Reiki as it is practiced today dates to the teaching of Mikao Usui in Japan in the early 1920s. Usui was a spiritual seeker, he was a lay monk and had a wife and two children. In his time, he would practice Buddhist, Taoist and Shinto. In 1920 Usui’s intense spiritual practices formed a new revelation that led to the now practice called reiki.
Usui travelled widely around Japan during the last four years of his life teaching more than 2,000 beginning students and training 16 reiki masters. One of his master students Chūjirō Hayashi was a retired naval officer. Hayashi worked with Usui to learn the healing practices from Usui's larger body of teachings. With Usui’s blessing Hayashi opened up a reiki clinic in Tokyo where 16 practitioners gave treatment in Pairs. Hawayo Takata an Japanese/ American came to Hayashi’ s clinic for healing with months of treatment her health was restored and she became a student of Hayashi and with his, guidance and support Takata brought reiki to Hawaii and from there reiki became a popular practice all around the world.