On January 19, Joyce Winough and I arrived at the University of California Santa Barbara to meet with David Gartrell, the curator of Special Research Collections.  He accepted the bulk of the “Takata Archives” contained in several boxes and one suitcase.  This was the beginning of a new phase of preserving and being able to make available the material that was given to me by my mother, some years after Hawayo Takata died in December 1980.   

In the years following this gift, these boxes accompanied my many moves from British Columbia to Santa Fe, to Vashon Island off the coast of Seattle, to Idaho and then finally to Arizona.  During this time, I was not very interested in what these boxes contained.   

In 2006, The Reiki Alliance held the annual conference in Idaho where I lived.  I was drawn to open some of the boxes and pull out some things that seemed appropriate to share with those who came to the conference.  Within the displays were documents, certificates, photos, and clothing.  I also had the Butsudan that my grandmother had in her house.  This is a place of remembering ancestors each day in a Japanese Buddhist tradition.  (This is not included in the archives because it was a part of her private life and my family is now caretaking this.)  

This was the beginning of sharing what I had with others.  After the conference people asked if I could have this displayed somewhere.  I didn’t know how to do this without possible damage to the materials.  I was waiting for the Reiki Foundation International or The Reiki Alliance to come to a place where a small or medium size “museum” could be obtained and supported.  However, after the first meeting of the Archive Team and our assessment of the materials, it was clear that a professional level library with all the obvious services and protocols in place would serve Reiki best.   

In 2013, I met Justin Stein, a PhD student researching the teaching and life of Hawayo Takata as a part of his thesis.  When he found out I had these boxes, he was interested in seeing what was in them and I was open to his being able to do the same.  Through the next months, an idea grew in me and at the beginning of 2014, I called upon a few people to meet in July and open the boxes for assessment, organizing, and creating a way to share this with the Reiki Community.  I recalled a conversation I had had with John Gray who insisted that an archive be set up for Reiki.  This was a deep connection and has been the driving force inside of me all these years.

On July 14, 2014, the small group met in Green Valley, Arizona to open the boxes!  Paul and Susan Mitchell, Justin Stein, Robert Fueston, Joyce Winough and myself became the Archive Team.  Justin arrived first.  Joyce and I had moved the boxes to an empty apartment close to our home where many tables had been set up.  Justin and I started to open the boxes and simply put out the things on tables . . . trying to sort them into categories.  After 2 hours of this work, we had to sit and take in the energy that filled the rooms.  Paul and Susan arrived with their obvious gift of having been students of Hawayo Takata, hosting her in San Francisco, and having a long time relationship with me.  Justin brought with him many years of researching Reiki in Hawaii, Japan, and throughout the world with his interviews as well as his inner curiosity about what was in the boxes.  Robert Fueston added his skills as a librarian and how-to-organize archivist knowledge (Robert has a Master Degree in Library and Informational Science and has just completed an in depth post graduate certificate:  Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study in Library and Information Science), as well as his passion for the teachings of Hawayo Takata.  Though it seems mundane, Joyce and I were thrilled to get the boxes out of storage and into the light of day!