When Hawayo was a young girl, she spent a summer harvesting cane on a Hawaiian sugar plantation. The work was hard and Hawayo, being smaller than the other children, struggled to cut her daily quota of cane. Seeing her in tears, some family friends came to her aid and helped her fill her sack each day.
At the end of summer, on her last day of work, Hawayo stood in the field with her arms raised to the heavens and prayed that God would give her something better to do with her hands, never making her return to the plantation.
Hawayo never did cut cane again, even as her fellow classmates returned to the fields each summer. Somehow, other job offers would come along just in time.
More remarkable is the fact that Hawayo’s hands ended up changing the lives of millions of people – mine included – when on a trip to Japan she discovered a clinic of practitioners who could heal people with their hands. Hawayo learned the practice of Reiki and, because of her efforts, this healing tool now spans the globe.
You can read more about Hawayo’s story and life’s work in Reiki: Hawayo Takata’s Story by Helen J. Haberly
You can learn more about Reiki here.
