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"Thoughts from the Attic!"

An ongoing series of informative entries by Rod Kaminski

A brief history of Jin Shin Jyutsu!

15 February 2022

A brief history of JSJ.


Jin Shin Jyutsu, “The art of the creator though the person of compassion”.

A man named Jiro Murai is responsible for taking a nearly lost spoken tradition of energy medicine/thought that has been around for thousands of years and developed that knowledge into an all-encompassing art form. Today this ancient knowledge is known as Jin Shin Jyutsu!

Jiro Murai was born in 1886 in Taiseimura, Japan and as Japanese tradition stimulates, the first born follows into the footsteps of his father’s occupation. In this case, his brother being the first born, had to become a medical doctor, and this afforded Jiro the freedom to choose whatever path he wanted. He took advantage of this and experienced life in various ways like entering eating contests (for ingesting the most food) for prizes/cash. When Jiro was 26, he became gravely ill and even with the attention and help from the best medicine resources that were available at the time, he was considered terminal. His last request was to be brought to the family cabin in the mountains and to be left alone there for seven days and that they return on the eighth day to retrieve him. Jiro meditated, fasted and utilized ancient energy healing techniques during this time and on the seventh day his body’s temperature grew very cold and he drifted in and out of consciousness. Being tested to its limit, his body went from conditions of feeling extreme cold, to feeling like he was burning up in the throws of a fire. Unknown to Jiro as to why, he felt much relief, peace and calmness after passing through his dark night of the soul. He was grateful to be alive!

Working with the homeless population in Wano park in Tokyo, Jiro began his lifelong study of Jin Shin Jyutsu. He would look for specific projects (diseases, conditions, etc. ) and would come up with flows or various ways to treat these people and then he would move on to another project. It is believed that Jiro did not leave Japan during his lifetime but felt an urge to introduce the old traditions to the West. Jiro would mentor a hand-picked student who would be instrumental in bringing this modality to the West. He met a woman named Mary Iino who was born in Seattle, Washington in 1918. Mary moved to Japan in the late forties for work and met Jiro at a mutual friend’s house. Jiro asked Mary, “Would you like to study with me to take a gift from Japan to America? “. With little awareness of what Jiro was asking of her, she felt a great urge to say YES! Mary studied with Jiro for twelve years and at one point she became very ill and Jiro cured her illness (project) and she gleamed much from her ordeal and used that to carry her forward in her studies of this art. Mary moved to the United States in 1954 and began to practice this art and worked diligently to promote and educate Jin Shin Jyutsu world wide till her passing in 2008. The institute for Jin Shin Jyutsu is located in Scottsdale Arizona and continues to promote this modality by training thousands of students all over the world.

Legend is told that Jiro and a good friend went on separate spiritual paths. One came down the mountain with the art of Jin Shin Jyutsu while the other friend came back with the modality of Reiki. An instructor told us about this legend in class, and it is interesting to think about their relationship, what they were seeking and how they ultimately found what they were looking for!

What a JSJ session is like!

28 February 2022

The name Jin Shin Jyutsu means , “ The Art of the Creator through the person of compassion “. This is a gentle non-invasive art that enables a person to bring about a sense of balance to their life. Jin Shin Jyutsu ( pronounced Jin Shin Jit-Sue ) can be best described as a light touch acupressure and because of the nature of the reality that we live in called duality, it is imperative that we arm ourselves with simple tools that we need to navigate through the peaks and valleys of life. Make no mistake that the highs and lows will come, but how extreme the energies will get is a conscious choice made by each person that can determine the severity of the shifts. The goal is to harmonize the body to a balanced state by enacting a conscious strategy to ride with the waves of life in a more neutral/harmonious state of mind and being.

The client lays on their back on a comfortable massage table, fully clothed. Through a process, the practitioner determines what flows to use and, through light touch, links up these points into what we call a “flow.” Sometimes the effects can be felt instantly or it can take time to manifest and there are times when there is no physical feeling, but an a-ha moment is realized! (An unexpected moment afterwards where one realizes that something has shifted and what would have been an expected or normal reaction to an event or situation, resulted in an unintended reaction to that situation.) The person wasn’t triggered, remained neutral and that is what we call balance. For myself, I describe it as being the OBSERVER! By being less emotional, more calm and neutral, a person has the ability to make better decisions not based on being emotionally, physically, or mentally compromised. A session continues for eight hours once the client leaves the massage table and that is why some people will only notice changes hours or days later. The innate wisdom of the human body is truly remarkable and all we have to do is start the process and trust the result.

I like to think of human bodies as accumulation jars. For each person this varies, but every person has a limit to the amount of trauma, stress, injury, anxiety and emotional angst that one can hold UNTIL our jars are full and start to pour over. For most people, this is usually the point where they realize that something is up ! As a human species we tend to be reactive rather than proactive and effects of letting our jars fill up now takes centre stage. This results in a shift of healthy living to a chronic decline in health if action is not taken. We have the tools available to us to make sure that we are consciously aware of our personal jars, the process that happens, and what we can do for maintenance. This is where I can help!

I was talking to a client the other day and he was pleased with his session and prior sessions he has had. But he commented that he found it a little difficult to get to get his head around the concept of receiving less information than he was use to with other modalities. Even though he was getting the end results that he was hoping for from the sessions, his monkey mind wanted details details details! This is not an art that conveys a lot of information being passed on to the client. Relevant information is indeed passed on, but as a Jin Shin Jyutsu practitioner, I am acutely aware that some individuals can resonate with their projects on various levels and in some instances can manifest their project to its truest extent. In Jin Shin Jyutsu we refer to disease, health conditions, emotional states, as projects. We do not use labels ( eg. cancer, COPD ) because some individuals have the tendency to take on the project “AS THEIR OWN”. This can set individuals up for a growth acceleration phase of their project and this is a road that should be avoided. Jin Shin Jyutsu is perfectly simple and simply perfect! With my hectic busy lifestyle , I wanted a modality that I would be able to incorporate under any situation that I was experiencing. Who would believe that simply touching two points on a body can bring about such a harmonious state? Who can believe that by grabbing your thumb, you can ease the emotion of worry? With Jin Shin Jyutsu it is possible! 

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