My Day Teaching Reiki in Juvie
/Chicago is home to some powerful energy healing practitioners. At least one of them is locked up in Cook County’s Juvenile Temporary Detention Center.
Just two years after I first approached the JTDC, I was able to teach a Reiki Level 1 class to six residents and two staff inside that facility. It was an incredible experience, and hopefully the first of many more like it.
Background
I first met with the Center’s director of gender services and special programming, Anna, in January of 2017. At the time, police-on-minority-male violence had been in the spotlight nationwide with slogans including, “Hands up, don’t shoot,” and, “I can’t breathe.” The situation in Chicago had become so dire, the Attorney General of the State of Illinois, Lisa Madigan, filed a complaint against the City. The response was a promise for dramatic reform within the Chicago Police Department’s policies, practices, training, and accountability mechanisms. I contend that we cannot regulate away trauma stored up in individuals, nor knee-jerk reactions to triggering situations. The root causes of excessive use of force, which could easily be categorized as “acting out,” include shouldering too much fear, anger, and stress for too long without relief. As a means to help alleviate some of this pressure, the Reiki Brigade volunteers to help Chicago Police officers let go of energetically stored trauma.
But that’s just one side of the coin. As a result of this climate, minority males in Chicago have also experienced higher than usual levels of fear, anger and stress of their own, and those locked up in the JTDC are no exception. Anna and I discussed all of this, and reiki as a means to provide some relief to this population. The facility is a temporary home to more than 350 youth, aged ten to 21. There’s a high school within its walls, because residents may find themselves confined there for more than two years before they receive a trial and a subsequent determination of guilty or not guilty.
Strategy
Anna and I agreed that introducing reiki to the resident population would be a slow process. The first step was to educate staff, and only if that went well (I was sure it would), would we try to convince the powers that be to give us access to the youth housed there. I began by orchestrating a wellness fair for all the staff at the JTDC. It included 13 practitioners generously offering craniosacral, acupuncture, nutrition advice, movement therapy, hypnosis, and, of course, reiki.
All the volunteers for the JTDC staff wellness event, and Anna.
This event was a huge success and paved the way for the Reiki Brigade to give a presentation and share reiki with a group of residents ages 18-21, those old enough to sign the waiver. The group consisted of twelve African-American youth, far and away predominant demographic among JTDC residents. Half an hour into this event one of them said to me, “You need to talk to our mental health professional.“ I was so impressed that he put that together so quickly—tapping into my grand plan.
At the end, a couple of the young men asked if they could learn reiki themselves. Thrilled at the prospect, we decided to offer another Intro to Reiki event for the rest of those in the 18-21 age group.
I was able to connect with the JTDC’s mental health professional via email. She wrote, “The residents just LOVED your program – I swear they were telling me about it for a week straight, all about how much they enjoyed it, how helpful they felt it was, and how they just KNEW I absolutely HAD to learn more! I’d be happy to attend the next demo session, and am happy to help in any way that I can!”
Despite all this momentum and my desire to move forward as quickly as possible, circumstances beyond all our control caused these next steps to take more than a year.
Feedback from some of the Intro to Reiki event attendees.
During that time, I had to retake the state-mandated PREA training in accordance with the Prison Rape Elimination Act. All staff and volunteers must complete this class annually, where we are reminded of the incidence and nature of sexual assault within the correctional system, and learn how to respond quickly and appropriately should we become aware of such a situation. It’s an unpleasant three hours. When I’d first taken the class, I thought I was going to hear about older residents abusing younger residents. Afterwards, I understood that volunteers play a crucial role in interrupting a cycle of abuse because it’s sometimes the guards perpetrating these crimes, and friendships among colleagues makes reporting instances of abuse to staff dangerous for the victims. The weight of this information and its implications took the wind out of me, and reignited my commitment to do everything in my power to bring reiki to this community.
Patience paid off. The second Intro to Reiki event was also a success, and a date was finally scheduled for the Reiki 1 class.
See an edited version of this article published in Reiki News Magazine.
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Special Rules
Anna and I had already talked through all the necessary modifications to my usual process in order for the reiki class to be allowed:
• No touching for initiation or student practice
• No staples, paper clips, or metal of any kind
• No laptop
• No smudging
• Not my schedule, but theirs
No problem. I retooled my whole class accordingly.
I recruited Reggie and Edit, two Reiki Brigade volunteers, to photograph upright, non-touching hand positions for the student handouts. Anna greatly appreciated that Reggie represented the demographic makeup of those attending the class.
The Big Day
On the day of the event I arrived early, eager to get started. Anna guided me through the two sets of TSA-style security checks, during which the tin of Altoids I keep in my class project box was flagged. “No metal.” Ooops. I dumped all the mints into my plastic box and surrendered the offending Altoids container.
In addition to to Anna, another staff member, and the six young men, there were to be two security guards in attendance. They were not participating voluntarily; it was their assignment for the day. I wondered if they would be receptive to reiki, or if there would be eye rolling.
Half the class was late, which gave me time to interact with the two residents who were already seated. Because a special activity was bound to sound more attractive than the daily routine, we had interested residents complete an essay about why they wanted to take the class. Anna chose the participants based on their responses, which were not shared with me. So I took this opportunity to ask these young men what they were hoping to gain from the class.
'“I’m here to work on my anger,” answered one. My heart warmed. I had not expected that level of openness so quickly.
When the rest of the students arrived and introductions were made, it became apparent that some of them were excited to be there and others were not. One young man in particular sprawled his feet out towards me, hooked his elbow over the back of his chair, cocked his head to the side, and alternated between looking bored and staring at me aggressively. It wasn’t difficult to imagine that he was wishing me harm, or even planning for it. I’ll call him Jimmy, and I’ll freely admit I was intimidated by him. As I enthusiastically explained the wonders of reiki and the potential it has to make the world a calmer, safer place, Jimmy’s facial expression remained stone-like. There was a moment I started to feel ridiculous. These guys were hypervigilant because their safety was constantly at risk and the outcome of their trial—their life—was hanging over them like a lead gavel. There I was talking about high-vibrational, loving energy.
About an hour into my presentation, I decided to run through some of the questions on the quiz I’d be giving them at the end of class. It’s not a difficult quiz, and it’s unusual for my students to get more than one answer wrong. But this situation was different. I started asking questions about the material I’d covered and received a couple blank stares from the two kids who had been most talkative all morning. But from his reclined position and without moving a muscle, Jimmy spoke up.
“What are the energy centers in the body called?” I asked.
“Chakras,” he said calmly.
“Who went up on the mountain and had the epiphany, then brought the system of reiki down to share with the world?”
“Mikao Usui,” he said. The pronunciation was off, but it was close enough.
He knew everything. He hadn’t been planning to shank me all morning, he’d been soaking up everything I said. I may have teared up a bit, and not for the last time that day.
Emboldened by my exchange with Jimmy, I began to speak about the more esoteric components of reiki and the information available in energy. The security guards had been sitting quietly in the back of the room thus far, rousing only to pat down anyone requesting a trip to the rest room. This is where I thought I might provoke their derision. Rather than rolling his eyes, one of the security guards perked up and asked me enthusiastic questions about clairvoyance, clairsentience, etc.,
Shortly afterwards it was time for the initiation ceremony. We put eight chairs in a straight line a couple feet apart, and I asked the students to sit in the chairs and put their hands in gassho position, palms together in front of their chests. Then I turned to move a table out of my way. When I turned back, the same security guard had his hands in gassho position, and was scootching his chair forward into the line with his feet.
“Can I do it, too?” he asked.
“Of course!”
The two young men who offered the most participation earlier in the day were friends, sat next to each other, and despite several pleading gestures from me, chatted, joked, and poked each other throughout this sacred ceremony. This was by far the greatest test of my equanimity all day. It would be one thing not to take this precious gift seriously, but it seemed to me they were actively ruining it for others. Had we been in my classroom, I would have asked them to leave. As it stood, without an escort back to their rooms which would have taken who knows how long to summon, there was nowhere for them to go. There was nothing I could do.
Following the initiation, the students were marched to the dining hall where they were served lunch. Anna and I had a chance to compare notes on how things were going so far.
“Jimmy!” I said, incredulous.
“Yes,” she nodded knowingly, then explained to me that some of these guys had never had occasion to learn active listening skills. It was such a simple thing to take for granted, and I was grateful for the lesson and humility this experience had given me.
We met another hiccup as half the class was trapped in the elevator on the way back to the room. We waited 45 minutes for them, during which I made periodic adjustments to my itinerary to accommodate for the lost time.
The last part of the class included pairing up and taking turns offering reiki to each other with the recipient sitting in a chair. I used the photos taken with Reggie and Edit’s help to demonstrate how different areas of the energy field could be accessed, and turned on some soft music. Predictably, the two jokesters paired up and continued their boisterous activity throughout. Anna and the other staff member paired up, leaving two other pairs of newly attuned reiki channels. Vacillating between making myself available and allowing autonomy to explore and share experiences, I sometimes walked from group to group, and sometimes sat in the front of the room and straightened out my course materials. Before long I heard snoring. I looked up to see Jimmy’s partner slumped over in his chair fast asleep, and Jimmy’s face, for the first time that day, broken into a big smile. Afterwards each person shared their experience with the group. Jimmy’s partner was profoundly relaxed and a little embarrassed he’d let his guard down enough to fall asleep. Jimmy described feeling a big ball of static above his partner’s head, and realizing he needed to focus his work there. He was astonished. And proud. And I was crying again.
The class ended in the evening. After they filled out their course evaluations, I thanked and congratulated everyone, and asked if there were any final questions.
“When is Level 2?” was the sole response.
When indeed.
Aftermath
It’s been nearly two years since this class took place. Anna, for personal reasons, no longer works at the JTDC. And the enthusiastic health care professional from earlier? She is no longer at the facility either.
I’m left with these priceless memories, and a few bits of encouragement from the feedback forms:
“I came down with bad energy and now leaving with good vibes.”
“My favorite thing was everything.”
And in answer to the question, “How would you improve upon this course?”
“By putting it out to the media worldwide.”
Feel free to share this story with your circles, and if you work in a governmentally-funded institution that would be open to reiki, I’d love to hear from you.
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