Using EFT to Transform Anger Into Gratitude

“I’m riding my bike to work this morning.” my husband tells me at 7:45 am. “I will need to leave by 8:15 am.” he continues. “OK.” I say, as I realize what this means. I will be the one dropping the kids off at school. Feeling time pressured now, I rush to finish the lunches, change clothes, and off we go, running a little behind schedule. We get to the front of the school, and I sigh with relief, thinking we made it on time. But the line of cars going into the school drop off, just sits, bumper to bumper. “What is the problem?” I wonder, a little panicked. I see lots of space inside the courtyard for cars to move up. “Oh, it’s that white car, two cars in front of me. It’s taking its sweet time, and holding everybody else up! But its OK,” I say trying to reassure myself, “I can wait patiently.”

“Woo Hoo! Now, we’re moving!” But, this joy only lasts two whole seconds. I’m stuck again! “What is this car in front of me doing?” He stops, exactly where the white car stopped, to let his kids off!! I can’t believe it! I am pissed! I honk and back up a little, to go around him. I then pull up as far as I can on the curve, so others can also pull in behind me, to drop their kids off. The bell rings as my kids close the car doors behind them. We made it!

Now that I’m not under time pressure, I take notice of how angry I’m still feeling. “Where did all this anger come from?” I ask myself. I definitely don’t like feeling this way, and this tells me, it is an “EFT tapping moment”. So, I begin tapping the side of my hand while focusing on the problem and say what I’m thinking and feeling, “Even though I’m really angry that this person was so thoughtless, I deeply and completely accept myself.” I continue, “Even though I’m really angry that this person only thinks about himself and not me…” as my emotion calms and my rational mind kicks in, I stop tapping because I get an insight, “Oh, I’m taking this personally, and that’s why I’m so angry. I’m feeling like this guy intentionally wanted to block me.” I resume tapping on the face points saying, “This can’t be personal, the driver doesn’t even know me.” After one full round of tapping, I stop to evaluate how I’m feeling. I feel much better, but there is still some remaining anger. So, I start another round of tapping, “Even though this driver doesn’t consider the needs and goals of the rest of the people behind him, I deeply and completely accept myself. Even though we are all trying to get our kids to school on time and the school has rules to help with this, and this driver was not following the rules, I deeply and completely accept myself. I continue to the face points, “Doesn’t that driver realize that by sacrificing a minute or two of his child’s time, he has the power to make life a little easier for others?” I finish the round of tapping, feeling pretty good. Now, my mind turns to answering the last question I asked. Logically, I am forced to conclude that this person did not realize he was creating problems for others or, most likely, he didn’t care. This conclusion leaves me feeling uncomfortable. So, I decide to explore this further.

At home, I take a few minutes to reflect on this, “Why am I uncomfortable with this conclusion?” Well, I believe that people are basically good and therefore thoughtful and caring. I know that other people, my husband included, believe differently. Could I be wrong about this? I’m not willing to let go of this belief so easily because it seems to me like it does hold truth.

David R. Hawkins in his book, Power vs., Force, states:

“We may see two general classes of people in the world, believers and nonbelievers. To the nonbelievers, everything is false until proven true; to the believers, everything said in good faith is probably true unless it’s proven otherwise. The pessimistic position of cynical skepticism stems from fear, while the more optimistic manner of accepting information arises from self-confidence.”

I consider myself a believer from this definition, and honestly, isn’t this a more positive way to live? Let me give you an example of how this shows up in life. My husband and I went to the grocery store one morning, picked up a couple of items and were in the fast lane checking out. I was trying to pay with my debit card and was having a little difficulty getting the card reader to work. My husband was next to me, and another shopper behind him. As I’m punching in my pin code again, the man behind him takes a step forward, trying to see what I’m doing. My husband instinctively steps into his way, blocking his forward movement. I notice this, but at that moment the next checker calls the man over. As the man walks away, he says, “I had trouble with the card reader too and was trying to see if I could help.”

In the car, I pointed out to my husband, our differences in behavior. I did not feel the same threat that he did, but he felt justified. He told me his intention was to protect me from what he perceived as someone trying to read my pin code. Another manifestation of these beliefs is, “You are innocent until proven guilty” vs. “You are guilty until proven innocent”. Different countries base their justice system on one or the other. So what did I learn from my experience this morning? It appears that we are not believers or nonbelievers for life, or maybe not even for a day. During periods of our lives we can feel cynical and at other times we can feel self-confident. We can go back and forth, shifting between both views depending on what emotions we are feeling. Some of us can get stuck in fear and therefore have a really hard time trusting anyone. Others are stuck in trusting everyone all the time and can misjudge people’s intentions, naively placing themselves in situations where they will be hurt. Some of us aren’t stuck, but tend to stay more on one side than the other. Where you are at the moment depends on how stressed you feel. As I look at my behavior from this morning, I have to admit that I definitely acted like a nonbeliever, I was afraid my kids were going to be late to school, I assumed that the guy that blocked me had bad intentions, and therefore got angry.

I could have gone through the day angry at this guy, who was an obstacle to my life, blaming him for my bad mood. But in fact, upon reflection, I can see he was where he was for this very important purpose: to give me insight into where I need to heal and grow. So, I am thanking this stranger, who had an affect on me and helped me to know myself better. I come back to my tapping moment, tapping on the side of my hand as I say, “Even though, I was angry at this guy, I forgive myself for judging him and I am grateful that he showed up in my life. Even though, what appeared as a stressful situation, in reality was just an opportunity for gaining deep insight into my sense of self and into life, I deeply and completely accept and love myself.” I continue tapping on the face points,”I am grateful for this experience and I am thankful that I can use EFT to help me take any negative experience and turn it into an opportunity for growth and self insight.”