Economics, Buddhism and the Five Principles: Why a Reiki Master Must Have Another Source of Income
The first article of this mini-course was about methodological errors in teaching reiki: theta healing, rhodology, the requirement of martial arts, separation from qigong and yoga.Today we are talking about the systemic reason that gives rise to most of these errors.It’s economic.
How much does it cost to start teaching reiki — and why is it unaffordable?
Let’s say a person has received a master’s degree and wants to teach others and practice.Minimum set for work in modern conditions:
| Expense item | Approximate amount (2024–2025) |
|---|---|
| Registration of individual entrepreneurs / self-employment + accounting | 0–15,000 ₽/year |
| Office rental (at least 10 hours/mem.) | 8,000–25,000 ₽/month. |
| Website, domain, hosting | 20,000–60,000 ₽ (launch) + support |
| Marketing (targeting, content, SMM) | 15,000–50,000 ₽/month. |
| Online platform for courses | 3,000–12,000 ₽/month. |
| Continuous training (supervision, courses) | 30,000–100,000 ₽/year |
| Total only for start + first 3 months | ~150,000–350,000 RUR |
At the same time, the median salary in Russia in 2024 is about 50,000–60,000 rubles per month.Real disposable incomes of the majority of the population have not been growing at a real pace for several years: inflation in food products and housing and communal services is outpacing wage growth.Saving 200,000 rubles “just like that” for most people is 3-4 months of incomeentirely, no expenses.
Conclusion: One person starting reiki teaching from scratch is in a state of structural financial vulnerability.And this is where the slippery slope begins.
Financial vulnerability → infobusiness → infogypsy
When a person is financially vulnerable and wants to monetize a practice as quickly as possible, they fall under the influence of an entire ecosystem of “monetization mentors.”Their message is simple: “If you don’t know how to sell, you don’t make money.Sell through emotion, pain, urgency.”This works in the short term and leads to systemic deformations.
| Honest Marketing | Infobusiness/infogypsy |
|---|---|
| Describes the real result: “you will master self-help techniques” | Promises an unrealistic result: “you will change your life in 21 days” |
| Transparent price, no pressure | Artificial urgency: “last 3 places”, “price will increase in an hour” |
| Taxes are paid on every sale | Business fragmentation, fictitious individual entrepreneurs, offshore companies |
| Limitations of competence are explicitly recognized | “Reiki treats oncology”, “I’ll get rid of depression in a session” |
| The client is an adult with a choice | The client is a “pain” that needs to be “squeezed out” |
Loud precedents: when the information business meets the criminal code
Elena Blinovskaya (“Marathon of Desires”).She sold marathons of “the right desire.”Scheme: splitting revenue into many individual entrepreneurs, dummies, understating the tax base.Debt to the Federal Tax Service —more than 918 million rubles.Arrested in April 2023 while trying to cross the border.In October 2025, the court appointed4.5 years in prison.
Alexandra Mitroshina (promotion courses).Criminal case since 2023: distributed proceeds from online courses among the accounts of one-day individual entrepreneurs, evading taxes on127 million rubles.In 2025 — the second case of laundering 115 million through the purchase of real estate.Result: 3 years probation, fine 900,000 rubles, confiscation of 115 million.
All these cases are the same in structure:financial pressure + lack of professional boundaries + aggressive marketing = violation of law and ethics.The same logic applies to the market for esotericism and reiki, but the amounts are just smaller.
Reiki Principle 5: Earn Fairly
Usui’s Five Principles are not decoration or a beautiful slogan.This is the ethical foundation of the practice.The fifth principle in various translations reads as:
“Just today — be honest in your work.Earn your bread with your honest labor.»
Just for today, work honestly / earn your living honestly
In the Japanese tradition, this principle had a specific meaning: Usui had monastic students with a monastery as their base of existence.Lay disciples had a profession, a craft, and trade.Teaching reiki was not intended to be the only source of income.
💡Practical conclusion:a reiki master for whom reiki is his only income, structurallyforcedeither make enough money from it (which requires a large audience), or cut corners: promise more than it can deliver, mix with methods that “sell better,” avoid taxes.If the master has another job or business, Reiki is taughtfrom excess, and not out of necessity.This changes everything.
What is lost when reiki is the only income
- Esotericization of the program.The course is filled with what is “sold” — birth programs, channeling, “protection from energy vampires.”This attracts a magical-minded audience that is easier to keep addicted to.
- Silencing restrictions.The master does not say: “For depression, see a psychotherapist; for pain, see a doctor.”Because then the client will leave.
- Isolation from adjacent systems.Recommending qigong or yoga means losing a client to a competitor.
- Inflation of promises.“Initiation” is sold as a transformational event after which “life will change.”
- Tax risks.With low turnover — self-employment, with growth — there is a temptation not to declare.The precedents of Blinovskaya and Mitroshina show where this leads.
What does reiki offer that is unique — something that neither qigong nor yoga has?
Criticism should not devalue what Reiki actually has and what other systems do not.
Initiation (attunement/Reiju)
In qigong and yoga there is no structuredtransfersthe ability to work with energy from master to student through a special ritual.In Reiki, initiation is specific work with the student’s energy centers:
- Activation of the centers of the palms (hoshi) — points through which energy is transmitted when working with a client
- Activation of the centers of the feet — for grounding and complete passage of energy
- Working with the crown center as the entry point of universal energy
Re-settings and supporting initiations
Reiki has a tradition of Reiju — regular (weekly or monthly) supportive energy transfers that help the student deepen his practice.This creates an ongoing master-student relationship rather than a one-time sale of a course.
Pair work: reiki session
This is the main difference.In qigong and yoga, the main work ispersonal practicestudent.In reiki there is a separate form:session for another person— when a master works with a client through touch or remotely.This presence, space, and addition to medical treatment is not a replacement.
There is nothing equivalent to this in qigong or yoga likesystematic method of pair work— No.This is the unique value of reiki.
Integration as a fair alternative to eclecticism
| Region | Best tool |
|---|---|
| Energy channels and circulation | Qigong, pranayama (yoga) |
| Working with the body | Hatha yoga, qigong gymnastics |
| Energy transfer, initiation, pair work | Reiki (unique) |
| Psychological needs, trauma | EMDR, CBT-T, somatic therapy |
| Physical symptoms, illnesses | Traditional medicine |
| Financial sustainability practice | Profession/business outside of reiki |
| Ethical and ideological basis | Buddhist tradition |
Reiki and Buddhism: what almost no one talks about
This is the most hushed topic in Russian-language teaching of reiki — and one of the most important.
Mikao Usui was a practicing Buddhist, a member of the Tendai community, and his Mount Kurama experience occurredin a Buddhist context.The roots of the reiki system go back to several layers of the Buddhist tradition:
- Tendai Buddhism— Japanese branch that retained tantric elements: work with mantras (nento in Reiki is a mantra), mudras and meditative states
- Esoteric/Tantric Buddhism (Shingon)— a tradition where transmission through ritual contact is a central element
- Pure Land Buddhism— the practice of nento / nembutsu, from which the technique of working with reiki symbols grows
teach reiki howhealing services sales systemwithout this context means commercializing Buddhist practice, cutting it off from its roots.A master without a Buddhist context is like a surgeon without anatomy.He can master the technique, but he has no understanding of what he works with.
An honest model for teaching reiki
- Independent income.A job or business that does not involve reiki is not a disadvantage, it is an ethical necessity.
- Transparent marketing.Without “I’ll cure depression”, without “birth programs”, without artificial urgency.Taxes — in full.
- Recognizing boundaries of competence.Explicit references to psychotherapy for psychological needs, to medicine for physical ones.
- Knowledge of related systems.The basics of qigong and pranayama — not as competitors, but as a deeper map.
- Buddhist context.At least a basic understanding of the tradition from which reiki came.
- Technical and financial literacy.Website, accounting, individual entrepreneur — without this, the practitioner is either invisible or falls into the hands of “monetization mentors.”
Next article: what is initiation into reiki — and why “online initiation for 5,000 rubles” is not the same.