It is back with a vengeance … if you live or work in MA, please take a moment and hear about this pending bill that needs our collective immediate attention.
In my personal and professional opinion, it is sadly a misguided bill under the guise of anti-human trafficking that will have a greater negative affect than good and ultimately hurting those they are trying to protect.
We will address the following:
- What is MA Bill SD1840? How will practitioners be affected?
- How will MA Bill SD1840 Affect You, the Consumer?
- Current MA Laws
- A Personal Note: Regarding how these practices SAVED my life, reiki, predatory behavior, training, pending MA SD1840
- Urgent action is necessary
- How you can help
What is MA Bill SD1840?
How will practitioners be affected?
MA Bill SD1840 has been introduced AGAIN by Senator Montigny for the third time. If passed, SD1840 would negatively affect all Reiki, Meditation, Yoga, Martial Arts, Thai Chi, and the like in Massachusetts.
Under current MA law, Reiki is exempt from massage licensure in MA, but this law attempts to set up an entirely new licensing process for all types of healers and spiritually based practitioners/facilitators or the like, and mandate they be licensed, receive government endorsed education; and that these modalities can only be taught in state licensed schools.
MA SD1840 bill will negatively impact all practitioners who:
“…uses touch, words or directed movement to deepen awareness of patterns of movement in the body, or the affectation of the human energy system or acupoints or Qi meridians of the human body while engaged within the scope of practice of a profession with established standards and ethics;”
How does one regulate ones own Qi … something that we all have that is innate in each of us?
Click HERE for more information and action to take through the National Health Freedom Action.
How will MA Bill SD1840 Affect You, the Consumer?
If allowed to pass, this bill will also negatively affect our human right to access to holistic, complementary alternative medicine, and spiritually based therapies.
If allowed to pass, SD1840 will also:
- result in increased cost burdens to the consumer and practitioner,
- reduced or eliminated access to much needed services especially those in the under-served marginalized communities, end of life care, those fighting chronic illness or cancer, elderly populations, and trauma survivors.
- will NOT end or reduce sex trafficking as it is proposed it will do as it is written.
- restrict or alter practices such as reiki, yoga, thai chi, meditation under the SAME training requirements without understanding the fundamentals or roots as well as the cultural and spiritual traditions of these practices that are non-western and attempts to westernize such concepts by legislature with no comprehension or involving experts in these fields is detrimental.
- may also fringe upon many sacred spiritual practices used in churches and religious places of worship throughout the state.
Requiring all practitioners to be licensed and trained through a state licensed school is currently impossible as these programs do NOT exist and would instantly put thousands of taxpaying practitioners out of business over night and halt all volunteer programs, and consumers access to care.
Current MA Laws
Massachusetts already has very good massage laws that protect bodyworkers exempting them from licensure requirements:
“including but not limited to……Feldenkrais Method; Reflexology; The Trager Approach; Ayurvedic Therapies, Rolf Structural Integration, Polarity or Polarity Therapy; Polarity Therapy Bodywork; Asian Bodywork Therapy that does not constitute massage as defined in this chapter; Acupressure; Jin Shin Do; Qi Gong; Tui Na; Shiatsu; Body-Mind Centering and Reiki”
Click HERE for more information and action to take through the National Health Freedom Action.
A Personal Note: A Message From Laura
Regarding how these practices saved her life, reiki, predatory behavior, training, and pending MA SD1840
Why MA SD1840 Affects Me Personally?
In search of “healing the broken me” as I would like to call it from years of abuse that resulted in complex C-PTSD or complex post traumatic stress disorder, I originally delved into the traditional American Healthcare System in hopes I can quickly return to my unbroken self. Like many others, I have felt that I was not getting better and band-aids were being applied to my mental, emotional, and physical symptoms that were not getting better and began to spiral out of control.
I realized there had to be more to all this and began looking into the spiritual aspects of my issues that the healthcare system couldn’t figure out.
I started reconnecting to my spiritual path. I began meditating. I eliminated inflammatory foods. I sought out reputable teachers and healers. I started connecting with the divine within me and my divine team. I learned and studied multiple holistic health modalities and spiritually based practices THAT would NEVER have been possible if this bill becomes law..
These practices saved my life and has been allowing me to reclaim my life in ways to defy all logic. I was fortunate in who I sought out as healers and other professionals to help guide me.
However, abusers and predators are still very skillful at their tactics, which is what leads me to the next point …
My 2018 Lobby Efforts
Many of you know I went to the MA State House last year and spoke to legislators about this bill as a survivor of abuse, an advocate for survivors, and as a spiritually based holistic health practitioner opposing this bill last year as I feel it will NOT address the sex trafficking problems and not only create unrealistic burdens on spiritually based therapies, but put most of us out of business.
There are current laws to address sex trafficking already on the books that are NOT being enforced. We see this clearly in the lack of enforcement in the massage industry with many sex trafficking massage parlors in plain sight allowed to operate and remain open.
Many of you also are aware of my work against predatory practitioners in this state. Even though this is a problem, this particular bill is NOT the answer.
Unfortunately, to some of you it may be a surprise that I am in support of some kind of regulation until our westernized mindset shifts the bastardization of many sacred arts in the name of fame, greed and predatory behavior.
The kinds of spiritually based practices that should be respected are NOT as it should be, and our own communities have failed to self regulate ourselves in the name of “inclusivity” without prioritizing safety first and healthy boundaries, while indirectly contributing or being complicit to predatory behaviors, scrupulous unethical behaviors, greed, egoic bases out of fear.
Many of us in the community have started to address these serious issues, but is it too late? I guess that all depends on YOU, me, us and how we respond to this bill.
Personally I have invested in over $14,000 in studying with the appropriate reiki studies and certification programs with an accreditation process to teach as it was taught by the founders in Japan, completely free of the westernization that quelled its magic … AND now the state of Massachusetts wants to say this training is inadequate and I must relearn through their school of their choosing who has NO invested interest in these sacred original direct teachings in Japan.
THIS would make our founder of Reiki, Mikao Usui Sensei, and his student who was responsible for bringing Reiki to the west, Dr. Chujiro Hayashi, very sad.
This bill if passed, will set up an entirely new licensing process for all types of healers and bodywork vocations under ONE educational program, mandate licensing, receive government endorsed education; and these regulated spiritually based modalities can only be taught in state licensed schools.
How is that possible?
What I Know and Why I Stand By My Statements
So much has changed over the years in the modern reiki world … at least in the United States of America. With the varying schools of reiki training, the growing legislation by some states to regulate many spiritually based practices and healing modalities such as reiki, and predators invading spiritually based communities to seek out their next grooming victim, it is important know how this affects you, how to find the right reiki practitioner and/or teacher to help you, and how to navigate all these changes. I wrote a couple of posts (links below) to help guide you.
As a whole, when we disregard the care and sacredness of sacred arts and teachings such as reiki, we not only lose the magic, we open ourselves up to state regulation.
When we LABEL anything that involves some sort of energy healing or use of crystals or Christian ideology or other new age concepts that did NOT originate from Japan … although nice in their own right (this is NOT a reflection of lack of value of those arts) … we lose the meaning and magic of reiki in its pure form.
As a result, how do we define reiki, LEGALLY, with all these added non Japanese reiki elements that dominate our western culture?
I do not know the exact answer to that, but I do know this may cause legal issues if the sacred pure form of reiki is lost due to westernization.
Click here to read MA Bill SD1840
Here are two other posts for further reading:
Click here to read “12 Tips and 10 Questions to Ask a Reiki Practitioner and/or Teacher When Healing Trauma”
and/or
Click here to read “#TimesUp Healers & Reiki Practitioners” where we will explore the following to address perceptions, boundaries, trauma, predatory behavior, healing, and healers.
My goal is two fold for these two posts:
- to awaken reiki practitioners and healers to their full optimum potential while understanding their ethical responsibilities to their clients and/or students,
- and to help guide those seeking healing services for themselves or a loved one.
Click HERE for more information and action to take through the National Health Freedom Action.
Urgent action is necessary
Inaction on this or thinking someone else will take care of it is misguided on our parts. Thinking we do not have the time it takes to address this issue, will hurt all of us. This bill was barely defeated over the last 2 years.
This will REQUIRE ALL of us to stand up against this bill.
This will take a community.
Will you join me?
How You Can Help
Click Here to automatically send a message to your personal Senator and revisit this link throughout the coming weeks for updates on the bill’s status (i.e., whether it is scheduled for a public hearing and when).
Click HERE for more information and action to take through the National Health Freedom Action.
In the meantime, I am here to help you. Don’t forget to pause, breathe and take a moment for yourself.
For more information about my work with trauma, please visit:
With love and appreciation,
Laura
Healing With Spirit
Spiritual Medium, Speaker, and Healer
Providing Spiritually based integrative holistic health enrichment
