Reiki Teacher

Kelli grew up in a small town near Wichita, Kansas. Growing up in the country is when she first fell in love with nature and its healing power.  Spending anxious moments near the creek and simply allowing herself to just feel, is when she discovered what it means to heal by moving energy.  

1. What is Reiki?

Reiki is the practice of moving energy, typically through touch. There are amazing calming and relaxing benefits of clearing energy. Reiki also provides an opportunity to tap into where you are storing unresolved emotions typically caused by trauma. Our brain can do a beautiful thing when we experience trauma; sometimes it will completely disassociate, a feeling of disconnecting from our surroundings, to ease the sting of the traumatic experience.  However, in these moments, instead of the brain fully processing the emotions and feelings of the experience, it pushes those feelings to be stored somewhere in our body so we can cope. Without fully processing feelings your body may react in a variety of ways: mental illness, eating disorders, addictions, you name it. Reiki is a tool to connect within to uncover conscious and unconscious emotions that one is storing throughout their body. 

2. What brought you to it?

Due to some childhood traumatic experiences, I started my healing journey at a young age with talk therapy. I got a lot out of it, and still do, but ultimately felt like there was something missing. I remember nervously going to my first reiki session having no idea what was about to happen, but as soon as we got on the table there was an immediate sensation of deep work. The ability reiki has to get straight to the point is why I wanted to share it with others. Reiki changed my life - and I want others to experience the same wholeness and healing that I have.

3. Who are your clients and what happens during a session?

My clients are regular people who are ready to do the work on themselves. Success in any therapy is what you're willing to put into it. My sessions are a place where we can fully tap into your conscious and subconscious energy. This can lead us to uncover things from your past that ultimately helps work towards uncovering your authentic self. 

4. What do you enjoy the most about your work? 

There’s nothing like seeing someone glowing after a session. I feel so honored to a part of somebody working through something difficult during a session. Often we need someone to hold our hand during those moments of deep healing and for someone to guide us to a place beyond where we can go on our own. It’s really beautiful to see people taking that first step because it can be so hard and scary.

 5. How has Reiki helped you in your personal life?

 It’s completely uncovered who I’ve always been. My reiki healer and I were talking the other day about how when she met me I was wearing dark clothes, in the back of the room, and my shoulders were hunched over - I was just hiding. Looking back, she was right. I was afraid of living in my worth and value because that had been taken from me at such a young age. I didn’t know how to feel deserving. Reiki has allowed me to deeply heal childhood wounds, which in turn has helped me come alive into who I am. 

photos: Patricia Bordallo Dibilodox

6. What do you think is the number one challenge for people? Is there any “quick fix” to apply to our daily routines?

Often, people feel a large amount of uncertainty. I think most of us have forgotten what our true yes and true no’s feel like. If we take a pause before we do anything and ask “is this going to add to my highest good?” we typically know the answer. Even after you’ve done something and you're reflecting back, if it didn’t make you feel good, there’s probably a reason. 

7. How can you help couples?  

So I think there is something magical about my couple’s sessions that the couples create together. It’s something about feeling your partner hold emotional space for you while you cry, or seeing them uncover this deeper reasoning behind something that has been a struggle in your relationship, that really brings two people together. I love inviting people to seal their relationship together in full trust and vulnerability. To not be afraid with how their partner is going to react but to just hold each other completely with no expectations. 

My individual sessions are more focused on their own personal relationship issues. Our goal is to tap into the patterns they are experiencing in their life. We sit down and get comfortable, I ask you a few questions, and then we get on the table and let the reiki do the work! 

8. Drawing a link to self-consciousness: Reiki aims for an internal balance. How important do you find appearance and fashion for your own self-confidence? Who are your 'go to designers' ? 

I’ve always loved fashion. Growing up I was the girl that dressed weird’ at school and I always wore that proudly. I believe fashion brings forth my inner creativity and self-confidence. There’s nothing like feeling good on the inside and outside. I love the concepts and sustainability behind independent designers. I am a big advocate of only buying what you can afford, so I will often save up for a favorite designer piece each season. Some of my favorites are 323, Ilana Kohn, Black Crane and a local shop in Kansas City called Dear Society.

9. What inspires you? What character traits do you admire in other women?

Nature, my mother’s ability to selflessly love others, poems (especially by Mary Oliver), music, outer-space, time alone.  

I deeply admire a women’s ability to share their story, I think there’s something so powerful in what someone has been through. My mother is one of my biggest teachers and friends. I admire her so deeply for the way she makes others feel loved through hospitality, how she invites deep conversation through gentle questions, cries with you, laughs with you. She truly is an angel to so many people. 

10. Do you have any life philosophy to share?

A quote from Mary Oliver’s ‘When Death Comes’ has always rung true to me. 

'When it's over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement. I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. When it's over, I don't want to wonder if I have made of my life something particular, and real. I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened, or full of argument. I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.' —Mary Oliver

follow @kellijobeb