’s book. One thing led to another, and when I discovered the SARA book, I found a way to connect with a rescue that was close by. I was just amazed at how well written everything was. My first experience with Kathleen and Leah was the written word.
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I am so incredibly grateful to be a member of SARA and to have met Kathleen and Leah. I would probably not be doing Reiki at all if I had not met Kathleen in ’07. I first learned the Western approach to Reiki and to be honest, I didn’t really get it. I had absolutely zero confidence, and I just didn’t do anything, because it just wasn’t resonating with me. But my teacher kept telling me, “You should work with animals, you should work with animals.”
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The Director of Lost Our Home Pet Foundation, Jodi Polanski, wanted to bring Reiki to her organization, but she didn’t know who to call to make that happen. Then someone told her about SARA. After several emails and a few phone calls, I found myself on a plane bound for Tempe, Arizona, to teach Level I Animal Reiki.
I recently worked with a shelter cat named “Bebe”. Bebe was rescued from a situation where he was living mostly outside of a basement apartment, entering through a well-window for food on occasion. It was unclear if the apartment tenant felt connected to Bebe but did seem to be feeding him. At some point the tenancy fell apart and Bebe encountered some sort of violent exchange while outside. He was chewed up and terrified when trapped and brought to our shelter.
This particular shelter is a No-kill, cat only shelter. It serves as a sort of cat hospice for elderly cats and is a place where cats are processed to barns, homes, and other situations as appropriate. I had worked with several cats that arrived untouchable and arguably unadoptable who, through Reiki and patience, began to unwind from traumas and found welcoming and sensitive humans to share their lives. With Bebe, I was not sure it was better for him to be alive and in our care. I know this is a radical statement but it speaks only of the severity of the distress this cat was experiencing and my estimation of the quality of his life. He was withdrawn in the extreme, crouched (not curled) in a corner of a crate in a room by himself where he could have wandered and explored but chose not to. He emitted something worse than a growl, a low, pitiful moan whenever I sat with him and I did for hours and hours over more than two months. My desire for release for him became seriously disruptive to my reiki offering.
While I knew, intellectually, that I could not bring my hopes for specific positive outcomes into the intentions of the reiki practice, it was easier “known” than lived. I found that I felt an increasingly desperate plea in my meditation and I could see it as not right. But, I found it hard to resist the overlay of such intentions given the profound suffering I saw. Isn’t it natural to hope for “release” from suffering? Isn’t that consistent with wanting to create space for healing? In the midst of this crisis I wrote this note to Leah.
“There is a cat, picked up wandering and wailing, badly beaten and inconsolable. This is an orange cat, a male with ears that are badly maimed and a gash on his face healing very slowly. This cat is in the worst condition I have seen in all my time in this shelter, not physically, but spiritually. For several weeks I have been sitting in his room, always at least a yard away, and meditating. I use the precepts and the Choku Rei and Sei Heki. I draw the symbols in my hand and meditate on the meanings. I chant and I use Dai Ko Myo. I focus wholly on my own peace and calmness. It is truly all I can offer this creature who emanates fear and despair. Occasionally as I draw the symbols in the air or in my hand, the cat growls, a low guttural noise that is the most agonizing I have ever heard from a cat. Nothing changes for this cat. In my three weeks now of sitting with him several times a week, I observe no change. This week I had the strong, strong sense that he wanted to leave, to die, to be freed. I wondered if I may have received the message because I created a space where it could be heard. I have not shared this with others at the shelter or in classes and am anxious to hear what you might feel in my telling this story. He is in an agony of spirit I have not sat with before. He is not going to die physically. He is lonely and unapproachable. Certainly this could change, I believe in the power of energetic healing but what is humane if he remains so disturbed? He is not hurting people and is being kept isolated from other cats. I can only continue to sit with him and focus inward but the message was clear and in its way, desperate. Hard to not want things to be better, healed, light filled for him. But, this is not about wanting….”
In response Leah (Leah DiAmbrosio, VP SARA) wrote to me: “When we are offering Reiki, it’s important to be open and remember there is no giving and receiving there is just a beautiful connection of your light to the other person’s or animal’s. If you become attached to the idea you are giving a gift with your Reiki then you are disappointed when the gift is rejected. In this beautiful space we are creating of connection, there is no giving and receiving – just oneness. When we attach ourselves to an outcome that creates a wanting and a wanting creates a need to hang onto an outcome and in that space of hanging on, nothing can move. Letting go is freedom and in that space of openness, anything can happen.”
“When we attach ourselves to an outcome that creates a wanting and a wanting creates a need to hang onto an outcome…”
As so happens with our Reiki teachers, human and animal, we receive what we need when we can use it. Leah’s caution to me about “wanting”, fit perfectly with my sense that my desire for Bebe was interfering with my creation of the space. After all, many of us are drawn to this work with animals by a strong and sincere ethic about animal welfare, freedom from suffering and freedom from cruelty. It is not surprising that I would get distracted by extreme suffering of Bebe’s sort.
Two weeks ago, two and a half months after I met Bebe and began regular reiki offerings, Bebe came out of his crate to eat tuna from my hand, roll on his back and present his belly in a demonstration of trust! I was shocked and moved to tears. Secretly I had given up on Bebe and become a silent advocate for his “release”! Gratefully, I do not control the energy! Bebe was healing, in his own way, in his own time. Hard to describe how dramatic this was. He didn’t inch his way over to me, he didn’t allow me closer or stop growling. There was a hard change and he simply moved from despair to hope with an invisible process. He was loving and engaged and catlike! He was no longer afflicted by fear. So very beautiful, such a teacher.
The next week Bebe “adopted” another very frightened kitten who he curled with and protected. Who he taught to eat tuna and tolerate people and the next week the two were adopted together by a person who appreciated their history and had patience for their future.
I think I am finally over the habit of limiting the power of reiki by imposing my own desires and decisions about needed outcomes! If I forget, I have Bebe’s teaching and Leah’s careful reminder to pull me back.
Melanie Powers