Mikao Usui continued to practice Reiki, following the spiritual disciplines of Buddhism and Christianity. After years of hard work, research and unselfish service to others, he decided that Reiki was a skill the world needed, and that it shouldn’t die with him.

After yet another long meditation, he had a vision in which the Reiki symbols were revealed to him. That’s how Reiki became a system that in the initiation process could be transferred to anyone willing to grow and help others. Eighteen Reiki Masters succeeded Usui, and the Emperor of Japan decorated him for his achievements in healing and teaching.

Chujiro Hayashi was one of the first disciples of Mikao Usui. He was a royal naval physician, and was eager to use Reiki to help not only his patients, but also everyone willing to heal their lives. On his deathbed, Usui passed on Hayashi a title of Great Master Teacher, asking him to continue his mission to find new masters and expand the Usui Shiki Ryoho – Usui’s system of healing using the universal life energy – across the world.

Hayashi turned out to be a worthy disciple. He never changed the Usui system, but only used it to support clinical treatments, sending his practitioners to patients unable to come to him. The systematic person the military had taught him to be, Hayashi managed to spread the healing system further, but it was his student who deserves credit for the international fame of Reiki.

Hawayo Takata learned how to practice Reiki at Hayashi’s clinic, in 1938. She was quickly promoted to the Reiki Master Teacher rank. Her commitment was so strong that it was her that Hayashi initiated a Great Master. Takata travelled to America, where she delivered a long series of lectures and workshops on Reiki. She initiated 22 Reiki Master Teachers. Her mission to promote Reiki in the West was taken up by her granddaughter and student, Phyllis Lei Furummoto, a Great Master Teacher since 1980.

The Great Master Teacher title was revoked later. Reiki is not an enclosed skill, and all Masters are equal, rightfully promoting Reiki with a specific, personal approach to Usui’s fundamental, unchanged system of healing.

William Lee Rand spared no effort to develop Reiki. His research has provided an enormous contribution to the promotion of Reiki, and increasing acceptance in the West. Relying on several great Reiki teachers, he expanded his practice into a Karuna Reiki system. William Lee Rand set up the International Centre for Reiki Training. Our teacher and licenced therapist, Žarko Ilić, is one of his students.