27 - Intro to Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT)

Fitlandia | Fitness for Your Mind

Episode 27 – Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT Tapping) Releasing Yourself From a Stressed State of Mind

Today we welcome Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) Therapist Jen Richards, founder of Matrix Rejeneration, who is here to tell us about Emotional Freedom Technique, also known as EFT Tapping. EFT Tapping, or “tapping” is an effective self-help technique which combines cognitive and exposure therapy with acupressure in the form of fingertip tapping on 12 specific meridian points. At the end of the podcast, Jen outlines the steps for us to follow to practice tapping so we can benefit from this quick and simple technique.

Jen’s Story

From her earliest days, Jen suffered with her body image, and by age 17, she had developed anorexia which eventually transformed to bulimia. For next 15-20 years, she lived in limbo not knowing how to eat or nurture her body in a healthy way. She battled depression and her thoughts often felt chaotic when it came to eating. Jen eventually tried tapping and saw immediate results. She says, “I understood why I had developed patterns with eating and the unhealthy relationship I had with food.” This practice can release us from past emotional traumas, stress, or pain and replace those emotions with a state of well-being, giving us back a life of love and healing.

With the success Jen had experienced herself, she knew she could help others by becoming an EFT practitioner and coach, especially to women suffering with body issues. “Once we heal ourselves, we then can inform and inspire others,” she exclaims. Jen has witnessed many triumphs using this technique, and her mission is to empower women so they can step up and step forward into the person they’ve always wanted to be.

How and Why EFT Tapping Works

What happens with stress?

Our bodies are designed to survive and evolve, we are naturally programed to look out for dangers that would interfere with that process. When we encounter things we’re afraid of, or a certain stress, our body goes into a fight or flight mode. We simply can’t digest food properly in this stressful state because our energy is being used for the body to be in survival mode.

Our autonomic nervous system unconsciously reacts and regulates bodily functions such as heart rate, digestion, respiratory rate and other reactionary responses. The amygdala part of our brain, which recalls memory, decision-making and emotional reaction warns us of danger. This causes our body to release an overload of hormones like insulin and cortisol, which are not only fat-storing hormones, but also play factors in weakening our gut bacteria, causing food intolerances and digestion issues. Our thyroid stops functioning properly and even the mitochondria in our cells are diminished, limiting the effectiveness of the metabolic systems we need to burn and digest foods correctly.

These negative thoughts we have about food, ourselves or our actions, set off these hormonal responses and with 37.2 trillion cells in our body, we send those cells into action.

“When we get afraid, it neurologically transforms us.”

How Did Modern-day Tapping Start?

In the 1980’s, clinical psychologist, Dr. Roger Callahan, was working with a woman with an incredible fear of water. This woman’s fear was so great that she was unable to even bathe her children. Without finding success in any current remedies, he read about a similar technique used in ancient Chinese medicine. Pressure was applied (by touch or with needles) to the meridian points that flow through the body. These channels are like energy highways through our systems, commonly referred to as “Chi”.

He discovered when we have a sick feeling in our stomach there’s a meridian point that corresponds with the stomach just under the eye. Dr. Callahan started to have his patient tap on her eye and as she focused on the feeling, eventually the feeling started to leave her stomach and she overcame her phobia. To this day, she is still not afraid. This is when Thought Field Therapy, or TFT, was born.

Dr. Callahan worked along Gary Craig who developed EFT, expanding the practice of tapping. The fundamental difference with TFT being, silently thinking about the problem whereas with EFT, the statement is verbalized.

The Meridian Points – Where to Tap

Karate chop - side of hand

Eyes - between the eyebrows

Side of the eye

Below the eye

Below the nose

Chin between your lip and chin

Below your collarbone(s)

Under the arm (lady’s bra strap)

Crown – top of head

Work from top to bottom and don’t worry about getting it right, even if it’s not perfect, you’re doing some healing in an energetic way!

The Mantra Statement

Besides the physical tapping motion, we incorporate the cognitive piece by developing a mantra statement. This type of exposure therapy gets us talking about our emotions and keeps our energy flowing so we can begin to release them.

Start with how you are feeling, “Even though…”

When acknowledge a craving, for example, start with how strongly you’re feeling it, where you feel it in your body and associate the feeling with a shape and a color.

“Even though I have this craving for _____, this _8/10 craving for _____, and it’s all in my ______, this big _____ _____, I deeply and completely love and accept myself.”

For example, Christa has a lot of stresses in her life, a busy job, home life, finances, etc. She feels the stress in her stomach, and she visualizes it as a big red blob. She ranks the level of her craving as 8/10. When she feels this type of stress, she tends to crave a glass of wine.

Christa’s mantra statement would be something like:

“Even though I have this craving for wine, 8/10 level craving for wine and it’s all in my stomach, this big red blob, I deeply and completely love and accept myself.”

Let’s Put it All Together

Use your mantra as the set up statement, and begin with the side of the hand – the karate chop. (Repeat 2-3 times)

“Even though I have this craving for wine, 8/10 level craving for wine and it’s all in my stomach, this big red blob, I deeply and completely love and accept myself.”

Then, starting at the top of the head and moving through each pressure point, verbalize the “feelings” part of your mantra statement. (Repeat 2-3 times per point)

“This craving, this craving in my stomach, this craving this big blob, this red blob in my stomach, I so want a glass of wine, so want this glass of wine, this craving of wine, this 8/10 craving, I feel it all in my stomach, this craving for wine, this 8/10 craving, I feel it in my stomach, this craving, this big red blob, this craving for wine, this craving.”

Breathe a big deep breath in, let it out and check back in with yourself to see if the craving level has lessened or changed.

Focus on the detail of the feelings at each of the points to release the intensity of the craving.

Tapping helps us discover why we’re really craving something, and to recognize the corresponding emotional reason(s) behind the craving. This is a great tool to use in the moment to decrease our stress level. It gives us access to the frontal lobe of our brains so we can start thinking more logically.

Try to journal while you tap to write down any awareness’s and follow the journey of releasing yourself of your connections you have with food. When we write the issue down, we bring it to life and can see how it may have been restricting us. We can give these thoughts love and not continue to let them control us. “Write it down, and give them the light and the love they actually deserve so you can invite the lesson back to you so you can work through it and grow,” Jen comments.

Your brain is trying to serve a positive function when you crave sugars, alcohol and/or refined carbs. It knows it makes us happy but applying tapping instead will remove that guilt, frustration and shame that follows from performing those behaviors. Now you can create a new pattern that follows and serves your greater good.

“When we shift the brain to gratitude we shift the energy so we shift our biology,” Jen explains.

It all comes down to our thoughts; our thoughts create the blueprint of our reality. The amazing thing to note here is that we have the power to reprogram our DNA by changing the energy flow within our cells.

Jen highly recommends this book, The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter, & Miracles by Bruce Lipton.

Tips:

• Tap whenever you need to, try to get into a relaxed state and then start tapping through the points.
• Use EFT to start focusing on loving yourself. Gratitude is the best state for relaxation and it is this state that our body is in a positive place to work in it best nature.
• Don’t wait until you weigh less to start loving yourself.
• Give yourself a break!

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