On being with the quarantined

There’s the problem now of sick people having to be quarantined, even facing death when alone, and so a problem for loved ones: How to show love in such difficult moments? We might review the Reiki techniques of ‘distance healing’ for some ideas.

Think about a great viral video—with 16.5 million views so far—showing a young woman in self-quarantine, offering a glimpse of her parents eating ‘with her’ from a different room.

To be ‘with’ someone involves intention. You could be sitting next to me and still feel remote. The Reiki techniques are about being present when not in the same place.

I think of a sentence I read once in Jane Austen’s Mansfield Park: “They were two solitary sufferers, or connected only by Fanny’s consciousness.”

A moment set aside for a distance healing session might be a practice for you to be your highest self—communicating with the higher self of another.

If that is possible, then distances wouldn’t matter.

You might think of the session as a form of meditation—intended to bring the highest good to another person, which might be to reassure them they’re loved in whatever condition they are in.

This is not unrelated to ‘prayer’ in the common Christian style. That is typically to ask God to perform a healing intervention on your behalf, which essentially is asking God to ‘boost’ your signal.

Many techniques are used to form connections across distances. You might send a card, or flowers. The ancient technique is to light a candle for someone who is healing.

As Zen practitioner Manali Haridas Scott writes: “candles become the externalized fire that represents the internal inner flame of our immutable spirit.” The flame is you; the light is your intention.

In energy healing, you are using yourself. You are the candle. You don’t need to be ‘boosted’. You need to be open, clear, loving. And that is powerful.

Penelope Quest has some thoughts in Reiki for Life on getting ready.

Prepare yourself for doing the treatment. You should sit somewhere comfortable and quiet, where you will not be disturbed — switch the telephone off, ask the family to leave you alone for half an hour, and so on. You might choose to light some incense or burn some aromatherapy oil and have some gentle music on in the background if you wish.

Imagine yourself as a clear channel for connection. That might mean letting go of some things. It’s a practice for you.

If the other person is conscious, you might agree on a time to do this together—to send love and to receive it.

Focus on a loved one, Quest suggests, by writing their name on a piece of paper, and holding it. You might say their name, and location.

You might imagine them with you. In Reiki, hands are often held above the body of the receiver, who is typically lying down. You might imagine the sick or quarantined person in this position before you. If you are familiar with the Reiki techniques, you could do a full session.

You could sit with your loved one, using an object belonging to them, a stuffed animal, pillow, or a photograph, to establish some form of connection. What is your intention? You could simply be with them. You could reassure and comfort them.

You might not have to ask for a disruption of the physical world, whose processes are important. Rather, you might ask for the highest good to be done—which might simply be to feel loved.

You might imagine the receiver in the palms of your hands, and hold your palms to your heart.

You might imagine light around them, in and through them.

You might intensify the light within them, moving through their veins and channels, through their fingers and limbs. Let light be in their thoughts and intentions—help them intend to heal.

You might try colors of light. You might try golden light.

Many Reiki practitioners use the process of drawing symbols to focus. The symbol used for ‘distance healing’ is complex. You might use it, or perhaps imagine your own pathway to the the other person.

Melissa Tipton, in Living Reiki, has a thought:

Perhaps when we are using the distance symbol to heal, healing comes in part from the realization that the distance itself is an illusion — you and I are actually One with all that is, and thus anything we think we’re lacking — anything we perceive as separating us from a state of wholeness and health — is an illusion on some level.

Note that some practitioners doing such techniques report that sympathetic symptoms can register in the sender’s own body.

Many report, as well, that you will know if the other person does not wish to receive your transmission.

I like the idea that the highest good we’d accomplish is that we will all feel connected—one body.

No one suffers alone. We are doing life together. If a nuclear family feels very close, then from the divine perspective we are all family, all humans.

A Reiki distance healing, or sending care and consideration, to all sufferers now, might be a useful practice. If it feels like a vast darkness, then you can be the candle.

A group meeting might be helpful. A Reiki guide has some thoughts:

Usually the practitioners sit in a circle, sometimes holding hands and sometimes not, and they visualize the client in the middle of the circle and then send Reiki to the client.

If a divine or cosmic intention to this difficult planetary experience might be intuited, perhaps it includes the idea of humans practicing connection. Of being together, ‘sending’ and ‘receiving’, across all barriers.

This is the goal, after all, of scriptures, and all books—and also energy healing. To be together, outside the restrictions of time and space.

I can touch you. We can be together.

Do it with feeling!