My Life-Changing Experience

When I was in Budapest, Hungary in 1999, I learned that today is a holiday called Holy Spirit Monday, the day after Pentecost Sunday. In the daily dialogue with the Divine, I realized this was the perfect day to share my life-changing experience with you. {A more detailed description of all aspects and implications of my experience is found in The Space Between Stars and Words Become Flesh. See www.drsrj.com].

In the late fall of 1995, I was staying at an inn in Rockport, Massachusetts. It was situated right on the rocky coast. On Friday afternoon, I met Mercedes. She was a teacher of the ancient Tibetan and Japanese healing art of Reiki (rei means universal and ki means energy). She was offering a Reiki class that weekend. I felt drawn to take the class but, as a clinical psychologist, I did not see how I could use it in my practice.

Later that night, I was awakened by a purple light pulsating in the middle of my forehead. Nothing like that had ever happened to me. Sure I had had dreams but no light that seemed to be internal and external. The next day, I spoke to Mercedes. Mercedes indicated that it was part of a spiritual awakening taking place within me; it was related to the opening of my heart as a man. She referred to it as the rising of the kundalini, which is what the Hindu and the Tantric traditions call this awakening of the spiritual energy. I decided to take the class.

As part of the Reiki class, the students were brought face-to-face with their Reiki Master Guide in a guided meditation. I saw Christ and other people saw other spiritual teachers known or unknown. I had an unexpectedly emotional experience. I felt how I had first served Christ as a soldier, pictures of ancient Rome flashed in my mind (I'll go into the benefits and drawbacks of focusing on past lives for our spiritual growth in a future posting), and later as a healer of emotional problems. Now, with Reiki, presumably, I would be able to ease physical suffering as well. I tried to keep an open mind, but at the same time, I remained skeptical. I was raised Episcopalian, so was I simply seeing Christ because of my background?

Two other Reiki Master Guides appeared: Tacomi, a Buddhist monk, and Shiva as a Hindu Goddess and not as a male deity. I began to doubt what I had experienced. However, a week later I read in a book on Reiki that in the ancient civilization of India, Shiva was a Goddess and she was credited as bringing Reiki to the planet. The synchronicity stunned me.

That night at three o’clock in the morning, I was again awakened by the pulsating purple light in the middle of my forehead. Following my Reiki teacher’s advice, I called on my Reiki Master Guide saying, “I call on my Reiki Master Guide, Lord Jesus Christ. If this is good for me as my Reiki teacher says, I surrender to it. If not I ask you to protect me from it.” With that, it was as though a dark cloud passed over my eyes. I later learned it was my fear leaving. What followed was the most beautiful white light; it fluttered like a huge butterfly, and, being biased by my current setting, an inn by the sea, I thought it to be about the size of a sea gull.

The light had a loving consciousness and presence about it, as it hovered in front of me. Suddenly, it struck me in the forehead in the area some sacred spiritual traditions call the third eye. I felt a sudden surge of electrical energy that shot down my body from head to toe and then back again.

From my background as an Episcopalian, I believed that I had been visited by the pure white light of the divine love that emanates from the Holy Spirit. Years later, an elderly Christian minister from Scotland confirmed my interpretation of my experience with the white light. He exclaimed to me in his heavy Scottish accent, “Goodness, gracious, laddie, ye’ve been anointed with the geeft of healing by the Holy Spirit!” My heart knew what he said but now my head was ready. I thought to myself, "Yes, I see what you mean. You call on Christ for help and a white light in the form of a dove comes, strikes you on the forehead, and sends an electrifying energy through you, after which, you can transmit a healing energy."

Two days after my experience, I was reading a more detailed story of Dr. Mikao Usui who rediscovered Reiki during the 1850’s in Japan. I was astonished as I read that while he was meditating on mount Koriyama, a white light came to him in the dark hours before the dawn. It hovered in front of his face and then struck him in the forehead. Visions of violet-colored symbols flooded his awareness. When he awakened in the morning, he discovered he had the ability to transmit a healing energy to himself and to others. The parallel between my experience and Dr. Usui’s stunned me. I continue to feel humbled and honored by what happened to me.

• Today, consider how the Holy Spirit is availble to all of us. It's not about religion. The Spirit of God is love and love is an energy that is everywhere from the tiniest subatomic particles to the vastness of interstellar space. Each day, we all have the choice to exercise our capacity to transmit the healing energy of love to ourselves and others. Happy Holy Spirit Monday!