Reiki Masters There's quite a search out there for Reiki Masters. In fact, by Yahoo's traffic estimating tool, nearly 2000 people a month search online for the term "Reiki Master." That doesn't include variations on the term, including those searching for "Reiki treatments," "Reiki practitioners," and so on. I think it's great that so many people are looking into this approach to health, because not only is there a lot of clinical evidence of its value, but there's also a growing amount of scientific evidence explaining how Reiki works. So of course I'm all for the search for "Reiki." But the term "Reiki Master" is one I'm careful about. This reiterates my concern discussed in the article, "Reiki: the Pyramid Scheme." Because these days, what is a Reiki Master? It's someone who has spent sometimes only a weekend getting "attuned" by another so-called Reiki Master, who may herself have been attuned a month before. Let's be clear that energy mastery has to do with what is usually called spiritual development. Regardless of what you call it, it has to do with raising one's own vibration through various purification processes and therefore becoming sensitive enough to work with energies -- either visually, intuitively, or by some other means. And this sensitivity, while present in more people all the time, is something that grows over time. You don't just suddenly have it at the level of a "Master." Working with a legitimate Master can indeed be of benefit, as that Master -- someone who TRULY understands what he is doing -- can have the ability to open certain energy channels, and thus attune someone to Reiki (life energy). But this attunement neither confers true mastery nor exists as a "here ya go" solution. The recipient of this kind of attunement needs to work with the newly opened energies in order to develop the ability to really master their use. As a result, Reiki Masters are never born in a moment, but over lifetimes of spiritual progress. Like any "overnight success" that in fact took years of preparation to achieve, one can appear to become a Reiki Master overnight. But this is in fact due to years or lives of diligence, and this should not be forgotten by those seeking to become Reiki Masters. What's more, people in search of such Masters should be cautious in their approach, taking care not to take too much stock in titles, nor to give away their power to anyone claiming Mastery -- because seldom will a true Master of energy call himself Master.