My Tera Mai™ Healing Journey
Updated: Jul 27
Ever since I can remember I've been aware that there's more to this world than we can see.
When I was very young I wondered why we couldn't just close our eyes and go wherever we wanted, or fly, or communicate telepathically - I'm not sure how old I was when I realised that these were actually memories of where I'd been before.
When I was 2 or 3, my father came into my bedroom and found me sitting on the windowsill looking up at the stars, chatting away in my own language - which I now believe was Light Language and I was actually communicating with my Pleiadean star family!
At school I was a bit of a loner. At primary school I would spend playtime wandering around the edge of the playground chatting to my imaginary friend - who is still with me today and whom I now recognise as my Spirit Guide, Kryia.
Secondary school was a bit different, I still never really felt like I fit in and it felt like I was putting on a show every day. I spent lessons in my head, knowing that what they were trying to teach me would never really serve me in any way.
Apart from French. Having fallen in love with Avignon and the whole Provence region at the age of 19, I completely understand the reason why French had always been my favourite subject - I even took my GCSE a year early and got a B!
I'd already decided when I was 16 that I wanted to spend a year in France as an au pair after my A-levels. I didn't want to go to Paris because my mum's best friend lives there and I wanted to be independent. The agency I went to only had one other family - in Avignon.
I set off for a year that would change my life - naïve, shy and thinking I spoke perfect French, which, on the way home from the airport with two animated children, left me with no doubt that I couldn't speak French at all and wondering what the F*ck I was doing there! (Excuse my French!!!)
I grew into myself that year. I found my confidence, made lots of friends - many of whom are still in my life today - and learnt to speak French properly!
I fell in love. With the city and it's medieval castle, ramparts and cobbled streets. With the family I worked for, we're still friends today - my little girls now married with children of their own! I fell in love with the beauty, expressiveness and musicality of the language. And yes, I fell in love with a man.
It remains the best year of my life, carefree, sunny, alcohol-fuelled days and nights. And the last week I was there is still one of the weeks that had the biggest impact on my life.
Combine intense heartbreak at the age 19 with the fact that I didn't want to leave in the first place, and that I had made plans to stay with a friend and get a job - well, it didn't leave me in a very good place.
And it just kept getting worse.
By the time I was 21, I was suffering from severe depression and anxiety, and by 22 I was almost an alcoholic. I was at rock bottom and could see no way out - no one in my life was aware of how bad I really was, I'd been wearing a mask most of my life anyway. It was thanks to my doctor, who noticed I was struggling and suggested I see him twice a week for counselling, that I began to pull myself together.
It was also thanks to two books that kept crossing my path - 'The Celestine Prophecy' by James Redfield and 'Conversations with God' by Neale Donald Walsch. The third time I saw them I decided it was time to buy them - and they literally changed my life. A lot of what I read was more like confirming what I'd known all my life without knowing how I knew it.
By the time I discovered Paulo Coelho, Diana Cooper and Shakti Gawain I was well on my way, not only to recovery but to spiritual awakening.
I was learning about creative visualisation or manifesting, angels, forgiveness, acceptance, energy, discernment, ascension, the power of I Am, the power of the present moment, conscious breathing, mindfulness and so much more.
I was super excited, and wanted to share what I was learning with everyone whose path I crossed. A good friend warned me about wearing my spirituality on my sleeve - most people weren't ready to hear about it, or understand for themselves, that I should tone it down and learn to lead by example.
And so I learnt to be the change I wished to see in the world. I embodied everything I was learning as best I could and would find people asking me how I managed to be always smiling and (almost) never stressed. I would share with them whatever I felt they were open enough to hear and encourage them towards their own spiritual awakening.
Reiki found me when I was 25 and at work early one morning. I was chatting with my brother about his latest adventures on his Australian adventure when he asked if I'd heard of Reiki. He said that he thought I would be interested and that I should check it out.
As soon as he said it something inside me lit up, there was a spark of excitement, an inner knowing that this was part of my journey.
I did what research I could - the internet wasn't exactly what it is now - and it didn't take me long to know that I wanted to learn.
One night before sleep I asked the Universe that if I was supposed to learn Reiki to send me a Reiki master - I met three within five days! I took that as a resounding "Yes!"
I chose Tera Mai™ Healing because it combines two ancient arts of hands-on healing, Reiki and Seichem for an all round healing experience, and because I felt a stronger connection with Claire than the others.
The Tera Mai™ energies cleanse and reactivate our chakras (energy centres in and around the body) and an attunement or initiation into the energies provokes a deep cleansing and redesign of your entire energy system - meaning that I was able to release all the old, stagnant stuff from the years of suffering.
I stopped overthinking and constantly analysing almost overnight, that's the thing I remember most. I felt so much lighter, in every way. I felt reborn.
A little while later, someone asked me what my passion is - not having particularly ever asked myself the question I was surprised when the answer came immediately: Reiki, one day I will have my own Reiki business and I'm going to heal the world one person at a time.
I spent the next 20 odd years studying at the University of life, growing and developing both spiritually and personally, and practising Reiki on close friends and on myself and sharing my knowledge and experiences with those who were open to hearing it - learning to live authentically but not living the life I knew I was meant to be living.
I lived with a constant, nagging inner knowing that I wasn’t fulfilling my dreams, I wasn't doing what I was here to do. Yes, I was always in a job where I was helping people and making them smile - be it in Corporate Front of House in London, various shops/bars/hotels etc and even the Palais des Papes in Avignon, but I wasn’t helping transform people's lives in the way I knew I could.
Towards the end of 2008 I was living back in Avignon and decided it was time to start my Reiki business. I got business cards printed, bought a treatment table and a few weeks later my then boyfriend - now Husband - was offered a job in Senegal. It was too exciting an adventure to pass up on and we spent an amazing 18 months over there but my dreams were put on hold once again.
We went back to the UK and within a few weeks I was working as in Corporate Front of House for blue chip companies such as Lloyds of London, Moody's and McKinsey. I loved it, I was working with awesome people and doing what I loved - helping people and smiling a lot!
Late 2011 we embarked on our first of four unsuccessful rounds of IVF. We'd been trying for a baby for a few years with no luck and unfortunately the only thing the IVF did was mess around with my hormones, bring on early menopause and plunge me back into a black hole of depression.
Some days I couldn't even get out of bed, my Husband would come home and tell me to 'snap out of it'. Yes. Because it's that easy, as anyone who's ever suffered with depression knows. Cue depression and anxiety education for Hubby - who'd had no idea I'd been suffering for the last two years, the mask was firmly back in place and it was only when our consultant asked me and I chose to speak my truth rather than hide it that he found out.
That was in 2014. We were living in Woking and I was working as a volunteer in a charity shop. I became very good friends with my bosses and I told them often that they literally saved me by allowing me to go in for a couple of hours whenever I felt like it.
I ended up becoming chief librarian and guardian of around 14,000 books - and working there 5 days a week, although they were very good about me not going in if I didn't feel like it.
Oh, what happened to me healing myself with Reiki and using Reiki to support our IVF journey? The depression put an end to that - it's very difficult to do anything to help yourself when you're suffering, for me it was in any case.
Fast forward to 2019. Living in Provence, with my supportive, quite simply amazing Husband and shaggy dog Poppy. My Mum passed away in August of that year and a few months later the pandemic hit. I found myself with the time, space and opportunity to think about starting my Reiki business.
More than anything else, I finally felt ready - and with Mum pushing me on from 'up there' I knew it was time.
During lockdown I qualified as a Crystal Healing Therapy Practitioner - with over 50 different kinds of crystals around the house it made sense to learn about them properly so that I can integrate that knowledge with Reiki.
I also got certified in counselling skills, chakra and aura healing and animal Reiki.
I started to live my life with Reiki again. Reiki isn’t just a way of healing you see, it’s a way of being. It had been a few years since I'd used Reiki for daily self-healing. I got back into the habit of a healing meditation every morning and very soon my life became infused with Reiki.
I use it for everything - self-healing every day, I send Reiki to my day ahead and all the food that I eat. I Reiki my plants, pets, send to family, friends and to our beautiful planet while I’m out walking.
The more I work with these energies, the stronger they are becoming. Every new client, every healing session and every meditation session brings me to a new understanding of myself and of how these universal energies can be used, how gentle yet powerful they are and seeing the real difference it makes in people’s lives every moment of every day makes humbles me and I know I am blessed.
Thank you for taking the time to read my story - I now invite you to write a new story of your own by inviting Tera Mai™ Healing into your life today: