The 5 Reiki Principles

The Five Reiki Principles Changed How I Live

These simple precepts from 19th-century Japan might be the most practical spiritual advice you've never heard.

1. Just for today, do not anger.
2. Just for today, do not worry.
3. Just for today, show gratitude.
4. Just for today, work diligently.
5. Just for today, be kind to others.

Five lines. Forty-three words. A complete philosophy for living.

Here's what surprises most people when they start learning about Reiki: it doesn't begin with energy. When Dr. Mikao Usui codified this healing system in early 20th-century Japan, he didn't lead with hand positions or techniques. He led with ethics. Before the symbols, before the attunements, before any discussion of channeling universal life force — he gave his students these five principles.

They weren't even original to him. Usui drew upon the teachings of the Meiji Emperor, whose poetry and moral guidance shaped an entire generation of Japanese spiritual thought. But Usui recognized something that many modern practitioners have forgotten: technique without character is hollow. Power without principle is dangerous. And healing that doesn't begin with the healer is incomplete.

Seventeen Years of Adrenaline

I spent seventeen years as a paramedic before I found my way to Reiki healing. Emergency medicine taught me to act fast, think faster, and suppress everything else until the shift was over. It was a career built on adrenaline and compartmentalization — necessary skills when you're pulling someone from a car wreck, less useful when you're trying to live a balanced life.

The thing nobody tells you about paramedicine is how it rewires your nervous system. You learn to function in chaos. You learn to shut down emotional responses because there's no time for them. And then one day you realize you've forgotten how to turn them back on.

The Reiki principles offered me something I didn't know I needed: permission to slow down. Not as a permanent state, but as a daily practice. Not as denial of life's difficulties, but as a framework for meeting them.

Let me walk you through each principle — not as abstract philosophy, but as lived practice.

Do Not Anger (Just For Today)

Notice the precision of the language. It doesn't say "never be angry." It doesn't demand that you transcend a fundamental human emotion through sheer willpower. It says just for today.

This is revolutionary in its modesty.

Anger itself isn't the enemy here. Anger is information — a signal that a boundary has been crossed, that an injustice has occurred, that something we value is under threat. The problem isn't the arising of anger but our relationship to it: the way we nurse it, justify it, rehearse it, and allow it to calcify into resentment.

The principle asks only this: for the next twenty-four hours, can you meet anger without becoming it? Can you feel the heat rise and choose not to add fuel?

In my paramedic days, anger was constant. Anger at dispatch for impossible call volumes. Anger at bystanders who just stood there filming instead of helping. Anger at systems that failed the people I was trying to save. Some of that anger was righteous. None of it helped me do my job better, and all of it accumulated in my body as tension, insomnia, and eventually burnout.

I carried that tension for years. It lived in my shoulders, my jaw, my lower back. I didn't even know it was there until I started receiving massage therapy regularly and realized how much I'd been holding.

"Just for today" gave me an exit ramp. I couldn't promise to never be angry again — that would be a lie. But I could commit to this single day. And when I failed, I could begin again tomorrow without the weight of having broken some cosmic vow.

The principle is not about suppression. It's about sovereignty. You can feel anger without being controlled by it.

Do Not Worry (Just For Today)

If anger concerns the past and present — what has happened, what is happening — worry concerns the future. It's the mind's attempt to solve problems that don't yet exist, to control outcomes that remain uncertain, to rehearse disasters that may never arrive.

Worry feels productive. That's its seduction. The anxious mind believes it's doing important work: scanning for threats, preparing contingencies, staying vigilant. But most worry isn't problem-solving. It's problem-generating. It creates suffering in the present over events that exist only in imagination.

I know this intimately. After years of responding to emergencies, my brain got really good at imagining worst-case scenarios. Every chest pain was a heart attack. Every headache was an aneurysm. Every phone call at odd hours was bad news.

Again, the principle doesn't demand permanent enlightenment. It asks for a single day of experiment. Just for today, what if you didn't worry?

This doesn't mean abandoning prudent planning. It means recognizing the difference between planning and rumination. Planning is finite: you assess the situation, make a decision, take action, move on. Rumination is infinite: the same thoughts cycling through the mind without resolution, generating cortisol without generating clarity.

The practice I've found most helpful is simple: when I notice worry arising, I ask whether there's an action I can take right now. If yes, I take it. If no, I acknowledge that the worry isn't serving any purpose, thank my mind for trying to protect me, and gently redirect attention to the present moment.

Some days this works beautifully. Some days it doesn't work at all. But the principle asks only for today — and today is always manageable.

Show Gratitude (Just For Today)

Of all the principles, this one has the most scientific support. The research on gratitude practices is robust: regular gratitude journaling correlates with improved mood, better sleep, stronger immune function, and increased resilience to stress and anxiety. Gratitude literally rewires the brain toward positivity.

But Usui wasn't citing peer-reviewed studies. He was pointing toward something the contemplative traditions have always known: attention shapes reality. What you focus on expands. And in any given moment, you can find evidence for either abundance or scarcity, depending on where you look.

This is not toxic positivity — the denial of genuine suffering in favor of forced cheerfulness. Gratitude practice doesn't require pretending that everything is fine when it isn't. It requires acknowledging that even in difficulty, something is being given. Air in your lungs. A roof overhead. One person who cares whether you live or die. The capacity to read these words and reflect on their meaning.

The practice is almost embarrassingly simple: notice what is good. Name it. Feel it. Let it register in your body, not just your mind.

I keep a gratitude practice as part of my morning routine. Three things, written down, before I check email or look at my phone. Some days the list is profound — deep love, meaningful work, moments of genuine connection. Some days the list is mundane — hot coffee, a sunny window, the fact that my back doesn't hurt today. Both lists work. The practice isn't about finding extraordinary blessings; it's about recognizing ordinary ones.

Work Diligently (Just For Today)

The Japanese phrase here is sometimes translated as "devote yourself to your work" or "earn your living honestly." Both translations point toward the same truth: there's spiritual value in effort, integrity, and craftsmanship.

This principle pushes against two modern tendencies: the glorification of hustle culture on one hand, and the fantasy of effortless manifestation on the other.

Hustle culture treats work as identity and exhaustion as virtue. It mistakes activity for productivity and busyness for meaning. The Reiki principle is not an endorsement of workaholism. "Diligently" is not "obsessively." The principle asks for engaged, honest effort — not self-destruction in pursuit of achievement.

On the other hand, some spiritual circles promote the idea that the right mindset alone will attract abundance, that hard work is somehow unenlightened, that wanting things to come easily is the same as trusting the universe. The Reiki principle gently corrects this fantasy. Consciousness matters, yes. Intention matters. But so does action.

For me, this principle is about bringing full presence to whatever task is before me. When I'm working with a client on the massage table, I'm not thinking about the next appointment or what I'm making for dinner. I'm there, fully, with that person's body and energy.

The quality of your work reflects the quality of your character. And both can be cultivated through daily practice.

Be Kind to Others (Just For Today)

The final principle turns our attention outward. Having addressed our relationship to our own emotions (anger, worry), our perception (gratitude), and our effort (diligent work), we now consider our relationship to other beings.

The phrasing is worth noting: "be kind to others," not "be kind to those who deserve it." Not "be kind when it's convenient." Not "be kind to people who are kind to you first." The principle makes no exceptions.

This is challenging. Kindness is easy when we're dealing with pleasant people in pleasant circumstances. It becomes genuinely difficult when someone cuts us off in traffic, when a coworker undermines our project, when a family member pushes every button we have.

But this is precisely where the practice matters most. Kindness in easy circumstances is barely kindness at all — it's just riding the wave of favorable conditions. Kindness in difficult circumstances is a choice, an act of will, a demonstration that our behavior is determined by our values rather than our reactions.

I've come to understand this principle through my healing work. Every person who comes to me for Reiki or massage is carrying something — pain, grief, fear, exhaustion. Much of it is invisible. The person who seems rude may be terrified. The person who seems demanding may be desperate. The person who seems cold may be protecting wounds I cannot see.

Kindness doesn't require knowing someone's full story. It only requires remembering that everyone has one.

Why "Just For Today" Actually Works

What makes these principles so effective is their temporal frame. They don't demand permanent transformation. They don't require you to be enlightened by next Thursday. They ask only for today.

This is psychologically brilliant. The mind rebels against absolute commitments. Tell yourself you'll never worry again, and the very declaration creates pressure that generates worry. Promise to be kind for the rest of your life, and you've created conditions for inevitable failure and self-judgment.

But today? Today is manageable. Today is specific. Today will end, and tomorrow you can begin again.

There's a teaching in many contemplative traditions that enlightenment is not a distant goal to be achieved someday, but a present possibility available in each moment. The Reiki principles embody this teaching in practical form. You don't have to become a different person. You only have to live these principles now, in this day, in this situation.

And when you fail — because you will fail, because we all fail — you simply begin again. No guilt. No elaborate self-criticism. Just a fresh start with the next sunrise.

How I Practice This Daily

I recite the five principles each morning as part of my meditation practice. Some practitioners speak them aloud; others write them in a journal; others simply hold them in mind while sitting quietly. The form matters less than the consistency.

But the real practice isn't the morning recitation. It's the moments throughout the day when the principles get tested. The email that triggers anger. The uncertainty that breeds worry. The blessing that goes unnoticed. The task that tempts half-effort. The person who makes kindness difficult.

These are the practice opportunities. Not obstacles to spiritual living, but the very substance of it.

Usui understood that Reiki is not merely a healing technique performed on a table. It's a way of living. The energy that flows through us during a treatment is the same energy that flows through every moment of existence. To be a Reiki practitioner is to cultivate that awareness continuously — not just during sessions, but always.

The five principles are the doorway to that continuous practice. Simple enough to memorize in five minutes. Challenging enough to practice for a lifetime.

Just for today.

I'm a Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Master practicing in Olympia, Washington. After seventeen years as a paramedic, I now integrate massage therapy, Reiki energy healing, and sound therapy at Reiki Massage PLLC.