EFT: Healing for Emotional Trauma, Stress and Anxiety

Medical doctors estimate that as many as 90 percent of all people seeking medical care for any reason are doing so because of a stress-related disorder. Given millions of home foreclosures, jobs lost and parents unable to provide adequately for their children, these numbers are not surprising. Stress is our number one source of medical problems: stress chemicals such as cortisol cause heart disease, increase our sensation of physical pain, cripple our immune system, damage the cells of our brain, leach our energy, rob us of sleep and in the process, destroy our joy in living.

But we don’t have to live at the mercy of the stressful events in our lives. Whatever is going on around us, we have a potent energy medicine technique for relieving stress and processing stress chemicals out of our body and our emotions. This amazing process is called meridian therapy or Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT).

The good news with meridian therapy is that it’s all good news. There are no needles, no pills, no chemicals, no painful procedures and no side effects. EFT is simple, effective and long-lasting—a claim very few therapies can make. I have seen EFT work effectively for clients with memories of parental abuse, PTSD, rape, and other deep emotional traumas.

How does EFT work?

One: it normalizes energy meridians. The part of the brain that processes our emotions is called the limbic system. It is a powerful part of the nervous system, and as such, it can affect any organ, muscle or system in the entire body. When we sustain an emotional trauma, it is recorded in both the body and the brain. The limbic system is on guard continuously. It encodes our negative experiences with an emotional charge, like a red flag. When it perceives something that reminds it of an earlier trauma, it labels that input with another red flag. Within three seconds, it turns on adrenaline and cortisol (chemicals of stress), and produces in us the same emotions of alarm, terror, stress that we felt the first time, no matter how long ago it might have been. We may feel an uncontrollable urge to flee or avoid this new red-flag situation or person or event at any cost.

Meridian therapy or EFT combines light tapping on acupressure points, coupled with mental focus on a stressful circumstance or traumatic event. When you perform EFT on yourself, you normalize your body’s energy meridians relative to an event or circumstance that causes you distress.

Two: EFT changes signals to the limbic system. Using meridian tapping on acupressure points changes signals to the limbic system, the emotion center of the brain that causes our feelings relative to an event or trauma. Pressure on acupoints sends fear-dampening signals directly to the limbic system, the emotional center of the brain. Using meridian tapping on the most painful remembered events reduces emotional triggering by over 90%, and normalizes the impact of these events.

Three: meridian therapy changes the wiring of brain circuits. New realizations are recorded in the brain as synchronous oscillations—at the moment we recognize a different way to perceive an event, a different way to see it, the brain records this learning and begins to create new circuits to carry that new realization. With practice and repetition of meridian therapy, the brain reorganizes its wiring around events and trauma; the memory is there, but as an event only, without the emotional pain or impact. Within one hour of repeated stimulation, the brain can double the number of connections in a neural bundle. This relieves psychological suffering and produces positive changes in the wiring of our wonderful neuroplastic brain, as a result of counter-conditioning our traumatic memories.

Four: EFT is a highly advanced form of thought field therapy. EFT is a more sophisticated and therapeutic form of thought field therapy, which was the first truly effective long-term psychotherapy, available for the first time in the 1970’s. It had and still has, a high long-term recovery rate. In thought field therapy we look at the meaning we attach to a certain event.

Example: abuse by parent. There is the event. And there is the meaning attached to the event. It is the meaning that holds the trauma for us. And it is changing the meaning that holds healing for us. Meridian therapy helps us begin changing the meaning of an event or circumstance with the setup statement, which is the first step of EFT.

The first part of EFT is remembering or thinking of a specific incident with a strong emotional charge and combining the recall with a statement of positive self-acceptance. Pairing the exposure to the memory with this self-acceptance statement introduces cognitive change. In this way EFT changes the experience of our mind relative to the event. EFT tapping is done while using both cognitive exposure and cognitive shift, two therapies proven to be effective in relieving emotional trauma.

Many effective versions of EFT are practiced today. The following is a streamlined version I find helpful when clients have issues that require immediate relief.

Rate the intensity of your issue.

Round one:

Tap the karate chop part of one hand three times with the following type of setup phrase:

“Even though I feel (_________), I deeply and completely love and accept myself.”
Or “Even though I have this (_____), I profoundly respect and appreciate myself.”
Or “Even though I (________), I love and appreciate myself deeply and completely.”

Now tap on each of the following places, saying the phrase of whatever it is that’s bothering you as you tap. For instance, if you were feeling anxious about an upcoming test you would repeat the phrase “anxious about the test” each time you tapped on an area (again on either side of the body.) Tap each point several times as you say your reminder phrase.

Beginning of Eyebrow
Outer Eye
Under Eye
Under Nose
Chin
Collarbone
Under Arm
Top of Head

Round 2

Karate chop—one time

“Even though I feel (_____________) I deeply and completely love and accept myself.”

Tap again with phrase of issue or problem:

Beginning of Eyebrow
Outer Eye
Under Eye
Under Nose
Chin
Collarbone
Under Arm
Top of Head

Round 3

Karate chop—one time

Even though I feel (_________), I deeply and completely love and accept myself.

Now, tap each area while repeating your supporting phrase:

Eyebrow: Deeply and Completely love and accept myself
Outer Eye: Deeply and Completely love and accept myself
Under Eye: Deeply and Completely love and accept myself
Under Nose: Deeply and Completely love and accept myself
Chin: Deeply and Completely love and accept myself
Collarbone: Deeply and Completely love and accept myself
Under Arm: Deeply and Completely love and accept myself
Top of Head: Deeply and Completely love and accept myself

Now, Take a Deep Breath. Breathing deeply helps process energy through your body.

Do this sequence as many times as you need, to feel genuine relief.

EFT is also an amazing tool for healing the inner child, creating unshakable self-esteem, creating supportive beliefs; relieving physical pain and transforming depression. To learn about these and other applications, see www.myenergymedicine.com.