It’s very rare to meet someone who knows about VortexHealing,” Simon tells me as I lay on the massage table in the living room of his six-floor West Village walkup. “There are only nineteen ‘Merlins’ (Vortex teachers) in the world, but you’ll see, in ten years it will be as popular as Reiki.”

Simon Deacon, is a Reiki master himself, but became interested in VortexHealing after having work done on him at a friend’s party in the city. “It was wonderful!” his face glows when telling me about the experience. As coincidence would have it, he caught sight of a flyer advertising VortexHealing classes at a local supermarket not long after that fateful party. He attended the first attunement and has been practicing for six years now.

“What makes VortexHealing different is it doesn’t just heal what’s in your body but the reality around you by working with divine consciousness. People often incur magical experiences after a healing. They may get a job that has been eluding them. They may find love or run into a long-lost acquaintance.”

But that’s not the only thing that makes VortexHealing different. It has a fantastical history and process, rich in legend, myth, and magic. According to the VortexHealing website, their story began 5,600 years ago with a divinely incarnated man named Mehindra. After his death, he worked with seven other beings to create a link between the “divine healing realm” and human consciousness. Then in 753 BC, Mehindra (calling himself Merlin) appeared to a man in England and passed on the VortexHealing teachings. This continued to other teachers (called Merlins) by means of transmissions, through the Merlin (the fifth one) of King Arthur lore until 1247, when, for lack of suitable candidates, the lineage died off. In 1994, Merlin reappeared in a vision to the founder of VortexHealing, Ric Weinman, who then resurrected this ancient knowledge system.

“If he really did exist, the name Merlin would be appropriate for the kind of magic we do,” Simon says in a humble, anything-is-possible tone. “When we talk about magic we have to throw out what we see in the movies or TV,” he cautions. “Magic is that universal fabric that we’re all connected to. Everything is energy and we’re all a part of it. But whether you believe in Merlin, divine consciousness, or magic, it doesn’t really matter. What matters is that it works.”

Simon then begins a strange, wonderful, and rather intricate healing process. I have been dealing with a certain chakra issue that just won’t go away. The energy gets mixed up in stressful situations as painful vibrations bubbling up to the surface. I’ve been trying Reiki for months and I’m hoping Simon might help take up the energy healing a notch.

The procedure involves several pleasant and unusual steps. Simon manifests invisible “conduced energy crystals” along my body that “create a healing energy grid.” He “fluffs my aura,” dusting off the energy fields and raising the vibration levels. Like a wizard, he sends out “healing structures” from the tips of his finger, which weave into different parts of my body. He even casts “spells,” magical incantations to the heal kidneys, the liver, even awaken dormant potentials within the spirit and body. The process is multi-layered, and multi-dimensional, connecting me with divine consciousness and my higher purpose, as Simon says.

The healing work is warm, calming, but also very powerful. It’s like someone has turned up the Reiki-nob to eleven. I can actually feel Simon’s precise energetic movements and the healing work each step is meant to accomplish. He undoes two karmic knots from the back of my head, later telling me how unresolved negative patterns will immediately start working themselves out. Then, the grand moment comes when he attempts to release the gremmies, deep blocks within my problem chakra. I can feel him dig in there and grab those little suckers and at first it’s a little painful, but then he pulls them out, like miniature vortexes themselves, and what do you know, they release. He does this several times, and I can feel the chakra area clear up and suddenly, instead of feeling like a boiling pot of water, the whole energy flow is nothing but smooth, calm waters. I can’t believe how amazing I feel.

I leave the session feeling healthier than ever before, wondering if maybe my reality will start shifting as Simon had mentioned – was there a long lost friend, a job, or other potentials waiting around the next bodega? My brain is still on overdrive trying to make sense of spells, energy crystals, aura fluffing, and the rest. But then I think about what Simon advised me earlier. “Whether you believe in Merlin, divine consciousness, or magic, it doesn’t really matter. What matters is that it works.” There’s one thing my logical mind or the problem chakra can’t deny - VortexHealing actually worked!

For more info, check out Simon’s website.