It is an internal practice, not an external one. The Western forms that grew from the mid-1970s, and then met the New Age movement, are about doing things to people; the Japanese style is about letting go. It changes you from the inside, and when you change from the inside everything around you is affected: the pebble in the pond, and the ripples.

Chakras came into Western Reiki from the New Age movement and have nothing to do with the Japanese system. Teaching from a Japanese perspective, I work instead with Sanmitsu, which I call the Three Diamonds: body, mind, and the breath that links them. Those three sit at the base of every practice in the system.