Emotional Freedom Technique for Health

Personally, I have had extensive experience with EFT over the past 2 years. From the moment I learnt the technique I was amazed by the results and began to embrace it as I could see the possibilities with EFT were literally endless. Consequently my life has been getting better and better over the last couple of years, and recently the results have increased several fold by making some adjustments to how I use the technique.

At first, I used it spasmodically, when I remembered. It wasn’t long before I was using it on a regular basis when I was feeling overwhelmed by emotion. I participated in workshops to learn more about the technique and continued to be amazed at its versatility and effectiveness. How could something so simple be so powerful? It seemed too good to be true.

I learnt about different variations of EFT and how they could be applied and experimented with various things.

I did get frustrated after a while. I kept tapping on deep issues, which at the time were reduced to a zero on the ‘SUDS’ scale (rates the level of intensity of a feeling or emotion). Then, days, weeks, or even months later, these issues would come back again as there was another aspect to them that I had not previously realised. With some issues this would happen repeatedly and I wondered if I would ever get rid of them.

I started to work with a practitioner who was extremely gifted at uncovering issues I had no idea existed and I made great progress at healing my pain. This was pain I had buried for years and had no idea I was avoiding, or how it was ruling my life and relationships.

It wasn’t until recently that I starting using EFT in a way that I have found to be the most effective for me.

During each day there are various moments that I react to with irritation, sadness, frustration, anger, etc. These reactions seemed to me, and probably most people, to be entirely reasonable. Most of our lives we spend being reactive to situations and events and, because we all do it, we generally believe this is normal and acceptable. But what if we responded to situations after considering all possibilities rather than reacting? What if moments and events didn’t push our buttons and cause us to react when consumed with emotion? What if our responses were considered and conciliatory, leading to a satisfactory resolution for everybody involved instead of inflaming a situation?

A few weeks ago, I had just arrived at a clients house. Her place was a reasonable drive from mine, about 20 minutes, and as I pulled up, my husband called. His battery had totally died in his car and, as he was a driving instructor, this was an issue that had to be resolved as quickly as possible. The only reasonable way to do this was for me to drive down to pick him up, get a new battery, etc. He just happened to be about 20 minutes in the opposite direction to our house, so he was about 40 minutes away from where I was currently. This meant I had to drive all the way to him, help him out, and then get back to my client.

I was angry. Actually, that’s an understatement. I was absolutely furious. And as I drove, I began to look at my level of anger and resentment. It wasn’t my husbands fault the car had died. And it was an unfortunate coincidence that I had been so far away when it had happened. Why was I so angry? It really didn’t make sense. So I started continual tapping (tapping meridian points randomly for varying lengths of time) and just allowing my underlying emotions to surface. I was particularly mindful not to suppress any of my emotions.

(It’s important to note here that I recently read some material that said there is bliss in every emotion when it is felt fully. This seemed strange at first, but I have since exercised this and found it to be true. Mostly we filter and suppress negative emotions such as anger, grief, frustration, sadness, etc, because we are conditioned to believe that that is the only appropriate way to respond. However, when you allow yourself to feel an emotion fully within you at a given moment, it flows through you unimpeded and actually disappears relatively quickly, depending on the depth of emotion. When we suppress these emotions, they gradually build until they overflow causing us an enormous amount of pain which becomes overwhelming anger, depression, sadness and this ends up defining our relationships and ruling our lives.)

Now, as I tapped, instead of the anger going, it became absolute rage! I did not understand where it was coming from. It wasn’t this situation that had made me this angry. This was obviously emotions that I had buried for a very long time. All the way to my husband I tapped and yelled and tapped. And yet, I also felt a strange sense of calm as I released the anger. I presume that was the tapping. I made sure I was calm and pleasant as I helped my husband and then on the long drive back to my client I tapped again. More rage and then lots of tears.

I stopped short of my clients’ house and tapped for about another 10 minutes until I was sure I had released all of the anger, and resulting sadness, that had been buried deep within me for many years, maybe even lifetimes! I could not think of an event in my life that would have made me so angry, but just allowing it and tapping at the same time allowed me to release it.

I have been a chronic teeth grinder for many years which was really beginning to cause me problems. I have not been grinding for the last few weeks and I feel a sense of calm that I do not remember previously experiencing.

What I learned from this is that when I am triggered by a particular circumstance, instead of justifying my reaction and allowing it to inflame a situation, I take time to tap and find out what the real issue or emotion is, allowing myself to feel associated emotions fully until it is completely released. This has transformed my life and is having an incredibly positive affect, not only on me, but my relationships.

I am releasing destructive emotions more regularly and effectively than before. I am calmer and tend to consider events more often and respond rather than reacting in a way that can exacerbate a situation that could be defused relatively easily when approached with consideration for everybody involved.

I have found this approach to EFT to be the most effective of all in my life and I encourage you to try this too. Imagine if all the anger in our hearts was diffused forever? What a different world it would be!

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Are you a woman who lives with a secret shame called Closet Eating?

A closet eater is a person with a complex about eating in full view and in front of others. For a closet eater, the idea of eating food in public creates an excessively uncomfortable feeling in their body generating fears and beliefs that people are always watching them and judging what they eat.

Most people speak to themselves over 10,000 times a day and according to research done, studies show that the majority of what we tell ourselves is based on criticism and negative input.

If you are a woman whos unhappy with your body and frustrated with your weight, you most likely are beating up on yourself with critical self talk. Since you are already conditioned to think of yourself in negative terms, you tend to think or believe that others share your negative opinions and judgments.

If you struggle with feeling ashamed when you eat in public, you are most likely replaying memories in your mind of actual events that have occurred in which you felt uncomfortable eating around people.

For example, as a young teen, like me, you may have had a very critical Uncle Don, who felt that he was doing you a big favor by criticizing your body and commenting on what you ate.

As you sat down to Thanksgiving dinner, with a full plate, eagerly anticipating enjoying your food, your Uncle may have made comments about how fat you were and how the food youre about to eat will only make you fatter.

Since your brain is always searching to make new connections, you associate Uncle Dons scathing criticism with the awful feeling of shame that you now have in the pit of your stomach.

In NLP, we call this a kinesthetic anchor. Each time, you are reminded of feeling criticized or judged, your body, sends a signal to your brain flooding your body with stress chemicals designed to alert you to danger. Your body sends a signal that stirs your brain to remember this feeling of anxiety, whenever you are in situations involving social dining.

In specific, your ears sent a signal to the brain that, Youre going to get as fat as a house one day if you keep eating that food. You already look like a truck driver from the back.

Desperately wanting to get away from this threat, you seek to find a way to eat the food you want without being noticed. By doing so, you create a new connection in your brain that eating in secret keeps you safe and in control. Yet because of the flood of stress chemicals that the negative memories create, and societal pressures to dine with others, you feel awful hiding and eating in secret.

Therefore, instead of eating Thanksgiving Dinner in front of everyone else seated at the table, including your Ugly Uncle Don, as many people would do, a closet eater will pick at their meal, often claim that they are not very hungry, and find a way to sneak the food away and eat it in a place where they can be all alone, feeling safe and protected from harm.

Until I finally stopped dieting, and learned to trust myself around food and began to honor my feelings as well as my body, I’m sad to say that I wasted years eating in secret too.

I used to be very strategic and clever in thinking up so many wonderful hiding places for food. I had stashes of cookies in my coat pockets, candy bars under the bed, wrapped snack cakes behind the toilet. I would eat in public bathrooms, closets, behind locked doors, in laundry rooms, anywhere that I could be assured of being alone.

For years I put on a show for everyone, including my Uncle Don that I was doing my best to diet and lose weight. Yet, the moment that I was left alone, I would desperately reach for the food that gave my life comfort and joy. I felt caught in a cycle of self abuse for decades, silenced by the secret shame that I felt that I had no control around food.

Today Ive found a solution that can help you to end your secret shame. I want to help you.

As a Professional Coach, I now understand that closet eating is an example of an eating disorder. Unlike the purging behavior associated with bulimia or the purposeful acts of starving connected with anorexia, closet eating is just as insidious in that it undermines the individual and reinforces negative messages to their brain, making them feel shameful and sinful.

If youre suffering from this painful and shame filled behavior, there is hope for you. One of the things that I recommend doing is learning a process called Emotional Freedom Technique or EFT. EFT will break the connection that eating in public is shameful and threatening.

EFT is based on the science of Acupuncture and often considered to be its emotional equivalent without the pain of needles. Anyone can use it anytime to balance their energy, feel better and overcome negative emotions and fears in minutes.

The reason this re-balancing of energy is necessary is due to the fact that when we experience stress and pain, our bodies hold on to the memory of that event.

Consider that your body is like a smooth running current. When things are going well, the current is flowing gently and evenly. Yet when pain, upset or disease occurs, its almost as though a monkey wrench has been tossed into the works.

This disruption short circuits the entire system, causing arcing and blow outs to occur everywhere. Thats when everything goes wonky, your eating goes out of control, and you feel miserable. That explains why you’re reaching for that food as soon as someone’s back is turned. There are parts of you that are short circuiting. If you want a quick easy, painless way to smooth it all out again, EFT can surely help.

You can have great relationships, wealth, possessions, and a rewarding career but if you’re plagued by pain or illness, it makes life difficult to enjoy. When you’re in poor health it affects everything else in your life. The good news is that a cutting edge energy healing technique that uses the acupressure points on the face and body can help you return to normal health and well-being. The technique is known as Emotional Freedom Technique or EFT.

Clear Ancestral Pain

Our body is basically an energy system. That energy can be disrupted by stress, negative thoughts and limiting beliefs. If you grew up in a family where health complaints where common, you may have adopted the persona of someone who is sick all the time. Consider that, in an effort to relate to family members, perhaps a mother or a father who was often ill or complained of pain, you began to mirror their afflictions. As nutty as this idea might sound, this is frequently the reason rather than heredity, for someone being stricken with pain and illness. This all happens on a subconscious level and EFT which works with the energetic body and the subconscious mind can help you to release long standing health issues.

The Downside of Getting Well Again

Although many would rather not admit it, often there is an upside to remaining ill or in pain. Way back in your childhood, you may have discovered that you received more attention and nurturing when you were ill and so in order to feel loved, you became sick. This is a pattern that can be repeated throughout a person’s lifetime. But there are healthier ways to get attention and EFT can help a person turn this sort of pattern on its head.

Release Conflicts Stored in Your Body

Over time, stress and emotional upset affect our energetic bodies and cause blockages that translate into pain and illness. The emotion of anger is a very powerful one and if suppressed, can develop into serious conditions such as cancer and heart disease. With the release of anger, symptoms can often completely disappear or the disease can go into remission. EFT is a very effective process for letting go of pent up emotions that affect our health.