Friend becoming a Reiki "healer"

Skepiroth

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I was talking to one of my friends and she stated that she was going to some school to learn to be a Reiki "healer". I do not talk to this person very much due to geographic differences, so this was kind of a shock. Does anyone know of a good way to convince someone that being an 'energy healer' is not a good idea and disservice to the community without talking down to them?
 
Ya' know, I don't think that there's any way to change people s mind on that sort of crap. I have a very good friend who's into that reiki crap, and she even teaches it. I just avoid the subject. Oddly enough, a lot of my friends are taken in by pseudoscientific sorts of garbage. I only offer my opinion when asked.

However, I have found a strategy that works (though very slowly and only in baby steps). I explain how critical thinking can debunk pseudoscience that they don't currently believe in. This seems to innoculate them from new "woo-woo" and helps to erode their current beliefs
 
joesixpack said:
Ya' know, I don't think that there's any way to change people s mind on that sort of crap. I have a very good friend who's into that reiki crap, and she even teaches it. I just avoid the subject. Oddly enough, a lot of my friends are taken in by pseudoscientific sorts of garbage. I only offer my opinion when asked. ...
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Same here. A very close friend of mine is a reiki "healer" and teacher. There's nothing I can say to her.

The sad thing is she's a registered nurse, and should know better. She even uses hpathy, and freely admits it's a placebo! :nope:

If you can get your friend to look at Quackwatch or various other skeptical sites or articles, that may help. Surely she wants the whole picture before starting this, right?
 
I had a Reiki healer help me once. I had some pain in my knee. She just made some quick motions with her hand waving back and forth, just a couple of inches from my knee. I thought I felt something, but later realized she was causing pockets of air to hit me over and over. My knee felt better, until I started thinking about what she had done, and it started hurting again.
 
Your Friend could chat to me about the realities of being a Reiki Healer.

I am an ex Reiki healer although those in the Reiki circle argue that you always have reiki, it never goes, is just activated, whatever that means.

I soon learn't that when push comes to shove it realy didn't work. I once had a ear ache that woke me up about 3am one morning. I paniced firstly because I knew I just needed a full nights sleep as I had two 8 month twins to deal with the next day,every second counts sleep wise. I tried Reiki and tried and tried some more. Nothing. I would have got a painkiller had there been any in the house. The next day rather confused and a bit put out that it didn't work I asked why on a Reiki forum. Was told...(something like) It worked on another level. Another Level!!! They where saying I needed my reiki more on a spritual level, the Reiki angels knew I needed work on my second chakra more than cure an ear ache that would make me a more resonable mum the next day when dealing with twins that where learning to crawl in different directions.

She will also have to wade through the different kinds of Reiki, I believe there are over 100 types. Each Master with an ego the size of a hot airballon preaching my reiki's better than your reiki. A nasty world.

It is an unpleasant buisness in my humble opinion. It was in fact the very first area in my my believer world that I had serious doubts, a catalist (sp) and from that It took my Tarot/numerology that mediums can chat to my grandparents away and I've never looked back.

I seriously hopeshe spend timeon Reiki forums and sees for herself the real nuts and bolts of Reiki world.

Sharon
 
Sharon,
I changed one word of your last sentence, and added a comma, and I think the result works.

I seriously hope she spend time on Reiki forums and sees for herself the real nuts, and bolts from the Reiki world.

What do you think?;)
 
Update: I talked to the person over IM. I had a few drinks prior to the conversation so I didn't care too much about being a tad "direct". I told them that if they were going to open a business that they need money, and getting a business loan is sometimes difficult, but James Randi would pay her one million dollars just for being able to demonstrate that Reiki works. I directed her to the Million Dollar Challenge website and got a response to the effect of "it is hard to manipulate the energy of someone who isn't willing". I guess some people just believe in that kind of stuff
 
Nex said:
Same here. A very close friend of mine is a reiki "healer" and teacher. There's nothing I can say to her.

The sad thing is she's a registered nurse, and should know better. She even uses hpathy, and freely admits it's a placebo! :nope:

If you can get your friend to look at Quackwatch or various other skeptical sites or articles, that may help. Surely she wants the whole picture before starting this, right?
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I'm a registered nurse and I have gone to reiki before. I didn't jump off the table after a session and start doing a James Brown thing, but it felt pretty good while I was having it done. I don't believe I get as much out of it as I do with massage therapy or accupressure (I KNOW accupressure works, it cleared my sciatica right up when I was pregnant) but if there are people who feel like it does something for them that doesn't mean they believe in quackery. Seems like you would go have it done before you make sucha judgement. You say you have read the *evidence* but do you believe everything you read?

The reiki therapist told me I probably had "healing hands" because no matter how cold it is my hands and feet are always hot. I just don't feel like I got enough out of reiki to keep going to it. That doesn't mean it isn't a worthwhile practice for someone else.
 
How do we change people to think and act more like the prominent and clear minded ones, meaning "ourselves"???

Well to inspire change in the most fruitful way, is to present yourself as you are, as an example, do you understand?
If someone appreciates an example and become inspired by it, the strive along similar lines of thought conduct.
Isn't the reason why any skeptic or believer entertain their held viewpoints because of the, instant or otherwise, emotional attachment they make to their "thoughts".

I do not myself consider the attitude of "I'm right and you're wrong simply because..." a fruitful way of doing anything but add to the alienation between our egos.
 
mayday said:
snip .... but if there are people who feel like it does something for them that doesn't mean they believe in quackery. Seems like you would go have it done before you make sucha judgement. You say you have read the *evidence* but do you believe everything you read?

...snip
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The problem here is that there doesn't seem to be consensus within the Reiki practitioners about how to do what they do, and there also doesn't seem to be controlled testing to show what it is that is being done. If it makes someone feel better to have someone else hover over them waving their hands, that's fine. However, if there is a claim that the hand waving has somehow changed the physical state of either person, shouldn't that be a quantifiable matter? And should it be of concern if someone chooses hand waving over a bad sprain rather then rest, ice, compression and elevation?

I would be more likely to think that accupressure would work over hand-waving, as direct manipulation of tendons, muscles and nerves would likely address sources of sciatica.

I've had reiki too. And I'll take a good hands-on massage over it any day.
 
Now I'm serious about this...it has been a year since I went to the reiki woman. I originally went to see if reiki could help with depression. She told me "it might." So, I paid $150 for three sessions. The first time I lay on this table in a little room and there was ding dongs and chimes and wind blowing on the stereo, and she had this lemon oil on her hands and told me if I wanted to talk through the session it was fine or if I wanted to be quiet it would be okay too. I'm not a talker so I just lay there, and she didn't really wave her hands over me but would either hold her hands over certain parts of my body or lightly touch them. The first time I went, my nose got stuffy and my eyes started to water...she said it was the start of my body beginning to purify itself. Also, my husband noticed after the sessions I was in an especially somber mood for awhile. In all seriousness I believe it depends on the therapist as to what they are capable of doing with reiki. I enjoyed going but after the third session I made and excuse about having to check my schedule to see when I could come back and I haven't been back since.

I think I would have definitely come back had the reiki therapist been a young Robert Redford look alike.
 
I was offered Reiki once by a friend of an ex. I considered it for about as long as Data considered the Borg Queen's offer. No, really. I did. I was having a crappy knee day.

Then the common sense part of my brain slapped me and I responded something along the lines of our energies not being used to each other since we just met and you're old friends and went back to whatever I was reading and let her babble on.

Admittedly, something about the whole setup, though casual, felt... uncomfortable. She used to give me stones too and I'd throw 'em in my backpack's netting pocket until I got bored. Which would be whenever I'd find them.
 
Just ask your friend if she thinks that being a con-artist is a solid, ethical decision.
 
So have they told your friend about the $10,000 fee for the final level of Reiki training?
;)
 
mayday said:
I'm a registered nurse and I have gone to reiki before. I didn't jump off the table after a session and start doing a James Brown thing, but it felt pretty good while I was having it done. I don't believe I get as much out of it as I do with massage therapy or accupressure (I KNOW accupressure works, it cleared my sciatica right up when I was pregnant) but if there are people who feel like it does something for them that doesn't mean they believe in quackery. Seems like you would go have it done before you make sucha judgement. You say you have read the *evidence* but do you believe everything you read?
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When you assume... yadda yadda.


I've had it done. More than once. It doesn't work. Reiki is ◊◊◊◊.


Thanks for shopping at NexMart. Have a nice day. :)
 
mayday said:
So, I paid $150 for three sessions. The first time I lay on this table in a little room and there was ding dongs and chimes and wind blowing on the stereo, and she had this lemon oil on her hands and told me if I wanted to talk through the session it was fine or if I wanted to be quiet it would be okay too. I'm not a talker so I just lay there, and she didn't really wave her hands over me but would either hold her hands over certain parts of my body or lightly touch them. The first time I went, my nose got stuffy and my eyes started to water...she said it was the start of my body beginning to purify itself. Also, my husband noticed after the sessions I was in an especially somber mood for awhile.
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I would feel sombre if I had paid $150 for someone just to hold their hands over bits of me, ding dongs and chimes or no.
 
mayday said:
Now I'm serious about this...it has been a year since I went to the reiki woman. I originally went to see if reiki could help with depression. She told me "it might." So, I paid $150 for three sessions. The first time I lay on this table in a little room and there was ding dongs and chimes and wind blowing on the stereo, and she had this lemon oil on her hands and told me if I wanted to talk through the session it was fine or if I wanted to be quiet it would be okay too. I'm not a talker so I just lay there, and she didn't really wave her hands over me but would either hold her hands over certain parts of my body or lightly touch them. The first time I went, my nose got stuffy and my eyes started to water...she said it was the start of my body beginning to purify itself. Also, my husband noticed after the sessions I was in an especially somber mood for awhile. In all seriousness I believe it depends on the therapist as to what they are capable of doing with reiki. I enjoyed going but after the third session I made and excuse about having to check my schedule to see when I could come back and I haven't been back since.

I think I would have definitely come back had the reiki therapist been a young Robert Redford look alike.
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That's a pretty long winded explanation. You appear to be attempting to disguise the statement, "I tried it, it didn't work."
 
new skeptic said:
I directed her to the Million Dollar Challenge website and got a response to the effect of "it is hard to manipulate the energy of someone who isn't willing". I guess some people just believe in that kind of stuff
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Might be worth pointing out that you don't have to prove it by practising on an unwilling individual (maybe she though she would have to heal Randi!).

I'm sure a test could be devised which used believers as subjects.
 
Nex said:
When you assume... yadda yadda.


I've had it done. More than once. It doesn't work. Reiki is ◊◊◊◊.


Thanks for shopping at NexMart. Have a nice day. :)
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Oh yea, I can tell you are a pillar of knowledge on the subject.
 
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