The history of Jikiden Reiki began in 1938, when Dr. Chujiro Hayashi, head of the Hayashi Reiki Kankyuka (Institute), a Reiki clinic and school in Japan founded years before by Hayashi Sensei with the approval of his teacher, Usui Sensei, the discoverer of Reiki, initiated 17-year-old Chiyoko Yamaguchi. She received Reiju (attunement) from Hayahsi Sensei at the home of her Uncle Wasaboro Sugano, who had been attuned to Reiki ten years earlier and had paid for all the members of his large family to be attuned as well. Two years after Chiyoko Sensei’s attunement, Hayashi Sensei died. Prior to World War II and during the war, the Japanese government was introducing strict regulations on all practices such as Reiki. Chiyoko Sensei, like many other Reiki practitioners, continued to practice Reiki but had to adapt to the many stringent rules set upon all hands-on healing practices. In many cases this meant that Reiki practice and teaching had to go underground.
As mentioned above, by the early 1900s, Japan itself had begun to make changes in the way that certain healing practices were regulated. After the war, there were even more restrictions and Reiki went underground, only being used in private for family and trusted friends. Since those times, the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai has remained a closed group and to this day does not teach anyone outside of the Gakkai. As a result, by the late 1980s much of the Reiki being practiced and taught in Japan was coming from outside of Japan from the Western Reiki lineage. Mari’s friend Frank Arjava Petter lived in Sapporo in 1993, and began offering a Reiki teacher course, which had previously been unavailable in Japan. There were also many styles of Reiki being developed in the West that blended new practices into the methods.
In 1999 Chiyoko Sensei was mentioned in a book written by a Reiki teacher in Japan, and people were excited to learn of someone who was practicing just as Hayashi Sensei had practiced. Chiyoko Sensei and Tadao Sensei were convinced by others to begin teaching workshops, so that more people could learn the original methods in all of their purity. The name Jikiden was given, which means “direct teaching.” Together, this mother and son started the Jikiden Reiki Kenkyukai (society) and began teaching workshops in Kyoto. These Jikiden Reiki Kenkyukai-accredited workshops are now being taught around the world, and they offer an approach that goes back to the Japanese roots of Reiki. There is a strong focus on sensing body toxicity by learning to feel for the different levels of byosen, or accumulation of toxins. The Reiki symbols are taught with a true understanding of their Japanese writing and meaning. Reiki history is visited with accurate accounts of more recent discoveries. Overall, there is a wonderful simplicity and clarity in Jikiden Reiki that makes seasoned Reiki teachers and new students alike feel grounded and nourished in their practice, and brings all of the pieces together for an experience that is truly enlightening.
Chiyoko Sensei remained in Japan practicing Reiki every day for 65 years as she was taught it by Hayashi Sensei. It is through Chiyoko Sensei’s dedication to her Gyo (diligence to duty) and to her teacher, Hayashi Sensei, that people inside and outside of Japan now have the opportunity to study and practice the original teachings of Reiki in the form of what Chiyoko Sensei and her son Tadao named Jikiden Reiki.
Chiyoko Yamaguchi
Arjava
Tadao Yamaguchi
