The manner in which Reiki heals or relaxes a being is related to its essential nature. The life force energy flowing from within a being always will express the ideal form of that being. Disease and stress develop as the organism is conditioned to expect that what sustains life is all in the outer world and that the organism must exert conscious effort in order to acquire what it needs to live. The connection to the life force is what sustains life. The acquisition of basic needs such as temperature control, oxygen, water, food, and function, are all important to the organism to keep it strong enough to stay connected to the life force. These thing are not "accessed through exerted effort" but very freely available in the world around us if you are a bird.

The practice of Reiki simply reminds the cells of the being, and ultimately the being itself, that the life force is flowing from within their being and outward as expression or behavior. The re-orientation of the cells to the flow of life from within has a very relaxing and healing effect on the organism. The more in accordance the organism is to the flow of life, the more ideal the expression of that organism, in other words healthy and content...

When the organism is not aware of its connection to the flow of life, the ego, or conditioned and programmed awareness, becomes predominant and the organism weakens its psychological connection to the source. It becomes more oriented toward the programmed ego, intelligent, creative response become mere reactions, the joy of life becomes a struggle to exert effort to maintain a modicum of happiness and contentment.

The organism then begins to seek psychological security, happiness, love, and peace in the world around them. A bigger house, a better job, a different relationship, are examples of what the programmed ego desires to "make it happy". This effort causes stress and discontentment with how things are, with the situation in the present moment. The result is a reinforcement of the ego in the intermittent satisfaction of desire in pleasurable experience. Pleasure is sought and desire drives the organism.

This seeking of psychological security in the form of attachments to philosophies and beliefs, objects and other sentient beings brings more stress and discontentment. Fear of loss and then the actual grief when those fears of loss become realities is often debilitating to the organism causing more stress and disease.

When effort to obtain happiness and psychological security is discovered as futile, the organism awakens from the conditioned dream state and moves toward awareness of reality as it is, not as it is perceived.

Where does disease and stress originate?

Stress and disease occur when the organism dissipates energy into the past and future. This stress and disease are exacerbated when the organism exerts effort to try to control situations to achieve a desirable outcome or avoid an undesirable outcome.

We are conditioned, or programmed, to seek our needs and acquire them from the outside world. This requires effort and often is frustrated by the conditioned programming that actually validates envy and greed. Also frustrating is that when we seek for spiritual or aesthetic qualities of life, such as happiness and fulfillment, in the outer world and focus on certain future event s that will "make" us happy or fulfilled, we often find that when those events do occur we do not sense the qualities of happiness and contentment that we expected to sense.

Stress and disease are more likely to occur in a being whose energy is dissipated in the past and future. The examples below are a few of the ways that a human dissipates energy into the past and future.

Dissipating energy into the future:

1. Expectations
2. Ideals
3. Goals
4. Dreams
5. Beliefs
6. Faith

Dissipating energy into the past:

1. Regret
2. Knowledge based experience
3. Prior experience interpreting current events
4. Dreams