Welcome & Meet Tracy Searight, Reiki Master
GLORIA GRACE RAND: Namaste. What if the wisdom you’re looking for isn’t something you need to learn, but something you already carry and just need some help remembering? Well, today I’m talking with Tracy Searight. She is a Reiki master and teacher of multiple Reiki systems who’s helped countless people reconnect with their inner wisdom through energy healing. And we’re going to explore how Reiki can support women over 50 as we navigate this wonderful season of reinvention. Because sometimes the clearest path forward starts with getting still enough to listen. So I am going to bring her up onto the stage right now and welcome you, Tracy, to Design Your Life, Your Way.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Thank you. It’s wonderful to be here. And what a beautiful synchronicity, as I was moving a deck of cards.
⚠️ EDITOR NOTE: The next short exchange (naming/reacting to the card) is difficult to attribute with certainty from the transcript alone — please verify against audio.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Wisdom.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: I love it. Oh, I love it. Oh, and I know that deck, I think — is that the ones from Denise Linn?
TRACY SEARIGHT: Absolutely. Yep. Sacred Destiny. Sacred Desi — yes.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: I have that deck. I love them, they’re so good. One of these days, maybe on a future episode, folks, we’ll talk about Oracle cards, because they are one of my favorite, favorite, favorite tools. We’ve got so much to talk about, and I thought we should start at the beginning — because I also failed to mention that you and I actually connected originally because you also have a podcast called Ready Set Reiki, as I recall, and you were wonderful to have me as a guest on your show a couple of years ago. But before we dive into what Reiki is a little bit, for those of you who’ve heard the term but don’t really know about it — what drew you to this work? You’re a master Reiki practitioner. I’m curious, because I know a little bit about how I got started, but what was it that got you involved in it? And was there a moment that shifted everything for you?
The Loss That Sparked a Reiki Journey
TRACY SEARIGHT: Absolutely. Standing where I am today, looking back, I probably was doing Reiki my whole life. So when people ask me, when were you doing Reiki, I say, since Atlantis. But the thing came into my life, really, in 2020, and that was a pivotal moment for many people. It was January 21st, and my sister — Angel — had gone into the hospital with flu-like symptoms. And that morning, she passed.
TRACY SEARIGHT: She was our Jenga piece in our family. Taking her out, everyone around her just fell apart. I was a schoolteacher, and at the time my husband had an opportunity to go to El Paso, Texas, so he was already there.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I had stepped down as a teacher because I had kids — four kids, and a foster daughter — so I’d taken a special education aide job instead. Yoga was also part of my life, and even though it helped me tremendously, I just couldn’t get out of that pit.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I was broken. I never thought I was going to teach again. And as the pandemic happened, of course it affected all of us. So I went and redid a teacher training for yoga, and it was in that training that I just completely broke down and cried.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I thought, I’m never, ever going to be able to teach again. I lost my confidence. I lost my willpower. And a friend of mine from college — my roommate, my best friend — had been talking about Reiki back in 2006.
TRACY SEARIGHT: She said, let’s go, we’re gonna go to this fair. And I watched her get a Reiki session, and I thought, this is — this is something else.
TRACY SEARIGHT: The gentleman just had his hands over her, and when the session was over, he asked if she’d had any impressions, and she said she’d seen a figure 8. From 2006 until that point, a lot of things had kind of circled back around for her, and she said, why don’t you give Reiki a try? You really got to get out of this.
TRACY SEARIGHT: So I really thought, what can I do? I decided to sign up for a training. I didn’t even go take a session first — I just went straight into taking the training.
TRACY SEARIGHT: And it was the idea that I just wanted to have my family feel better, have myself feel better. And I never realized, in that moment, the journey I was beginning.
A Shared Story of Grief and Reiki
GLORIA GRACE RAND: Yeah, that’s incredible. And I can relate a little bit to that story too, in a couple of different ways. For me — and this is going back to about 2002 or 2003 — I think I was reading Natural Awakenings magazine, and I saw they were having a Reiki circle in my neighborhood, and I thought, huh, Reiki, what’s that? So I started going.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: And then my mom passed. Even though she’d been ill, in and out of hospitals, I still didn’t expect it — she was only 78, and especially now that I’m in my 60s, that feels too young. One of the times I went to the Reiki circle, when the practitioner was laying hands on me, I just started bawling. All this grief just kind of finally released. It just felt — I don’t know — it was just amazing. And after that, I thought, maybe I want to look into doing this myself. So I wound up getting certified in Reiki 1 and 2.
⚠️ EDITOR NOTE: The following short back-and-forth is compressed in the raw transcript and hard to split with full confidence — please verify the exact speaker breaks against audio.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: You know, one of the things I noticed — well, let me see, where do I want to go first? It’s like so many things here.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I love that you decided — that you wanted to learn.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: So I think I’m going to go first — how did you wind up then? I gather you used it for yourself, and it was helping you, and maybe helping your family members. How did you then make that leap to where you actually started working with clients? What prompted that?
Building Confidence, One Level at a Time
TRACY SEARIGHT: So I started my journey studying. It was level one, and for myself, I had to do self-Reiki for about two years until I had the confidence — I mean, I could get in front of an audience of 200 people and teach, but I could not even do a little group of two people without breaking down. I’d completely lost my confidence. I had two teachers co-teaching level one, and they said, well, you know what, I really think you could go somewhere with this.
TRACY SEARIGHT: My first study was Usui Reiki, and I thought, okay, I need a little bit more, maybe level two. Many people feel Reiki in their hands — they’re in trainings saying, oh, my hands are burning, I feel it in my hands. But I couldn’t. Then I realized I’m an empath — I feel it everywhere. If there’s grief, my eyes start watering. I can feel your back pain. I felt it all over. So I thought, there’s something here — let’s get the symbols involved with level two.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Then level two came, and something shifted and changed — the confidence started coming. Every single night as I went to sleep, I’d repeat the principles. There are five total, and I’d add my own: just for today, I will have confidence. Just for today, I will have willpower.
TRACY SEARIGHT: That was helping me get out of that valley of despair. My daughter would say, you’re wallowing in the grief. I just couldn’t get out of it. And through Reiki, it really built the steps for me to get out of that valley.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Then it came into the Masters level, and there was still a piece missing. I’d framed the whole thing like my teacher training — four years of education — and Usui Reiki kind of wasn’t doing it for me on its own.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Then I found Usui Holy Fire, and it was like, yes, this is my language. It’s an addition of a holy fire symbol and bringing in the energy — it was like chocolate and peanut butter together. That was life-changing for me.
TRACY SEARIGHT: And that turned into — I have a mission here. I created Feather Sister in honor of my sister, because feathers were one of the signs she’d give me. So I had Feather Sister, and I began to teach yoga and Reiki, and it really took off. I went from system to system because I was so curious — animal, crystal, kid, Celtic, fairy, you name it. And I started wondering, why am I taking all of this? Am I doing it to fill a hole? Is it a confidence thing?
TRACY SEARIGHT: And then — you know that scene in Forrest Gump where he’s running and he just stops and says, I’m gonna go home? I hit that moment where it’s like, you know what, this is enough. I need to just do it. And I started teaching, and it really took off when I made the decision to leave Pennsylvania and join my husband.
TRACY SEARIGHT: He said, why don’t you not go back into the schools and try this full time? I was 50 years old at the time, and people would say, too old, why are you doing this — this is yoga and Reiki, this is crazy. And I just went out and things started to happen. I had Feather Sister, then I created Ready Set Reiki, then a mobile yoga business — the Yoga Jeep, beep beep — until the Jeep broke down and we had to build the Yoga SUV.
TRACY SEARIGHT: So I’ve created an entirely new life for myself. And you know, the five-year-old Tracy always knew she wanted to be a teacher — she just never expected to be a yoga teacher doing sound baths.
Once You’re Certified, Do You Ever “Lose” Reiki?
GLORIA GRACE RAND: I would probably be blown away to think that. I knew about animal Reiki, but I didn’t realize there was also — your website mentioned something about crystals, so I’m very intrigued and want to delve a little deeper. And I’m going to ask you this, because I don’t know if you’ve experienced this — well, let me back up. Originally, I got my first certification, I think in 2005. And I practiced it on myself for a while, maybe a couple years, and then I kind of let it slide, because life gets in the way sometimes.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: At some point I felt called to do it again, so I actually got recertified. Although I’ve since heard you don’t necessarily have to — that once you get the symbols, you’ve got it. So I’m wondering, what are your thoughts on that? Is it something that, once you have it, you have it, even if you let it slide?
TRACY SEARIGHT: I’ll go with that. Well, many people believe you’re born with about 20% of the Reiki already in you. I looked up Reiki back in 2020 to really get serious about it — I only thought there was one Reiki, but you’ll find hundreds of styles. Many people, when they become masters, either feel called or channel something and decide to create their own Reiki. That’s why you’re finding all these specialty, complementary ones.
TRACY SEARIGHT: If you have an ethical teacher, and you say, hey, I did this training 20 years ago, should I take it again — when you have that placement (in Holy Fire, an attunement everywhere else), that’s always a part of you. It’ll lay dormant. All you have to do is start using it again.
TRACY SEARIGHT: If you feel called — like, you know what, it’s been a while, I need a refresher — you can take the class again. And there have been some shifts and changes in the last year — Justin B. Stein’s research has come out with information that’s really shifting the history as we know it.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I kind of tell people, listen, I was a school teacher — I used to teach that Pluto was a planet, but now we know differently. Things shift and change, just like in medicine.
TRACY SEARIGHT: An ethical teacher would say, listen, you’ve had it before, maybe I can give you a discount or work with you in some way. But if you don’t feel like you need it — nope, I got it — that’s fine too. There’s so many resources out there, so many books, podcasts, things online, and you want to make sure you really research the teacher.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Just like any profession, you have some bad apples in Reiki too, so you want an ethical teacher. But it is a personal decision. I’ve had students come back and take my training many, many times because they want to teach but need to build that confidence — I’ve been there too.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I saw people take the training and start teaching the very next week, and I thought, why am I doing this? I have all this education, I’ve put in all this time — just do it. The fear is always going to be there. But Reiki and prayer have been instrumental in helping me get over that.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Five or six years ago I wouldn’t have been able to talk like this — people would ask, how are you so confident? There were times I had tears in my eyes wondering if I’d ever get through this, if I’d ever be able to teach again. That’s why I was grabbing onto so many different modalities — dolphin, akashic, rainbow, you name it, the list goes on.
TRACY SEARIGHT: It all branches out from Usui Reiki, though there were other systems before him too — he’s considered the father, the roots, and the tree grows out from there.
TRACY SEARIGHT: You have traditionalists who say, absolutely not, money Reiki, that’s horrible, it’s demonic — but we’re all in this for love and service. If crystals get you on a path that helps you self-regulate in a productive way, what’s the harm? It does no harm.
TRACY SEARIGHT: No matter how you color it, Reiki does no harm — we’re all unique individuals with our own abilities, and we find our way using something and adapting it. It’s like medicine — there are all kinds of different specialists for different areas, so why should this be any different? And one of the cool things about Reiki as a healing tool is that hospitals are starting to recognize and use it now.
What Is Reiki, Really?
GLORIA GRACE RAND: But I wanted to go back to the promise of our show, which is about helping women over 50. We start going through transitions — and you yourself lost a sister, which is kind of what prompted your journey, and mine has happened as well. I can’t believe it’s going to be 10 years now since my sister passed.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: We start going through these life changes — becoming empty nesters. I don’t know how far along you are on that path — mine are still home, it’s me, my husband, and our dogs, all of them functioning adults. That’s where it came for me too — when I turned 50 and left Pennsylvania, they were all still there, and I was moving with my husband and our dogs to start this new life.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: That was a struggle too, because the kids ruled everything — that was a hard transition, and going from Pennsylvania to El Paso, Texas was a culture shock, completely. So how have you found that Reiki can support women going through some of these changes — either yourself personally, or maybe with clients you’ve worked with?
TRACY SEARIGHT: Reiki has no religion to it — it’s spiritual, meaning your own path. I believe in God, I believe in Jesus, Mother Mary, I read the Bible — I was raised Episcopalian, and I choose to bring that in for myself.
TRACY SEARIGHT: So it’s a combination of Reiki and prayer, and how it’s helped me be a better wife, a better mother, a better friend, in a way that allows me to regulate my nervous system so I’m not triggered as much. When Angel passed, I’d go into a store and see something she loved — she loved Disney, Snoopy — and I could feel a wave coming on. Just placing my hands here and asking the Reiki, and doing a prayer, helped regulate it.
TRACY SEARIGHT: It became something I could recognize — okay, this is coming on, I’ve got this. Time after time, it helped soften that, so I wasn’t as triggered when I saw something online. It didn’t ruin my whole day. I wasn’t getting frustrated or reactionary with my husband or the kids for doing something kids do. It really brought a sense of calm and peace.
TRACY SEARIGHT: It opened up a whole new world for me, because I began shifting — okay, there’s anger, it’s here, I can feel it coming on, but I’m not letting it linger. I’m doing something about it now, so it doesn’t stay and fester. I see that happening with clients too, if they’re open to it.
TRACY SEARIGHT: It can absolutely be life-changing, and you can make it whatever you want — if you have a God of your own understanding, or you just want to bring in affirmations. Money Reiki is fun, because it helps release that mindset of limitation and lack. I always had that worry about money because we never had enough growing up, and money Reiki brought in this energy of abundance and prosperity.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Affirmations that mean I’m not flipping out anymore if the water heater breaks or something happens with the car. Five years ago I would have been running around like Chicken Little; now it’s like, okay, I know the money’s going to come. I’m an even steven, I’m a money magnet.
TRACY SEARIGHT: And if someone rips me off, instead of getting bitter and angry, I know the universe is going to compensate me in some way — it’s going to come back to me. I did good, I’m putting good out into the world.
TRACY SEARIGHT: That’s how it’s helped me be a better human being. Instead of going off on somebody, I take a few moments, breathe, and ask the rest of the Reiki to flow. It’s been helpful — I had surgery, and I was giving Reiki to myself in the future.
TRACY SEARIGHT: You can give it into the past too — my dad and my sister passed, and I give it to them in heaven. I give it to my animals that have passed over. You can give it to anything — you can even give it to your phone and ask that every conversation on it be one of positivity and enlightenment. Using it as a tool to help better yourself — that’s how it’s helped me.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: I love that. And yeah, animal Reiki is amazing too — I remember one time our dog wasn’t doing well, something was going on with her, and I wound up giving her some. I hadn’t done a regular animal Reiki course, but I knew enough, and she did come around — she was doing much better later that same day or the next.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: I realized we’ve been tossing this term around, but let me go back and ask you to explain a little bit about what it actually is — just a simplified version, for anyone who’s tuned in a bit late.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Sure. Reiki is a universal energy life force from a source — whatever you consider God of your own understanding. It’s a Japanese form of energy healing, and the word combines two parts: rei, which means universe or spiritual, and ki, which means life force — so, universal energy life force.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Mikao Usui, in the 1920s — specifically around 1923 — is the one who gets the claim to fame, though there were other systems of Reiki around at the time. There was also a book published in 1919 by a psychiatrist writing about Reiki, and systems are often named after the person’s last name — his was Usui. He’s considered the founder of his system. He went up on a mountain, stayed for 21 days, and connected with this energy on the 21st day — that’s when he came down and started the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai.
TRACY SEARIGHT: At the time, in the 1920s, the Gakkai was made up mostly of elite military men. He passed in 1926 due to a stroke, but his claim to fame was in 1923, during the great Kanto earthquake and tsunami, when he helped thousands of people — giving Reiki with his eyes, his hands, his feet. He was like a rock star, helping thousands of people in a short period of time.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Within four years, he had a friend he’d given an attunement to — Hayashi — who eventually trained Madam Takata. Madam Takata was instrumental in bringing Reiki to the West; she was doing this in Hawaii around the time of Pearl Harbor. From there, things evolved, and now we have lots of different systems and lineages, very westernized.
TRACY SEARIGHT: There are a lot of misconceptions — one being that because it uses Japanese kanji, it must be Buddhist. But there’s no religion attached to it. Reiki does no harm — even if someone spoke horrible things over the symbol, it wouldn’t bring any harm to anyone. It’s a complementary modality — we never diagnose, we never go against anything a doctor says, and it’s not a replacement for medical care.
TRACY SEARIGHT: It’s a beautiful stress-reducing modality to walk alongside whatever you’re dealing with in life. Some people have faith in prayer, but sometimes the action of placing your hands somewhere helps people, helps regulate the nervous system — that feeling of touch really helps individuals. So it’s just a great tool.
Money Reiki, Animal Reiki & Using Energy Work on Everything
GLORIA GRACE RAND: It’s a great tool. And you mentioned animal Reiki — animal Reiki can also be used on humans for compassion fatigue, right, if you’re a veterinarian or a zookeeper. We actually lost our dog — we had to put him down in February, and I wrote an article in Reiki News about choosing love.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: My husband wasn’t ready to put our dog down; we’d had him for a number of years. I brought in animal Reiki because I knew he was ready to go, and I was exhausted from taking care of him, and I asked the Reiki to help my husband come to terms with it, instead of fighting with him about it — which, five or six years ago, I probably would have done. Instead, I let it be handled. I prayed and said, please God, let my husband see that it’s time for Bentley to go. And the energy came in, in such a loving way.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Yeah — if you have any style or system of Reiki, you can use it on everything. Animals, trees — and always ask permission with animals too. You can say to them, can I have your permission? And they’ll let you know. If they don’t want it, they’ll shake, they’ll walk away. It’s always meaningful.
TRACY SEARIGHT: You never want to give Reiki to a whole fish tank, because it traps the fish — the fish may not like your energy, they just want their own space. So you put a bubble of Reiki that floats. It’s always a choice.
TRACY SEARIGHT: It’s true about not wanting it — I’ve had cats where one loved it and the other one was like, no, get out. So you respect that. Dogs don’t need it as long as humans do — humans might need an hour and multiple sessions, because Reiki is cumulative, but an animal might only need a minute or two, and they’re done.
How to Start Exploring Reiki
GLORIA GRACE RAND: Well, let me ask you this — if someone is curious about Reiki, what do you recommend? What’s a good way for them to start exploring it? Would it be good to go to something like a Reiki circle — which I probably should have explained, but I know you lead them, so I’ll let you do it?
TRACY SEARIGHT: Yeah — there are Reiki circles and Reiki shares. If you’re a practitioner or master — there are different levels to Reiki. In the Usui Reiki Ryoho that I studied, there were actually four: level one, you’re learning and working on yourself; level two, as a practitioner, you get the symbols; level three, in that system, makes you a master practitioner; and then level four — I actually apprenticed for a year under another master teacher.
TRACY SEARIGHT: In Usui Holy Fire III, you have level one, then level two, which makes you a practitioner, then you wait six months and become a master teacher, and then it’s right away after that. There are all different types of systems, and they may do it differently.
TRACY SEARIGHT: At a Reiki share, if you’re online you need that level-two distance symbol — in Usui tradition we keep the name of it secret, but if you look it up online you’ll see what it is; it gives you the ability to give Reiki at a distance. If you’re in person, there are different techniques for doing a share. A circle, traditionally, involves meditation, and it’s the practitioner sharing with you, whether in person or online.
TRACY SEARIGHT: The best thing is to decide whether you want online, in person, or both. If in person, you can find Reiki shares, or schedule an appointment to try it out. A lot of practitioners and masters offer a discovery call, where you can talk with them a bit — because this is about energy, so you want to feel safe and comfortable with the person. Sometimes it doesn’t matter that they have 25 certificates — you just want to feel calm and comfortable with them.
TRACY SEARIGHT: If you’re online, there are a lot of free Reiki circles and shares out there. I’d recommend listening to podcasts — besides mine, Ready Set Reiki, there’s Reiki Lifestyle with Colleen Benelli and her daughter Robin Benelli — Colleen’s been doing Reiki for decades, and there are lots of resources on her page; she also offers a free Reiki share on Tuesdays.
TRACY SEARIGHT: There’s also Reiki on the Farm with Pamela Allen-LeBlanc — she’s excellent too. Both women are part of the International Center for Reiki Training, reiki.org, and both are authors of the Animal Reiki Manual for the ICRT — great resources.
TRACY SEARIGHT: There are some fantastic books out there too, and the Reiki Business Collective, a free Facebook group hosted by Christian Stone, who also has a Reiki business podcast. There’s lots of great resources — but do your research. Even Google how many systems of Reiki there are, and you’ll see a list.
TRACY SEARIGHT: It’s not that one is better than the other — I call it, as the kindergarten teacher in me would say, finding your ‘just right.’ Usui Reiki alone, I felt like there was something wrong with me — like I didn’t feel it the way everyone else described feeling it. Then I went to Usui Holy Fire, and it was like, yes. Then animal Reiki, yes.
TRACY SEARIGHT: And now I have this beautiful energetic toolbox where all the pieces of the puzzle start to come together, because you may feel called one day, like, okay, I’m a master now, but I’m seeing these symbols and I feel like I can do this — and you might even develop your own system. Anything’s possible.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I never imagined, that first day I took the training — I’d never even had a physical Reiki session myself. My teacher said, hey, we feel you’re moving fast. And I did move fast — I’m an Aries, that’s just my energy.
TRACY SEARIGHT: But it’s okay if it takes you years — you go at your own pace. That’s why I say on my podcast, it’s a journey, not a race. If it takes you 10 years and you put it down, know that when you’re ready to use it, it’s there. And it’s okay if it’s just not for you — it might still be a stepping stone toward something else that helps you, or helps you help somebody else. This might be the first step someone needs toward their higher purpose.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: I believe that 100 percent — I think it’s definitely what paved the way for me to get into light language. So I’m very grateful to have had that, and thank you for all those wonderful resources — I’m going to check them out.
TRACY SEARIGHT: Well, you don’t have to reinvent the wheel — Colleen has invocations on her site. Before you start a Reiki session, you say a prayer of invocation, and maybe that’s a strong point you can build on. She has a book on there for free that lays it all out, so you can build your confidence.
You’re Never Alone in This Journey
TRACY SEARIGHT: There’s lots of great people out there to help. You’re never alone in this journey — I thought I was alone, and there’s so much support out there. I could have let myself linger in that valley, been angry, lashed out, been frustrated.
TRACY SEARIGHT: There’s nothing wrong with needing medication — I just didn’t want to go that route, and I was kind of tired of doing therapy. I thought, okay, this worked for me, that worked for me — it became an option that grew into an opportunity.
TRACY SEARIGHT: And you truly know you’ve healed when you’re out there helping others despite the challenges, because things haven’t been easy. I didn’t have a lot of support growing up as a child — I was always told no, you can’t do this, you can’t do that. It was negativity. I had to really build my confidence within myself, one piece at a time.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: Well, I’m glad you did — and I think that’s a good lesson for all of us, that sometimes you do have to do that, and it’s definitely a journey you move through at your own pace. You don’t have to get caught up in comparing yourself to someone else who was able to do it — that’s a trap.
Why Women Tear Each Other Down (And How to Stop)
TRACY SEARIGHT: It is a trap, called that for a reason. I don’t want to gatekeep — we want to rise each other up. When one of us succeeds, we all succeed. And women are terrible at this — tearing each other down. What’s the first thing they attack? Your looks, your hair, your weight. It’s like, oh my goodness, can we all just support each other?
TRACY SEARIGHT: It gets really hard on social media, because you’re seeing the very best of the best being shown. Like, when I do a yoga class, I’ll have three people, and then I’ll see someone with less experience, less training, and they’ve got 35 people — and you go down that rabbit hole: why, must be a terrible teacher, what’s wrong with me.
TRACY SEARIGHT: And that’s where it comes in — okay, just stop, you’re being ridiculous, it’s not like this every day. It’s a great tool to bring in and give a try — maybe it’s for you, maybe it’s not — and learn a little bit of different techniques. I always ask, what can this teach me, what can I take away from this?
TRACY SEARIGHT: My master teacher always said, look at it like a buffet — you come up, take what resonates with you, you don’t have to take everything on your plate.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: Yeah, absolutely — that meditation piece was great, I’m going to use that in my class. It’s funny you’re talking about how women tend to pull each other down — what occurred to me is, I wonder if it’s because we’re raised in such a masculine culture, and that’s what we see.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: We pick up on that masculine energy — not the good masculine energy, more of the fighting energy — instead of leaning into remembering that we have this wonderful gift of feminine energy that is more receiving, and more compassionate, as opposed to the other side.
Growing Up in a Different Era: Breaking Free from Old Expectations
TRACY SEARIGHT: That, that just occurred to me too — more of a balance of the positive aspects of both, as opposed to the other side. This is gonna really date me, but going into schools in the mid-70s and 80s, it was — you’re seen and not heard, and you have to go into these classes.
TRACY SEARIGHT: In high school, it was typing, business, and the guidance counselor was like, well, you can go into nursing, you can go into teaching — the sciences and maths weren’t really pushed on me. And even my mother, probably unintentionally, would say, oh, you’re like me, you’re not good at this.
TRACY SEARIGHT: That was poured over me, and I limited myself — I didn’t take the more challenging maths or sciences because my mom had already put that on me. And then it was, well, you’re gonna make a really great wife one day — so it was all geared toward: finish college, and the second you finish, you’re supposed to get married. A lot of us got put into marriages we probably should have waited on.
TRACY SEARIGHT: My daughters are clearly learning from my example — they’re in their 20s. My older daughter is 30 and not married, she’s taking her time. My younger daughter, who’s 22, said, well, I want to get engaged, and I told her, that was the age I got married — just wait, what’s the rush?
TRACY SEARIGHT: Everything was rushed — hurry up, get your degree, get married, start your life. And then in my 30s, when everybody was telling me what to do, something in me broke — it was like breaking the girl. I thought, I don’t want this life, this isn’t who I am.
TRACY SEARIGHT: And then finding myself again — I really feel like in my 50s, I’ve truly found myself and put those boundaries up. The people who spoke over me so negatively aren’t really part of my life anymore.
TRACY SEARIGHT: My friend once asked, don’t you want to be an example to your daughters? And I said, I am — they’re seeing this, they’re learning that I’m going to really wait. Everything was rushed with that expectation, and I got into a marriage that I got out of 14 years later.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I couldn’t have waited — I was with someone in college who wasn’t ready. He said he didn’t see himself getting married right now, he couldn’t get a job — this was in 1994, and with everything going on economically at the time, he really couldn’t.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I gave him an ultimatum, and he said he couldn’t, he didn’t have any money. So I left, and I was engaged to another guy within six months, married within a year — and 14 years later, divorced. And then that same first guy — I came back to him, and we’ve been together for 17 years now. So I got a redo.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: Very good — well, see, he wasn’t ready then, and so you were ready for him.
TRACY SEARIGHT: He was. And I’m his first wife, so there you go.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: So I love it — it’s interesting what society puts on you, this culturally created self. Like, you have to do this and that. I let my mother tell me what to do too — who to be, who my parents’ God was — and it was just like, this is enough.
Reclaiming Your Own Sovereignty After 50
GLORIA GRACE RAND: I think one of the nice things to look forward to — for young people, if there’s anyone under 50 listening — is that, as you get older, you do start to hopefully reclaim your autonomy, your own sovereignty, and start deciding for yourself, do I want to do this?
GLORIA GRACE RAND: For me, I was raised Catholic and stayed in the Catholic Church, even though — again, my mother wasn’t the best role model for this either, because she’d complain about the sermons and still keep going. Finally, after she passed, a message I read in the church bulletin really annoyed me, and I thought, why am I still going to Catholic Church?
GLORIA GRACE RAND: I don’t need to keep doing this if I’m not getting what I need out of it — if I’m complaining more than I’m receiving the good news I should be receiving, there’s no point in attending. So I stopped going. I did go to the Episcopal Church for a little while, because I liked that they let women be priests — that was one of the things we didn’t like about the Catholic Church. But that’s a story for another day.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: This has been so great — is there anything else I didn’t ask you about, or one message you’d want to leave our audience with today — something you feel they really need to know?
Trust Your Season: A Message for Women Over 50
TRACY SEARIGHT: Absolutely. When I was in college, taking my core education classes to prepare for student teaching, a professor said, remember, this is a season in your life. And I had four children — I was home raising them, I had to give up jobs and opportunities for my children. I do not regret that at all; if I went back in time, I’d choose it again.
TRACY SEARIGHT: And now I’m an empty nester. So many people look and think, I’m not doing what you’re doing, I want to do this so bad — hold on, your season will come. Those very children I raised are now helping me — they make my logos, they edit my podcast, they tell me, mom, fix your hair on TikTok, or don’t say that, you’re going to get canceled. They’re part of my team now. So know that it’s a season in your life.
TRACY SEARIGHT: If you see someone and feel that pang of, huh, I want to do that — just know there’s a season, hold onto it. It’s a teachable moment. I saw somebody a couple years ago with an ad for a podcast, and that kind of jealousy popped up — I thought, no, no, we’re not living in this.
TRACY SEARIGHT: And I remember thinking, I want a podcast that teaches — and the time came to do it, and here it is. It’s all come together beautifully. So trust in the process — you do have a purpose, and know your season will come. Take care of those children, do that job, do the things you need to do, and that season will arrive. I’m telling you, the blessings will come.
TRACY SEARIGHT: When I started this and left Pennsylvania, I was so scared. I was fighting it — I went to a Renaissance fair, and there was a palm reader I’d go to for fun every year. She was very blunt, which is why I liked her. She looked at my hand and said, stop being a brat, you need to go.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I said, what are you talking about — am I supposed to go somewhere? She said, yeah, you’re supposed to go to El Paso, your husband needs you there, stop it, you need to go. And I went.
TRACY SEARIGHT: The night before, the RV broke down, and my husband drove across in a Jeep he’d bought me — three days, thirty hours. We had six dogs at the time, one in congestive heart failure. We put the back seat of the Jeep down, I laid in the back with the dogs and the air conditioner, and we drove to El Paso.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I thought it was going to be just me and the dogs, sitting on the couch. But I cannot tell you how God put people in my life — within a couple months I met someone who’s become my El Paso best friend. It wasn’t family who showed up to support me, it was strangers — people who found me online, found me here, word of mouth, and became very good friends I met through the podcast.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I’d prayed for that — there’s a prayer, Jabez, and I’ve since learned that the word ‘territory’ can be triggering for people, so I call it community — expand my community, protect me, may your hand be with me. And that’s what the prayer was: allow me to be of service to people, allow me to connect so that I’m more than a contact, I can be a connection.
TRACY SEARIGHT: But have faith — I never imagined my life looking like this. I got so busy that I needed surgery recently, and I thought, what am I going to do, I’m at the height of things, and here comes surgery, and all these opportunities I have to turn down — things I prayed for years ago, and now I’m having to say no.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I think, what are you doing, really, right now, when I can’t do this? But there are lessons in it — what is this teaching me? And I pay attention, so I don’t have to learn it again. It’s a season, and your time will come to shine — believe me, it’s all good.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: Yeah — trust in the process. I love that. This has been fabulous, and I know our audience has enjoyed it. So if they want to learn more about you, and maybe get some Reiki from you, where can they go to find you, to connect with you?
Connect with Tracy Searight & Closing Thoughts
TRACY SEARIGHT: Well, there are many ways. First of all, I have Feather Sister — feathersister.com. I have the Ready Set Reiki podcast, and I also have the Ready Set Reiki Center of Learning, which is integrity-based — again, really check out your potential teachers, do your research, there are some fantastic ethical teachers out there. I’m in person in El Paso, and I’m online internationally.
TRACY SEARIGHT: I also have a show on New Reality TV called Laughing Lightworkers, where we haha our way to healing — I do everything from yoga to Reiki to sound baths, animal communication, oracle cards. I have two special abilities — one where things come to me in my dreams while I sleep, and if I touch the bottom of your foot in person, I can see impressions of your different soul lives. It’s quite interesting.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: Okay, might have to have you back and talk about that. Thank you so much for being with us, Tracy — I really enjoyed this conversation, so appreciate you.
TRACY SEARIGHT: All right, thank you for having me.
GLORIA GRACE RAND: And I also want to thank all of you for being with us today. I really hope you got a lot of value out of this episode, and if you did, let me know — leave us a comment on your favorite platform, whether that’s podcast or YouTube. And we’re on newrealitytv.com as well, so you can check us out there. And until we meet again next week, I encourage you to go out and live boldly and on purpose.
