Distant Reiki is a great way to heal your animal’s past as well as your own. Sometimes this can happen during the same treatment, as I learned from a treatment I gave to my cat Cassy, who passed away several years ago. The reason for the treatment came about in an unusual way.

Elizabeth had called to tell me of a mother cat she was working with who didn’t trust humans after her kittens were aborted. I started thinking about the cat that I had as a child. She was fixed while pregnant, and it had never occurred to me that she may have missed her babies.

I decided to offer Reiki to Cassy and her kittens. I wondered if perhaps they had reunited in the spirit world. I hoped that Reiki would heal the pain from that situation in the past, and also that Reiki would heal my own guilt as her person who thoughtlessly allowed the situation to happen. As I began the treatment, I wondered if Cassy had ever forgiven me. Almost immediately after starting, my hands began to pulse strongly. After ten minutes or so, I began to remember the specifics of Cassy’s markings: for example, how her chin was half black and half white. It had been years since I’d even looked at a picture of her, and yet it was all completely clear in my mind’s eye.

My hands continued to pulse. Then, suddenly, I felt a weight on my chest and felt the unmistakable and familiar vibration of a purr resonate through my chest. I remembered that she had always liked to lay on my chest. I felt her spirit there, palpably, just like the old days. I knew instantly that she was thanking me for the Reiki, and had forgiven me. As soon as I made this realization, the purring was gone. I was left with the feeling that Reiki had reached her, and that she continues to watch over me in my healing work.

– Kathleen

– – p. 188 Excerpted from Animal Reiki, Ulysses Press 2006.