The story of Reiki begins with its founder, Dr. Mikao Usui, born in 1865. Dr. Usui loved learning. He studied at a Buddhist monastery as a child. There, he learned martial arts, swordsmanship, and Kiko (a Japanese form of Qigong). Over the years, he studied medicine, psychology, divination, and theology. As an adult, he held many professions: reporter, secretary, missionary, guard, etc. Later, he lived at a Buddhist monastery and became a monk, spending many days in meditation.

The inscription on his memorial states that on Mount Kurama, during meditation, he received knowledge of the Reiki symbols and their use. With prior knowledge of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Kiko (the Japanese equivalent of Qigong), acupuncture, and other practices, Mikao Usui was able to develop Reiki as a beautiful healing system using subtle energies.

In the 1920s, he opened his first healing school in Tokyo and wrote a small manual, “The Original Reiki Manual of Dr. Mikao Usui.” Word spread throughout Japan about Mikao Usui’s success with Reiki, healing a variety of ailments. It became especially popular among the elderly, who valued his efforts to revive ancient healing practices. With a large impoverished population in Japan, Reiki students often learned Reiki for free or at minimal cost and then provided it to the poor for free or almost free as a fair exchange of energy and effort.

In just a few years, the demand for Reiki became so widespread that Mikao Usui had to open a new, larger school and began traveling to introduce Reiki to other parts of the world. His original teachings of self-healing and charity continue in the Mikao Usui Reiki teaching lineage. Since its origins, several new Reiki schools have developed over the years.