Positive Health Online

"Why isn't this depth of energy recognition taught at the beginning, or anywhere in shiatsu training?" Asked one fully qualified Shiatsu practitioner.

Four days of intensive training, and the direct experience of 'energy' and energetic studies had taken her beyond anything she had experienced in her three years of training in shiatsu, and several years as a Shiatsu practitioner.

One of the biggest drawbacks about training in any therapy that professes to work with energy is that part of the baggage of training is acceptance of the therapy's concepts of energy: what it is, how it works and how it is treated within the narrow structure of the therapy itself.

My own training in shiatsu was in the early 80s, and I was lucky enough to have the very best of Shiatsu teachers. The training I received was mainly governed by the requirements of the Shiatsu organization I became a member of: meridians, 5 Elements, Anatomy and physiology, point location, Kyo Jitsu theory. What was missing was a clear structured training in a personal realization of the direct experience of energy.

This teaching was passed down from teacher to pupil who perhaps then become a teacher, but much of it was based on what the 'book' said and tradition, and again the requirements and directives of the organization.

My experience at that time was a feeling of inadequacy, and although I could already see the human aura (energy field) my experience of Ki, Qi, universal energy was fleeting, and based on feelings, but nothing really tangible. The energetic experiences that I had did not fit in with how energy (I was taught) was 'supposed' to move and respond.

It was however, only when I became a teacher myself that the struggle really began.

I was expected to teach my pupils something I did not fully believe in, and went very much against my growing experience which had developed over many years. In my practice however my treatments bore fruit and my clients were very happy, so something was working.

A sudden profound experience in 1996 opened my eyes and senses to a direct experience of energy that could no longer be ignored. I continued teaching for a while, and then was no longer able to teach that which was for me, at best a limitation and at worst (for me personally) a lie.

What I had directly experienced simplified everything and made completely redundant many of the practices, tools and theories I had been programmed to accept as 'gospel'.

I decided to give up teaching shiatsu, and spend time enabling others to discover for themselves that life changing connection and change of perception that comes with direct experience of the energetic matrix.

In the years that have followed I have worked with a wide range of therapies and disciplines, demonstrating that, given the right conditions and direction, within just a few days, anyone can gain access to a direct experience of energy. The fundamental source of energetic change is at the root of all disciplines and even life itself.

Many students have come from backgrounds that have nothing to do with energy work such as accounting, airline pilots, HR Managers, home makers, private investigators, even a University Professor who was also a part time magician who wanted to discover, what the 'trick' was.

Some have been cynical about their potential to have a direct experience of energy. When the experience is in front of them, those that struggle with this experience are invariably amongst the seasoned therapists and teachers of energy disciplines.

What is the Struggle About?

What these therapists have experienced does not fit what they have been programmed to accept. There are preconceptions about the outcomes of even the simplest energy exercises. There is surprise and disbelief when their personal experience contradicts their preconceptions and training.

At source, once accessed, the direct experience of energy is a shared one, it is available for all and not just the 'gifted ones' or therapists. Energy work should not be just 'tacked on' within disciplines that claim to work with a person's energetic field.

Ultimately, the success or otherwise of a therapists treatment will always be down to the energetic awareness of the practitioner, not how much information they have managed to absorb in training. Treatments will however, almost always work to some degree, as the energetic connection starts with the appointment, the client's first step toward self-help and self-empowerment.

Each of us in good faith works in a discipline that we are drawn to for whatever reason, and believe it to be the 'best' or we would not have chosen to train in this discipline rather than any other. Within disciplines, there are also different schools of thought, which are often fiercely defended. We can, unfortunately find parallels to this mind set throughout our planet and for long as Homo sapiens became aware of their own consciousness and asked questions about the source of their existence.

Prejudice, even towards other branches of the same therapy exists, although the source of energetic change is open and available to all. That a particular method of treatment works for one person does not mean that other approaches are wrong or ineffective.

As long as you know what you are looking for, energetic change is a shared experience, and its source can be accurately pinpointed by all who perceive the change taking place, regardless of discipline or therapy.

Ten years ago, whilst running a Waveform energy workshop in Zurich I was reminded of just this fact.

The participants were mainly from the disciplines of Shiatsu and Acupuncture. All were qualified practitioners and some were teachers. One afternoon, during an exercise with participants working in pairs, a massive energetic change was perceived and heads turned in an effort to locate the source of the change.

There was no question about the source of the change; however to their great surprise it wasn't one of the Shiatsu or Acupuncture teachers producing the change, it was the student Reflexologist working quietly, methodically and until then, un-noticed in the corner of the room.

As the ripples of energetic change were so strong, all the students stopped what they were doing and paid full attention to the Reflexologist, who produced a clear demonstration of what was possible if one has awareness of the direct experience of energy, and applied simple principles that create energetic change.

During 15 years of providing energy workshops, I have worked with practitioners and teachers from Reiki, Reflexology, Spiritual healing, Acupuncture, Shiatsu, Chiropractic, Osteopathy, Massage, Physiotherapy, Homoeopathy, Fascia Release, Craniosacral therapy, Tai chi, Chi Gung and a host of others.

In every case, using their skill base and adapting this to their new degree of awareness and experience of energy, they found that they were all operating from exactly the same energetic source as everyone else, and the same principles of energetic change applied in every single case regardless of the difference in therapy skills.

Instead of the history, techniques and dogma of the discipline, if training in a discipline were to start with enabling students to achieve the point of realization in their own direct experience of energy, more practitioners would work from an 'energy' base rather than a 'therapy' base. They would require fewer techniques to create energetic change, and the choice of technique would be based on information provided directly from the energy field of the client. This approach is the gateway to more effective treatments.

The energetic matrix doesn't differentiate between one individual and another; putting programming aside, and working from a foundation based on direct experience, each therapy would have the opportunity to recognize the common ground that they share with other therapies, providing a path towards unity, a common goal and a new understanding.