The Prophecy On The Tombstone Of Mikao Usui

Mikao Usui Sensei, Founder of Reiki

Shrine at Mt. Kurama, Birthplace of Reiki

Reiki Kanji

The Tombstone of Mikao Usui, Japan

Excerpt from the preface of the book “The Hayashi Reiki Manual” by Mr. Frank Arjava Petter

～The Prophecy～

There is a prophecy on the tombstone of Mikao Usui, the founder of Reiki, that the practice of Reiki will spread all over the world, healing the people as well as Planet Earth herself.

This epitaph to a beloved teacher was written in 1927 by Juzaburo Ushida the second chairperson of Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai, Dr. Usui’s Reiki organization. Little did he know the explosive effect Reiki would have on Mother Earth and all of her children.

Today Reiki is practiced on all continents by people of all creeds and races, social status and of all religions. This fact is due to the dedicated effort of one man and one man alone, Dr. Chujiro Hayashi.
In the mid-nineteen thirties after he had broken away from the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai Dr. Hayashi teamed up with Hawayo Takata in Hawaii and with her help brought Reiki to the USA. This was the great step. The rest of the story is history….Reiki spread from Hawaii to America and from there to Europe, to Australia, to Asia and Africa.

In the winter of 1999 I learned of an old lady who had been a direct disciple of Chujiro Hayashi. This lady was said to be teaching in Kyoto, my favorite city in Japan. Her name, I heard, was Mrs. Yamaguchi. For seven years I had been looking for the possibility of training with someone who had learned the traditional form of Reiki in Japan.

Before I called the Yamaguchis I was not really full of hope. Would they even talk to me once they discovered that I was a foreigner? However I was determined to find out.

Already on the telephone Tadao Yamaguchi was very open, friendly and polite. He didn’t mind at all that I was foreign or that I had been teaching Reiki for seven years. Actually he was thrilled that I wanted to train with him and his mother.

Several months later, in the summer of 2000, I spent five days in Kyoto with Mrs. Chiyoko Yamaguchi and her son Tadao. I was to learn Reiki One and Reiki Two just as Dr. Hayashi had taught them sixty years before. What an exciting prospect being able to immerse myself in the original Reiki as taught by Dr. Hayashi himself!

I wondered about the attunements, the symbols, the hand positions and so on. But what I was looking forward to most was to see and feel how someone who had practiced Reiki her whole life would BE. I was disappointed with the way many Western Reiki teachers live their lives and how they do not live what they teach.

Meeting One of Dr. Hayashi’s Students

Meeting Mrs. Chiyoko Yamaguchi and her family heralded a new era in Reiki for me. As I left the Yamaguchi home in Kyoto after this first initiation I told Mrs. Yamaguchi what an immense pleasure it had been for me to finally meet an honorable Reiki Master. In the Western World we are still in the adolescent stage of Reiki. What we call “tradition” is at the most twenty-five years old. In the presence of Mrs. Yamaguchi I felt the spirit of Reiki being transmitted with extreme clarity. I found Reiki in every smile, in every reassuring word this humble lady uttered, in every little healing hint she gave. In the way she moves, in the way she talks and lives in each moment of her life. 

A year later I visited the Yamaguchi’s again. During this step in my training our friendship and the mutual trust that was growing in our hearts further matured. Tadao Yamaguchi and I even decided we would write a book together.

In the summer of 2002 my dream came true and I began the Reiki maser training under the Yamaguchis. This was the completion of one full cycle in my life ～(text partly omitted)～
May your hands and the people they touch benefit from the journey you are about to embark upon.