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What to Expect at Your First Reiki Session

By Steph · August 2026 · 7 min read

Most people arrive for a first Reiki session a little unsure — not sceptical exactly, just unclear on what they've signed up for. Will there be chanting? Do I have to talk? What if nothing happens?

So here is the whole hour, start to finish, with nothing left vague.

Before you come

• Wear something comfortable. You stay fully clothed for Reiki — shoes off, that's all.
• Eat something light beforehand. Lying still for an hour is more pleasant when you're neither stuffed nor starving.
• Leave a buffer afterwards if you can. Most people come out slow and dreamy, and it's nicer not to have to snap straight back into the day.
• There's nothing to prepare. No reading, no intention to craft, no correct mindset to arrive in. Simply turning up is enough.

Arriving

You'll come to a quiet home studio in Inglewood — warm, low-lit, and set up for the day you're having. There's magnesium water waiting for you, and we'll draw oracle card guidance to open the session.

Then a short check-in: what you're carrying at the moment, where it's sitting in your body, anything I should adapt around. Injuries, pregnancy, sensitivity, anxiety, a shoulder that doesn't like being touched — all useful, all easy to work with.

This part is short, I promise. You don't have to narrate your life or justify why you're here. "I'm tired and I don't really know why" is a complete answer.

The session itself

You'll lie down on a cosy treatment bed, fully clothed, covered with soft blankets. Then I work slowly from head to toe, placing my hands lightly on or just above the body — with chakra balancing, crystals and essential oils chosen for the day.

There's no talking required. Music is soft, and tuned to the frequency you need on the day. Everything is consent-led: you choose the amount of touch, and I explain anything before it happens.

Your job for the next hour is nothing. Genuinely nothing. You don't have to relax on cue, empty your mind, or feel a particular thing.

What it might feel like

Everyone is different, but the most common reports are:

• Warmth and heaviness — limbs sinking into the bed, heat around my hands.
• The mind going quiet — often abruptly, and often for the first time in months.
• Tingling, or a sense of movement in places you weren't thinking about.
• Emotion arriving from nowhere — tears or unexpected laughter as held tension lets go.
• Falling asleep. Extremely common, and completely fine.
• A gurgling stomach, or your own snoring. Both are good signs, not embarrassing ones.

About the snoring and the stomach noises

This is the thing people apologise for most, so let me say it before you feel you have to: it's exactly what I want to hear. A gurgling stomach means your body has dropped out of fight-or-flight and into rest and digest — the state where it actually repairs. It's your nervous system letting go, out loud.

Snoring is the same story. What clients most often describe is a meditative in-between: they feel asleep, they may well snore, and yet they still know where they are and what's happening in the room. Safe, warm, and like the deepest rest they've had in a long time.

There's no version of this you can do wrong.

Afterwards

We don't rush the ending. There's quiet time to land, and then a small debrief — how the session felt for you, and anything that came through intuitively for me. Often that's where I noticed tension sitting, sometimes it's a piece of soft guidance. You're welcome to take what's useful and leave the rest.

You'll leave with a simple take-home integration pack — small, practical, and nothing that feels like homework.

Most people feel calm, light and slightly dreamy for the rest of the day. Drink more water than usual, keep the evening gentle if you can, and expect to sleep unusually well. A great many clients report their best sleep in months that night.

The worries people actually have

"What if I fall asleep?"

Then your body took exactly what it came for. Sleep is one of the ways it lets go, and the session works just the same whether you're awake for it or not — snoring very much included.

"What if I cry?"

You'd be in very good company. It happens more often than people expect, usually with no obvious reason attached, and there are always tissues within reach. You won't be asked to explain it, or to pull yourself together.

"What if I don't feel anything?"

That's completely okay, and more common than you'd think. Some people feel very little on the table and then notice the difference over the following days — sleeping better, snapping less, breathing a little lower in the body. The absence of fireworks isn't the absence of effect.

"Do I have to believe in it?"

Not at all. I hold a psychology degree, and I was the sceptic in the room once myself, so you're in familiar company. Come in curious, notice what your body does with the hour, and draw your own conclusions in your own time.

"Is it religious?"

No — Reiki has Japanese origins, but there's no doctrine, no scripture and nothing to sign up to. It isn't medical treatment either; it sits gently alongside your doctor and your therapist rather than in place of them.

Booking a first session in Perth

Most people start with Alignment: one hour of hands-on Reiki for A$111, Friday to Sunday in Inglewood. If your mind is the loud part rather than your body, sound healing may suit you better — that piece is worth a read first.

Come as you are. Bring the tiredness, bring the scepticism, bring the day you've had. Nothing else is required.