Reiki practitioners, you’re all in my heart, and this post is for you.
By Karen Yankovich
Several months ago I hosted a free workshop titled “How to Make More Money with your Reiki Practice”. Over 800 people signed up for this workshop, it’s clearly a topic that many Reiki practitioners struggle with.
I want to share with you some posts that I got on my Facebook page when I promoted this workshop. These are straight from this page.
“I was trained by my mentor to not charge for my services. How do the morals work with charging for reiki?”
“Reiki is God’s gift to ONLY some people so he /she can do good for People…………How can U make it a Business???”
“Reiki should not involve money! You taint intention. Please do it with compassion, not a price tag”
“the return is your own good karma. That is all u should recieve”
“why charge people to help them?”
“I think this is the problem with integral healing practice – it all becomes about how to make money and not about how to best serve.”
“The advert makes reiki look a cheap way of making money and I don’t agree with your selling point either. It’s disrespectful to the art and dicipline of reiki”
Keep in mind, these aren’t people who don’t understand or believe in the benefits of Reiki. These examples are from real people, who understand and often practice Reiki.
I wonder how they pay their rent?
To be fair, there were many more people who jumped in with comments like this:
“One is not paying for the reiki but for the persons time. The room has to be clean, heated and a treatment couch. I have been a reiki master for longer than I remember. I do give a lot of free treatments. Often in payment I will accept what a client can do in return. The reward for me is seeing the miracle come true. Oh, and I forgot the insurance, candles, crystals and tea and cake afterwards. Plus the heated couch !
Love & light to all.”
“As a healer you have a gift to help others , but we are souls here on earth to have a human experience!! Which means bills and mortgages. No one should ever feel bad about charging for their services as long as you the practitioner know in your soul that what you are charging is the right amount for you. Money is energy and you need that exchange !!!!”
These are comments from just one post. There are others, with the same kind of exchange. I occasionally block a post if it’s particularly nasty, but for the most part, I don’t shy away from the controversy. It’s MY passion in life to help others live a life of abundance from THEIR passions, and if Reiki is your passion, I want you to spend as much time in that energy as possible. I don’t get the same controversy from my yoga clients, or my health coach clients, they understand that in order to help the greatest number of people on this planet, they need to be supporting themselves financially while doing it.
Reiki Fundamental: In order to get the most value from a Reiki treatment, there needs to be an exchange of energy.
I’ve been a business consultant and coach for over 20 years. I’m also a Reiki Master and a Dream Coach. I know how icky talking about money as an energy exchange can be if you’re Reiki minded. I say this with much love: Reiki practitioners, it’s OK to value your time.
Maybe, in order to shift your mindset, your services should list the benefits of your Reiki treatments instead of the time vs price. For example, it’s typical to see Reiki services listed like this:
Reiki One Hour Session $65.00
Reiki One and half hour $85.00
Where do your clients minds go, immediately? “She’s making $65/hour! I’m lucky to make $20/hour.” Now, we know this isn’t true. WE know that we spend hours each week preparing our space. We pay for insurance, oils, sheets, tables, we pay rent for a space, we spend hours giving free treatments at hospice centers and at farmers markets. In order to be successfully balancing your practice and your life, ALL of that needs to be considered.
What about if your services were priced like this?
Shortcut to stress-free – stop in for a half hour after your busy day for some soul soothing Reiki – $50
Reiki for Relaxation – spend an hour aligning your emotional, mental, and spiritual self – $95
Do you think maybe this would help you feel comfortable about the INCREASED prices? Listen, I’m not here to preach that you should overcharge to make millions off your unsuspecting clients. I’m here to say that if you DON’T value all of your time spent on managing your Reiki practice, you will soon be closing your doors.
Money is a worthless piece of paper without the human energy exchange behind it. Give value to that human energy exchange, open yourself to it energetically, and your clients will too.
The true consequence of undervaluing your time is that you are building an unsustainable business. Your heart is in the right place, now you have to find confidence in your gift to price your services properly. What do you think your clients would think if they knew how much money you REALLY make per hour? Is it even minimum wage? Is this a business, or is it a hobby?
I’m including the Reiki Precepts here to remind you of the amazing gift you are sharing. I want you to continue sharing that gift with the world. I want you to be able to abundantly gift your services when you choose to, because you are being supported abundantly by it. PLEASE value your time, all of it, and your clients will understand why.
My friend Laura Wieck, a body-mind coach, says it like this:
“Pricing isn’t personal… It’s BUSINESS!
Being able to clearly communicate the benefits to what you offer and confidently price yourself accordingly is how you assert your VALUE to clients.”
Assert your value. Value your time. Keep sharing your amazing gift with the world. We NEED you!
Homework: Pour yourself a glass of wine/tea/kombucha and get out your journal. Write a love letter to yourself, asserting the value of your time. Being confident with the value of your time has to start with YOU. When you’re done, grab a mirror, look yourself straight in the eye, and read the love letter out loud. Now, go back and look at your services, and rework them from that space of loving value. xoxo
Extra Credit Homework: Get out that journal again. Start to list all of the ways you can serve the world if you were abundantly supported by your passions. Where can you volunteer? Who can you leave a huge, secret tip for? Spend some time on kiva.org, who can you support there? List at least 100 ways. DREAM BIG!
Comment below, share your tips and techniques for pricing YOUR services! We need all the help we can get.
P.S. I’m happy to help! Sign up for a FREE 20 minute business boost session.
Heart picture courtesy of www.awakenvisions.com
Thank you, Karen for the wonderful call! I struggled for years on charging for Reiki Sessions. Then, I struggled in raising my fees…I remember the first client I had once I raised my fee structure and when it came to advise the client on the session fee….I COULD’NT DO IT. Once she left, I felt depleted and really upset at myself on not stepping into my “worth” …not a good feeling, the next client I stood up to the challenge, kept my boundaries set and jumped into the new fee structure and it FELT AWESOME!
Awesome Cynthia! I find I sometimes have to say it out loud a few times to be comfortable enough saying it to a client.
I feel like I shouldn’t price my long distant healing the way I do. But I understand the energy exchange. Its been going on for eons in my culture. 🙂 I still have problems with it. Thinking that because you don’t see the healing and the person may feel Im charging too much for something you can’t see. I guess that is one of the reason I have just been giving away my services. I know I need to value my work. <3
<3 Lucilia! I hope you're offering it as a service, and of course, that service has a value. You don't see the radio waves yet people are willing to pay for satellite radio, right?
Thanks I see your point. 🙂 I will have to remember that I’m merely doing an energy exchange.
Yes. Easy to say, hard to remember.
Thank you, Karen. I needed this today! I also volunteer a lot of my services to Horse Rescues and Cat/Dog Shelters, however I do need to charge when I’m using my gas, my time, etc for individual clients… Thank you for showing me that it’s o.k. to value that time!
Thank YOU for all the service you’re doing! I hope you find a way to value it so that you can continue it.
I like the homework Karen! 🙂 We need to remember to check in and remind ourselves of the value we add and can add. xo
YES! No one else is going to value us properly if we don’t value ourselves first.
Kudos to reminding lightworkers and healers our worth and our value. So important as we continue to help others, we need to fill our own cups also!
So crazy that we need the reminder, but we all do!
YES! YES! YES! Generosity and service was ingrained in me from an early age. The giving message continued in professional trainings. It will always be a part of my personality. However, you articulated the greatest thing my coach ever said to me, “Money is a form of energy. Business is an energy exchange.” Fairly charging for services also allows room to set aside a sliding scale spot and a workshop scholarship to help even more people.
I LOVE the scholarship idea, and often use it myself. Great reminder!
Thank you for the common sense.
My absolute pleasure. 🙂
Thank you for this, Karen. Over the past few years I have offered a range of “lightworker” services such as counselling, reiki, tarot reading and yoga and I have not once come across a client who expects me to offer my service for free or cheap, but I have met many healers who feel guilty about charging for their services. I wonder if doctors feel this kind of guilt? I think not!
TRUTH! Why do we bring this on ourselves? Heading now to check out your Tarot Forcast….. 🙂
Thank you for this. Although I am not a Reiki practitioner, I do energy healing. I am also an over-trained Holistic Nutritionist. I often struggle with billing clients and getting paid for helping someone heal. I will write myself the letter! I am good at what I do, have years of training under my belt, and want to make the world a better place….so I am now stepping over my guilt of charging for what I am worth!
Sue “over-trained”? I don’t understand THAT!
There are so many ways to automate the billing process so that you aren’t hands-on, and when we’re hands-on, we give ourselves the opportunity to interfere! Sounds like some automation would be good for you. xoxox Get those bills out!
Karen, This is a great post! And it is so true what you are saying! I’m an orthomolecular nutritionist and often people come to me & want free advice which I often gave- but I try not to do this too often anymore. Also, I have realized that many people will not take you seriously and appreciate your work unless you send them a bill. Thanks for sharing this!
It’s so true. I don’t even like to barter, there is energy behind the actual transfer of CASH. Even if it’s an even-exchange.
Love this! It’s so true. I’m a yoga instructor (who is going to be attuned to reiki this summer) and I charge $85 for a private session. That’s for many reasons. Reason number one, is my time. Reason two: if I teach this private lesson in a studio, I rent it for $15 for the hour. I need to value myself and it is a constant conversation. I’ve been looking into self-love a lot recently, through teaching The Ahimsa Project, and I’ve realized it is a constant conversation you need to have with yourself.
I love the letter idea. It is such a great homework, and will guide people to become the best version of themselves, full of love!! **And Karen if you haven’t read Ana Forrest’s “Fierce Medicine” add it to your list–she talks about the death meditation and letters to yourself. From reading your site, I think you’d love it!
Ooo thanks for the book recommendation! I’m going away for the holiday weekend, I’m going to see if I can find it!