Find out more about our Lineage Below.
Our Lineage
Practitioners who follow the Usui Shiki Ryoho Tradition have a specific lineage of Reiki. They each have a set of Reiki Masters - all of which can be traced back to Dr. Mikao Usui, the founder of Reiki.
Dr. Mikao UsUi
Dr. Mikao Usui was a doctor of religious studies in Kyoto, Japan during the 1880's. While teaching on the healing abilities of such enlightened Masters as Jesus and the Buddha, his students asked that Usui demonstrate these healing powers with his own hands. Since he couldn’t fulfill his students’ request, Usui set out on a journey for understanding and to answer his students’ question for himself. Usui traveled to the United States and Asia to study these healing capabilities. Throughout his studies, he learned much about religious figures, religious teachings and their practitioners, yet he still did not understand how they were able to heal with their hands. When he found a document with sanskrit writings, he thought he may have found some answers - yet he was still missing any healing ability for himself. As a last resort, Usui decided to complete a 21 day meditation and fast on the top of Mount Kurama for more answers. There, on the 21st day of his meditation, Dr. Usui discovered the system of healing called Reiki, which he passed on and taught to many others in Japan.
Dr. Mikao Usui taught his students Five Reiki Precepts to Contemplate Daily for Health and Happiness:
Just for today, do not worry.
Just for today, do not anger.
Honor your parents, teachers and elders.
Earn your living honestly.
Show kindness to every living thing.
The famous tree roots at Mount Kurama, where Mikao Usui completed his 21-day meditation.
Modern-day Mount Kurama with its steps.
Mount Kurama from a distance, the mountain in Japan where Mikao Usui completed his 21-day meditation and discovered Reiki.
Dr. Chujiro Hayashi
Dr. Chujiro Hayashi was one of Dr. Mikao Usui's many students - and perhaps one of his last Master students and a member of the Japanese royal family. After his retirement from the navy as an officer and medical doctor, he became a Reiki Master in 1926, at the age of 46. Hayashi trained with Usui after reading an article about him in the newspaper and the success he had with Reiki to heal those with tetanus- and incurable disease at the time. Hayashi opened a Reiki clinic in Tokyo and subsequently other nearby cities during the 1920's. During this time, Dr. Hayashi attuned many students to Reiki and trained roughly 17 Master students, one of whom was Mrs. Hawayo Takata, who originally came to his clinic in Tokyo from Hawaii as a patient. Before World War II and his transition in 1940, Dr. Hayashi made Hawayo Takata lineage bearer of the Usui Shiki Ryoho system of Reiki.
HAWAYO TAKATA
Hawayo Takata is the Japanese-American woman responsible for bringing Reiki to Hawaii and later in her life, throughout the the United States. As a young woman and after the death of her husband, she traveled to Tokyo to seek treatment and surgery for severe health issues. After she felt a strong urge not to have the surgery, she was introduced to Reiki as an alternative and therefore Dr. Chujiro Hayashi. While Mrs. Takata started as a Reiki patient in Dr. Hayashi's clinic, she became fascinated by Reiki and became one of his students. She studied with Dr. Hayashi for several months in Tokyo. When she returned to her home in Hawaii in 1938, she opened a Reiki clinic. Dr. Hayashi later made her a Reiki Master in 1940, which enabled her to train other many students and several masters in the United States, therefore helping to spread Reiki throughout the world today.
Mrs. Takata, center left, visiting Utah in 1960, published in the The Daily Herald 10 January 1960.
"Mrs. Takata and Reiki Power" article published in the Honolulu Advertiser, 25 Feb 1974.
Hawayo Takata and Dr. Chujiro Hayashi together
John Harvey Gray
John Harvey Gray was trained by Mrs. Takata as a one of her first Reiki Masters in the United States. During the 1970s, Mrs. Takata made frequent trips to teach and lecture in USA and met John at the Trinity Metaphyscial Center in Redwood City, California, where John and his wife were both ministers. They then became Reiki students under Mrs. Takata. In 1976, John Harvey Gray was initiated as Mrs. Takata's third Reiki Master in the world and first in California. In the 1990s, John often visited New York City, teaching Reiki in Manhattan at the studio of Elaine Abrams, where he met and trained Brian Brunius. As the longest practicing Master in the Western Hemisphere, John, along with his wife, Lourdes, operated the John Harvey Gray The John Harvey Gray Center For Reiki Healing in Rindge, New Hampshire. He died at age 93 in 2011.
Brian Brunius
Brian Brunius, Reiki Master and owner of New York City Reiki Center, is Stephanie's Reiki Master. He began his training in the 1990s under John Harvey Gray. After opening NYC Reiki Center in 2007 and completing his Master training in 2010, Brian has gone on to teach thousands of students in New York City and trained several Reiki Masters around the United States. He serves as a mentor for many Reiki practioners and created a Certified Reiki Practitioners Program to support students in opening and running Reiki practices. Brian is also the founder of Reiki Centers of America, a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving the tradition of the Usui Shiki Ryoho system and history of Reiki. Brian is a member of The Reiki Alliance, an international community of Reiki Masters dedicated to the practice of Usui Shiki Ryoho.