Rev.Rucifer

It was a cold February night, and I was excited to see my boyfriend after a weekend apart. He was traveling back to his hometown, and I remember we had a little fight over the weekend because he had drank too much and forgotten to call when he said he would. While I wasn’t sure if he did have an alcohol problem, drawing attention to the issue caused immediate backlash.

He arrived to my house, excited to see him, he had what appeared to be his overnight bag, and my heart filled with excitement as we embraced. It was in that moment I could feel the shift. Something had changed, and yet I had no idea why. He proceeded to tell me that the relationship was over and it was time to move on. After a year together, my first thought was shock, quickly followed by sadness, disappointment and a world of anger. I called my best friend as I lay crying on the bed while he gathered his things to leave.

I scream at him, and questioned why he brought his overnight bag if he was planning on breaking up with me. He responded simply… It had my things I had left at his house. This was really over.

I cried through the night and into the next morning. I tried to gather myself off the floor and make it to the office. Tears billowed on the train as I tried to keep it together enough to be a reasonable person in the workplace. This is the type of raw emotion that is never right for work and by early afternoon I could no longer take it and had to send myself home.

Lost, sad and disappointed, my best friend took me into her home as I began the journey to heal this sweet, yet strong heart. With care and attention, this friend provided comfort, love and a copy of A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson. I slept with this book for three days before I had the courage to read it. Slowly I was able to open the pages, and open my heart to healing.

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.” — Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love

It wasn’t going to be easy, and yet, I knew this is was necessary and a part of my healing journey. Day by day I started to slowly feel better and do the things I needed to care for myself to feel good. It was in this that I came across a catalogue for the NY Open Center, and flipped through until I found the page about reiki, and I knew in that moment that this was the time.

I found myself in the Reiki 1 class as a birthday treat before my 30th birthday. It was less than 2 months since the breakup had happened, and while I was slowly healing, the raw emotion still sat in the center of my heart, breeding insecurity, fear and unworthiness. The class created a welcoming and safe container to explore reiki as we first learn to care for ourselves through a self-care protocol. Reiki teaches us to care for ourselves first. We cannot give what we do not have. It is a spiritual centering practice and a way to come within and heal the parts of us that feel broken. It’s a tool that quiets the mind to better listen to the needs of the body and the spirit.

As I found reiki, I was curious if a session could help to work through and release the incessant thoughts of this person and the relationship ending. It was my first professional reiki session, and I explained that I was working through a breakup with the practitioner. It was early in my reiki journey and I wasn’t sure what was going to happen. While everyone’s insight manifests differently, I tend to be very visual and saw a vision of me holding a single red balloon during the session. In this vision, this balloon represented all the anger, fear and resentment I had for this person and how they chose to end the relationship. It was in this moment, I simply let the balloon go and realized I was the only one holding on to those feelings and emotions.

It was maybe a couple months after that session when I was doing another reiki and meditation session for myself. In this experience, I saw a vision of my sweet, yet broken heart. There she was in all her glory, and I could see the cavern of brokenness caused from this relationship. During this meditation I saw this heart come back into wholeness, into rightness, into its true purpose. Where there was once a hole was now complete with no signs of damage or pain.

I do believe time heals all wounds, and yet with reiki, this wound seemed to heal a bit better. I could see more clearly and look upon our relationship with the eyes of love. My heart filled for gratitude for the lessons I learned about life and relationships after our time together ended. My perspective shifted as my heart returned to its rightful place — a home for love, compassion and understanding.

Reiki helped heal and soften this hardened heart. It created a possibility for healing and carried me with softness and grace as I could more easily come into acceptance, healing and movement in mind, body and spirit, fully in alignment. While we all have our ways of healing, if this work resonates with you, it can be a powerful tool in your own healing journey.

Blessings & Light.