Often, we begin seeking help not for ourselves, but for someone we love — a child, a partner, a family member.
We come carrying concern, responsibility, and a sincere desire to help.
Beneath that practical concern, there is often a deeper exhaustion: the feeling of holding too much without adequate support, language, or inner ground.
Many do not yet recognize how much they themselves are carrying — or how much they, too, need care in order to navigate the situation.
As peace and inner steadiness erode, anxiety grows, and what once felt manageable becomes increasingly difficult.
The story that follows is a real reflection by an advanced student of mine who recognized this turning point and chose to empower herself, so that she could support her loved one with greater clarity and confidence, rather than from worry and anxiety.
Through this process, she found a clearer sense of direction and meaning in her own life — a foundation that allowed her to show up differently for those she loves.
I invite you to read her story. Please feel free to share your reflections in the comments!
The Mother Who Came for Her Son and Found Herself
Dasha was exhausted.
By the time her son turned four and a half, she had run out of answers.
He was restless, unable to stay still, innocently curious about everything with interests that pulled him in a dozen directions at once—and she couldn’t keep up.
The specialists had names for what was happening, diagnoses that felt clinical and distant, but no one could tell her how to help him.
No one could tell her how to stop feeling like she was failing.
She had grown up in a household where the spiritual realm simply didn’t exist.
Her family was atheist—not out of rebellion, but out of absence.
There were no prayers at bedtime, no rituals to mark grief or joy, no language for the invisible forces that shape a life.
And so when her son began to unravel, Dasha did what she’d been taught to do: she searched for answers in the visible world and evaluated conventional paths.
Therapists.
Behavioral specialists.
Medications.
Nothing felt right or complete.
Desperation has a way of opening doors we didn’t know were there.
Dasha found herself searching for Reiki practitioners—something she barely understood but was willing to try.
Anything.
She needed anything that might help him.
That search led her to Mika.
The Moment Everything Shifted
She still remembers their first meeting clearly.
Her son rushed into Mika’s office, that innocent giggle filling the room as he dove under her desk.
Dasha braced herself for the usual response—concern, worry, desperately asking for what to do to support him.
She was hoping Mika would help him.
Instead, Mika looked at the boy, then at Dasha, and said something that would change everything:
“Believe it or not, he will be fine. It’s you I’m worried about.”
The words landed like a bell struck in an empty room.
Dasha had come to save her child.
She hadn’t realized she was barely holding on.
Learning to Sit Still
She began her healing sessions, followed by spiritual training.
Spiritual practice, it turned out, was nothing like she’d imagined.
There was no instant relief, no sudden clarity.
Just the slow, uncomfortable work of sitting with herself in the early beginning.
In those early meditation classes, Dasha couldn’t focus for more than five minutes.
Her mind was a storm—thoughts racing, body restless, every fiber of her being resisting the stillness.
She remembers feeling almost physically unable to see straight, as if her nervous system itself was rejecting the practice.
But Mika was patient.
And something in Dasha—some quiet, stubborn part beneath the chaos—kept showing up.
Dasha made a choice that felt counterintuitive: she decided that becoming whole herself was how she would help her son.
Every hour spent in practice wasn’t time stolen from him—it was her learning to be the mother he needed, one who could hold space for his pain without drowning in her own.
This reframe turned her guilt into fuel.
She began with Reiki Level One Workshop.
Then meditation.
Then Universal Qabalah, a tradition so intellectually vast and historically layered that she felt fascinated, and yet sometimes overwhelmed by its depth.
In the traditional way, it can take twelve to thirty-two years to master the teachings.
Dasha’s class was moving through each Sephirah faster.
Her memory couldn’t easily hold the names, the pathways, the intricate cosmology of the Tree of Life.
But something deeper than memory was absorbing it.
The energetic rituals were what surprised her most.
Lighting candles.
Entering symbolic spaces through guided meditation.
Moving through the spheres of the Tree of Life in visualization.
She felt like a kid again—not the anxious, responsible version of herself, but the version who believed in ancient mysticism and wisdom.
The part of her that had been buried under years of rational survival.
And slowly, something began to shift.
The Floor You Live On
One of the teachings that stayed with Dasha—beyond any specifics that she learned from years of study—was this:
You are not a passive receiver of life.
You are its architect.
She began to see patterns.
How some families seemed to live on what she called “the misery floor”—where struggle begets struggle, where crisis is the constant hum beneath everything.
Her own family had lived there.
She had inherited that floor.
But Qabalah taught her something radical: she didn’t have to stay there.
Through awareness, through practice, through choice, she could move.
Not by force.
Not through willpower alone.
But through attunement—learning to sense the energy she was bringing into each moment, each relationship, each decision.
Mika was the first person who showed her this was possible.
That she wasn’t waiting for the government, or the doctors, or anyone else to fix her life.
She was in charge.
Not of everything—never of everything—but of her alignment.
Her frequency.
The floor she chose to live on.
It was eye opening and exhilarating.
Many Languages, One Truth
Over the years, Dasha’s practice expanded.
She explored Hatha and Raja yoga.
She spent time in ashrams.
She learned Qi Gong during the pandemic, drawn to the fluid precision of Chinese energy work.
Each tradition felt like a new language—but they were all, she realized, describing the same thing, one truth.
Mika’s meditations remained foundational.
The chakra work. Taoist-style meditation.
The guided ascensions.
The personal mantra Mika had given her, which she still uses daily.
These weren’t replaced by new practices—they were deepened by them.
She learned that spiritual study isn’t exclusive.
You don’t abandon one path to walk another.
You gather tools.
You find what resonates.
You let curiosity lead.
The Practice That Became a Life
Consistency, Dasha discovered, matters more than perfection.
Her New York apartment is small. Crowded.
Her son, now grown, has moved back home after finishing university.
He wakes early for work.
Her husband sleeps late.
There is no sacred corner, no quiet room, no ideal conditions.
But every morning—before her son stirs, before the bathroom is occupied, before the day makes its demands—Dasha sits for meditation.
Sometimes for thirty minutes.
Sometimes for an hour.
She meditates in whatever corner she can claim, no longer caring if her family thinks she’s strange.
At first, she worried they’d judge her.
Now, they’re used to it. She is used to herself.
The hook isn’t discipline.
It’s the feeling.
After a while, you start to experience things: the rush of prana moving through the body, fleeting moments of bliss, a calm that settles into your bones.
You feel different after.
Your life begins to shift in ways you can’t quite explain but can absolutely feel.
And then there’s the long view.
Dasha thinks about aging now—not with dread, but with intention.
She thinks about the kind of elder she wants to be eventually.
Not someone depleted, burdened by bitterness or failing health.
But someone who still has energy to give to the community, to the Universe. Presence. Light.
Meditation, she realized, is how you harvest that.
It’s how you prepare to offer something to the world even when your body slows.
It’s spiritual savings—investing now in the elder you’ll become.
The Path Unfolds As It Must
Looking back, Dasha no longer believes her arrival at Mika’s door was random.
Some people come to spiritual practice consciously, seeking.
Others are brought by crisis.
Either way, they were already on the path—they just hadn’t remembered yet.
Her story isn’t a prescription.
It’s an invitation.
To trust that the thing you’re searching for might not be what you think.
To sit with discomfort long enough to find what’s beneath it.
To practice imperfectly, daily, until the practice becomes part of who you are.
And to remember: you are not here to be fixed.
You are here to awaken.
Mika offers Energy Soul Therapy sessions, meditation instruction, Reiki training, and Qabalah study for students at all stages of their journey. If you’re curious, that’s enough. Start there.
Mika Ichihara, M.S., L.Ac., B.Phar., LLM, LLB, is the integrative healing master | teacher of spiritual knowledge and founder of Love & Compassion Integrative Health. For over two decades, she has helped thousands of patients from all over the world with her unique integrative treatments and spiritual teaching of the East and the West.
Her services include Japanese acupuncture, herbal medicine, Energy Soul Therapy, spiritual healing/reading, and Feng Shui as well as teaching meditation, Reiki/energy healing and Universal Qabalah. Services and teaching available online as well as in-person in Charlotte, NC and New York City.