What Is Reiki and How Does It Support the Nervous System?
If you’ve ever been curious about Reiki but felt unsure what it actually is, or whether it’s something that would even help you, you’re not alone.
A lot of people find their way to Reiki after they’ve tried everything else. Or when they’re exhausted from pushing, fixing, optimizing, and still not feeling better. Others stay away from it because they think it’s too “woo woo” or doesn’t do anything.
That’s usually when the question shifts from “What else should I be doing?” to “Why does it feel like nothing is working anymore?”
And that’s where Reiki, especially when viewed through a nervous system lens, can be really supportive.
So… What Is Reiki, Really?
Reiki is an ancient Japanese healing modality that’s been around for over a hundred years. The word itself translates to life force energy, and the practice is based on the idea that energy flows through and around all living beings.
Reiki doesn’t rely on physical touch or being in the same room. The work is just as effective when offered virtually, which is how I practice.
A simple way to understand this is that your nervous system responds to safety and cues of calm, not location. Just like your body can relax during a guided meditation or feel soothed by someone’s voice on the phone, it can also respond to Reiki while you’re resting in your own space.
In a virtual session, you’re guided into a relaxed state while Reiki is offered energetically. Many people are surprised by how tangible it still feels - a deep sense of calm, softening in the body, emotional release, physical warmth, or simply feeling supported.
Reiki isn’t about fixing or making something happen. It’s about supporting the body’s natural ability to regulate, restore, and heal when the conditions are right - when it finally feels safe.
While Reiki is often described as energy work, one of its biggest impacts is on the nervous system.
Why the Nervous System Matters for Healing
Your nervous system’s main job is safety. It’s constantly scanning your outer and inner world, asking one main question:
“Am I safe right now?”
When the answer is yes, the body shifts into a parasympathetic state - often referred to as rest and digest. This is where digestion improves, inflammation can calm, immune function is supported, and healing processes are prioritized. Think of it like your body taking a big exhale and being able to feel at ease.
When the answer is no, the body moves into fight-or-flight. This response isn’t bad or wrong, it’s protective. But when we live in that state for too long, the body stays focused on survival instead of repair. The body cannot heal in fight or flight.
We’re painted this picture that the goal is to be regulated and calm all the time, but that’s not real life.. The real goal is to have the tools and awareness to help train our system to recognize what’s a threat and what’s not, to handle more, and to switch between sympathetic to parasympathetic quicker. Reiki is one tool that can help.
Why So Many Of Us Are Stuck There
Modern life doesn’t give our nervous systems many changes to truly rest. We’re constantly stimulated, always reachable, thinking ahead. Often holding things together for everyone else while ignoring what we need.
Add in chronic illness, emotional stress, perfectionism, people-pleasing, or unprocessed experiences, and the body learned to stay braced - even when things look “fine” on the outside.
Over time, this can show up as:
feeling wired but exhausted
digestive or inflammatory issues
anxiety or emotional numbness
trouble sleeping or truly resting
flares that seem to come out of nowhere
feeling disconnected from your body
A lot of this isn’t about doing something wrong or doing more. It’s about a nervous system that hasn’t felt safe enough to fully relax in a long time.
How Reiki Supports Nervous System Safety
Reiki works gently. It doesn’t activate the system, it settles it.
Many people notice that during or after a Reiki session, their body naturally relaxes and into a calmer, more regulated state. Breathing slows. Muscles soften. The mind quiets.
This is important, because when the body feels safe:
tension can release
emotions can move through
stored stress can unwind
healing processes can finally take priority
Reiki doesn’t create healing. It creates space for it. And in that space, the body does what it’s been trying to do all along.
A lot of us learned early on to push feelings down, stay strong, or keep going no matter what. Those patterns make sense, they helped us cope. But over time, holding everything in keeps the nervous system on high alert too. The body stores what hasn’t yet felt safe enough to be processed.
When safety is present, the body may allow emotions, sensations, or memories to surface so they can move through and be released. Not all at once, but in a way that feels manageable.
This is why healing doesn’t need to be forced, it needs to be supported.
My Approach To Reiki
My Reiki sessions are rooted in nervous system safety. By combining with grounding, slow, and deep breathwork, it helps signal to the body that it’s safe to soften.
The goal isn’t to make anything happen or have this huge release or else it didn’t work. It’s to create enough safety for the body to expand. Because when that happens, things that have been held in can begin to move naturally and in their own time. The body really does keep the score more than we realize, this is one way to work with it.
You and I aren’t doing the healing, your body is.
I’m simply holding the space and acting as a conduit, allowing your system to do what it knows how to do when it finally feels safe..
Healing Doesn’t Have To Be Hard
A lot of wellness culture teaches us to override our bodies, biohack, focus on supplements and protocols, and push through symptoms.
That can work for some time but it’s not sustainable and things usually end up coming back up. This approach is different because it’s slower, softer, more honest, and really gets at the root. You’ll hear me say it a million times but it’s really important that you understand that the body can’t heal in fight or flight. Adding one more thing to your regimen and to-do list actually might be keeping you in that activated state and is putting a band-aid on the problem. Working with the nervous system is the root of our enter being and how we view the world. So why not start there and see what that journey looks like.
Healing isn’t about control, it’s about connection. And when the body feels safe, healing becomes a lot less complicated than we’ve been led to believe.
If you’re curious about experiencing Reiki in a way that honors both its roots and your nervous system, my Reiki + Somatic Breathwork Sessions are designed to support exactly that - gently and without pressure.
Your body already knows what to do. Sometimes it just needs the space to do it.