Ah you see, just exactly what I was talking about yesterday. I have a very dear friend who has recently been diagnosed with an immune deficiency disorder. She has spent the last few months in near crippling pain in most of her joints. The symptoms are much the same as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Last night she came round for some Reiki and after the treatment she reported that all pain had gone. This is the point where I say a huge “thank you” to who or what ever facilitates such success.

Before you go jumping off your seat and reaching for the telephone to contact me as a fantastic healer you really should know that this is not me. I am not a healer, I am merely a channel for the healing energy. Anyone can do it. Just as we are all born with the ability to be psychic, we are all born with the ability to heal. Indeed, as I’ve said before, it is the client who determines how much energy is received during a Reiki session. Does this then, not prove that it is the client who is essentially providing the healing?

This also begs the question “do we really care?” Not that I mean that derogatory, but do we really care where it comes from when it actually works? Alright, I know, there are a lot of people who still think that the devil could be working lovely miracles to dupe people, I very much doubt it myself as I don’t believe in the devil.

My first love in complimentary therapies is Reiki. So much so I’ve got myself four or five Reiki Master Certificates. Each discipline differs slightly in its teaching but it all comes back to the same thing, the Universal Light Energy provided by the divine. No, don’t worry, I’m not going all religious on you. A mistake I think a lot of people make when they become involved in this type of life style is that they believe they must suddenly become aloof and lose their sense of self together with their sense of humour. Personally I don’t think that’s what the divine is looking for. I came to Reiki after studying the Qabala. That’s the Kabala with a Q, which separates it as the quest for knowledge of all things hidden (the occult). In its teachings we find that the God wanted to know itself and split itself in order to gain knowledge. To this end, everything in the Universe then is part of the divine and every experience unique, it is this unique experience that the divine wants. Now, my point is, if we follow the path of any “discipline” that changes the personality how is it possible to take a unique experience back to the Universe? So. When we begin to follow these paths we should be extremely careful not to emanate our teachers to the exclusion of our own personality.

Each Reiki Master will discuss with their students their recommended method of building the energy that is channelled as Reiki. I try to be open minded about this and offer as many methods as possible to my students allowing them to try as many avenues as they wish before deciding which works best for them.

So, what does Reiki do? Good question. My answer is generally, what do you want it to do? I’ve seen Reiki heal problems that medicine couldn’t. Does this make me a healer? Nope. I am just a vessel, if the divine energy wishes to use me to bring about a healing then well and good. Not everyone will be healed by Reiki. The energy that is drawn into the client is decided by the client. Don’t worry though, that doesn’t mean you need to believe in it for it to work. Just not so. My best results have been for people who are the biggest sceptics you could hope to meet.

One of the things that most clients report is that the energy continues to build through the body for days, sometimes weeks, after a treatment. So, someone with backache may feel an immediate relief, but a week later they may realise that the pain has completely gone!

The greatest thing that Reiki does is to relax the mind and to bring the mind, body and soul together. All too often we are all over the place because the three aspects of our lives are off in different directions. Once they come together we are able to function and focus better on our lives.

I find that Reiki is also extremely useful for people who are terminally ill. If you can imagine being given a “death sentence” by the doctor and you’re not ready or prepared to move on there is going to be a huge conflict. As I’ve already discussed, we are each here to take our unique experience into the divine, but it worries me that taking a negative experience of leaving the world may, in turn, have a negative affect on the divine. Reiki helps us to accept the cycle of life and to let go when the time is right.

Vets practice euthanasia all the time where quality of life is deemed to be so low and the animal is suffering so badly that it is inhumane to keep them going. Like any other animal lover, I fully agree with this concept. I could never justify sitting back and watching my favourite pet suffer unnecessarily. The question is why do we insist on treating our fellow humans so differently? Surely if we are capable of seeing the injustice of retaining a poor quality of life for small animals we must be able to see the same for those born into our own species?

The point is that once the quality of life is no longer there and each day blends into a metamorphosis of the previous, all hope is gone. Would you wish to carry on with such an existence, day, after day? If the answer to this question is “no”, then perhaps you should consider petitioning your MP in the campaign to legalise euthanasia for council employee.

I was recently asked the following questions and thought I’d blog the answers fro future use.

1. If you were to fully live your life, what is the first change you would make?

A. Time management would be a big thing for me. I’m getting better at it with my home life, but I always feel there’s room for improvement.

2. What do you want more of in your life?

A. George will think the answer to this is going to be ice cream, but it’s not. There are a few things I’d like more of so here’s the list:

1. Sunshine the sun doesn’t shine nearly enough in WL although it’s shining today.
2. Time:
2a. with the people I love
2b to study what I want to know about
2c to help people in need

3. What do you want less of in your life?

A. Again, a list of things, they kind of mirror the above:

1. Rain, I know we need it, but I’d like to wear footwear other than wellies from time to time.
2. Work. So long as it doesn’t affect my income J
3. Pressure. I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling that there is so much needs my attention that I feel drawn in all directions.
4. Debt. Not that I’m as skint as the tooth fairy, but wouldn’t it be nice to be able to keep what you earn every month instead of having to shelf it out on stupid stuff like insurances?

4. What three things are you doing regularly that don’t serve or support you?

A. You know, I really can’t think of one? By our very nature we don’t do anything that doesn’t serve or support us. It may well be that it’s negative, such as always picking up after someone, but in the end, we do these things because we want to not because we have to. It makes us feel better, not the other person.

5. What would you try now if you knew you could not fail?

A. Ah this is an easy one. I’d open a Complimentary Therapy Studio in Edinburgh. We would offer therapy to those who could afford it and free treatments to those who genuinely can’t.

My youngest grandson started big school today. He was surprisingly happy about it, perhaps that goes to show what a good idea it is to have them at nursery.

His dad came all the way up from England to see him start school. Oupa was there and Great Granny, not to mention Mummy. I couldn't make it, sorry my little goblin, like I said, I have to work so that I can pay the tax man who sends money to Santa for your presents every year.

This year Santa has been placed on the bottom of the payroll, which means that everyone has to work extra hard to pay for all his expenses, and there are lots of them. You know, the Elves union this year have demanded and increase above inflation to bring them up to the national minimum wage. Have you ever heard the like? What do Elves need money for? Everything they could ever need is given to them by the faries.

Elvis, the head of the Union, has insisted that it's only fair, whether they use money or not, that they get some, they're only human after all. So, here I am, working my little fingers to the bone to pay Santa to pay some Elves who will never use the money they get.

hope you have a wonderful first day at school my little goblin.

Scrooge the tooth fairy!

Finally the day arrives when I'm due to get rid of this aweful tooth that has caused me nothing but hardship since the beginning of the year. You'd think, wouldn't you, at almost 50, I'd have experienced my fair share of toothache? Not so. I've had mild toothache once, several years ago. When I went to the dentist she said it was because I'd been walking around with a temporary filling for around seven years. OK, finding a dentist was not on the top of my priority list when I came back from overseas. The offending tooth was cleaned out, filled and that was the end of it.

Now, last year I found I had chronic sinusitus. Painful, but no big deal, you go off and get them drained and that's the end of it. Oops. I forgot we were talking about the national health system. It took seven months to get an appointment with a specialist and another seven to get the operation booked. Fortunately, I got the op the day it was promised.

In the mean time, back in the mouth department. Having booked a holiday to celebrate my wonderful partners 50th birthday, I was keen to have my toothache resolved before we left. So, at the beginning of January, off I trapse to the dentist. She takes one look and says "no, nothing wrong with that tooth, the pain you're feeling is coming from the sinus infection you have". Arrrggghhhh!!!! So, live with it, basically.

So I did. In the end my sinuses were drained, end of May and I settled in for a lifetime of pain free facial features. That lasted all of a week. A week after the op I started to experience pain in my tooth. I'm sure you're very much aware that trying to appoint with a dentist here in the UK is much the same as trying to get an appointment to visit with Christ himself at the time of his birth! In the end, I had to opt for an emergency appointment where I was told that they'd have to take x-rays and wait until the results of the x-rays came back before they could do anything. Make another appointment. I did, but couldn't last that long so I went back to another emergency appointment at which time the nerve was removed. I was told that this particular tooth could not be removed without prior consultation with the ENT as it could cause a fissure between the sinus and the tooth. The tooth was filled and I waited for notification of a date to have it removed.

That date arrived, today! Hooray! or so I thought. Fate stepped in once again and, as I sat patiently in the surgery, the waterboard cut off the water, totally without warning. My dentist went out to speak to them and ask when it would be put back on. They couldn't say. I had to reappoint! So, here we are, still together, me and my well rotten tooth. I think it has a will of it's own and a purpose to remain in my mouth for quite some time. My new appointment date is the 18th October. Well, it's only two months away!!

My conclusion? The tooth fairy is skint! Sitting there on the bones of her arse cutting corners to save the pennies. Why is she so skint? Probably because all these little itsy bitsy people keep shedding teeth right left and centre. If you're reading this tooth fairy, you can have my tooth for nothing, free, gratis, nowt, zilch. Just let them take the bloody thing out!

Oh, I love a good gripe. That feels better :))

In the perfect world, I wouldn't need to drag myself in day after day to perform mind numbingly boring tasks for sufficient money to pay the mortgage and buy a crust of bread every day. In the perfect world, the weather forecast for my area would not foretell "rain" day after day. How much simpler was life back in the day when you didn't need to worry about keeping up with the Joneses or building small empires? It's little wonder that stress is rampaging through the lives of everyone on the planet! It's little wonder that people scream "money is the root of all evil". I doubt it. It's our aspirations to always be better than the last person that makes us so stressed out. For those of us who are not blessed with wealthy parents and university degrees it appears to be a continual upward (or downward depending on your point of view) struggle.

I'm not going to take this laying down. I'm going to find a way to live my perfect life without breaking my back in the process.

watch this space. :)