Distance Reiki: how does it actually work?
The question I get asked most often
Of all the things I tell people about my practice, distance Reiki is the one that gets the most raised eyebrows. In-person Reiki is at least imaginable; a practitioner, a treatment table, hands placed gently on a body. But Reiki sent across distance, to someone lying in their own home miles away? That, understandably, is where even the mildly curious can start to feel they've crossed a line.
I understand that reaction.
I'm not going to ask you to dismiss it. What I'd like to do instead is tell you what actually happens, practically, and in the experience of the people who've received it, and let you draw your own conclusions.
What a distance Reiki session actually looks like
Let's start with the practicalities, because I find a lot of people don't book distance sessions simply because they can't picture them.
I run my distant Reiki sessions on Zoom and at the start of the session, we have a conversation about what's going on for you and what you'd like to focus on. This is the same conversation we'd have if you were coming in person.
Then we switch off cameras as I don’t need to see you during the treatment, and you find a quiet space, lie down somewhere comfortable, and do your best to be undisturbed for the duration. You don't need to do anything in particular. You might close your eyes, you might not. Some people drift into a light sleep. Some stay fully awake and notice what arises. There's no right way to receive it.
I also offer to play the music that I listen to whilst I treat you, which many of my clients like to have playing over their audio. Have your headphones at the ready if this is something you’d like, too.
On my end, I work in the same way I would in person, moving through the same hand positions and the same quality of attention but without physical proximity. The actual treatment typically lasts around half an hour.
At the end of the treatment we come back to sharing our videos and have another conversation to check in. I share what I noticed during the session, and you share your experience. That conversation is often where the most useful material surfaces, and I will often share some simple practices or somatic exercises to help you continue to relax and regulate your nervous system between ongoing sessions.
That's it. No special equipment, no particular belief required. Just a quiet hour in your own home.
What people actually experience
This is the part I find most difficult to write about, because individual experiences vary considerably and I want to be careful not to overstate. So I'll share a few examples from my own practice and let them speak for themselves.
One client, a woman in her mid-fifties, managing significant fatigue alongside a demanding job, received her first distance session deeply sceptical. She'd agreed to try it partly to satisfy a curious friend, partly because she was too exhausted to travel. She reported afterwards that within about ten minutes of lying down she felt a wave of warmth move through her chest, followed by what she described as "the sensation of something releasing that I didn't know I'd been holding." She slept for eleven hours that night and now has regular treatments with me.
Another client noticed very little during the session itself, no particular sensations, no obvious shift. She nearly messaged me to say it hadn't worked. Three days later she wrote instead to say that something had quietly changed; a low-level anxiety she'd been carrying for months had loosened in a way she couldn't account for.
A third arrived at distance Reiki through sheer practicality. She lives in Scotland, had attended an online workshop I had run, and wanted to work with me specifically. She describes her monthly tune-up sessions where she reliably feels, in her words, "set back down." She has no interest in explaining why it works. She just notices that it does.
None of these experiences are typical, because there is no typical. But they reflect a pattern I observe consistently: that something is received, even across distance, and that something tends to be useful.
The honest bit about what we don't know
I'm not going to offer you a tidy explanation for how distance Reiki works. There are various frameworks. Some draw on quantum physics, some on the idea of a universal energy field, some on the practitioner's focused intention as a form of connection in itself. None of these is established in the way that a mechanism in conventional medicine is established.
Interestingly, there are a number of studies that have been done both outside and within the NHS, most notably the ‘Evaluation of a Distance Reiki Program for Frontline Healthcare Workers’ Health-Related Quality of Life During the COVID-19 Pandemic’ which concluded: ‘The Reiki program was feasible and was associated with decreased stress, anxiety and pain, and increased wellbeing and sleep quality in frontline healthcare workers impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.’ So if you are someone who looks for evidence, then this report is worth reading.
What I can say is this: the experience of people receiving distance Reiki is remarkably consistent with the experience of people receiving it in person. Not identical; some people find they go deeper in their own environment, others prefer the containment of a dedicated treatment space. But the quality of what lands, and the effects that follow, are closely comparable.
For me, that consistency is more interesting than any explanation I could offer for it. I don't need to fully understand something in order to observe that it works. And I think that's a reasonable position for you to hold too, at least long enough to find out for yourself.
Who distance sessions work particularly well for
In practical terms, distance Reiki tends to suit certain situations especially well.
If you're managing fatigue, illness or significant stress, removing the effort of travel can make the difference between having a session and not having one. Several of my clients receive distance Reiki precisely because their energy reserves are too depleted to spend them on a round trip.
If you'd benefit from regular sessions but logistics make that difficult - work schedules, caring responsibilities, location - distance removes those barriers entirely.
If you're based outside Surrey and want to work with a specific practitioner rather than whoever happens to be nearby, distance makes that possible. I work with clients across the UK, Europe and the US this way.
And if you're someone who finds it genuinely easier to receive in a space that already feels safe and familiar - your own bedroom, your own sofa - distance sessions can actually produce a deeper response than the treatment room would.
If you're curious …
A distance session is, in some ways, a lower-commitment place to start than coming in person. You don't need to travel. You're in your own environment. You can make up your own mind about what you experience, without any pressure to interpret it in a particular way.
If you'd like to try one, or if you have questions you'd like answered first, I'm very happy to hear from you; sceptical questions included.
Get in touch here, email me direct at Karen@serotina.co.uk or if you’re ready to book a session click here.
About Karen
Karen Skidmore is a Reiki Master Practitioner (Usui tradition) based in Hindhead, Surrey. She offers in-person sessions locally and distance sessions for clients across the UK, Europe and the US.
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