Self Healing Portal - Articles & Documents

I had the pleasure of having a good friend staying with me a while back. We were doing lots of healing together, and had also been tackling a job in the garden. It occurred to us, as we worked together, how much the job in the garden was a metaphor for the healing we'd been doing.

Our healing was mostly centered around pretty core issues of self acceptance, and at times it seemed there were just so many issues to tackle, we couldn't see our way through them. The job we were doing in the garden felt a bit the same at the start. In fact, the story started several months earlier really, when I finally acknowledged that the blackberries' threats to take over the property were getting serious. Like I do sometimes with healing big issues, denial kicked in and it took several months before I managed to get myself motivated on the job. A while later, I went great guns at clearing away some of the blackberry for a while, but then got fed up with being scratched and caught up in it, and somehow managed to forget all about the job for several weeks! Then my friend arrived, and we decided to tackle it together.

These are the things that became clear to us with our healing, through clearing away the blackberry:

* Denying that the plants needed clearing away for several months didn't make the job any easier! Not healing our issues as they come up means they can grow from a small plant easily pulled out, into a tangled web that's hard to remove.

* This sort of work is much easier with a friend to motivate you, share successes and laughs and learning along the way.

* At first the job seems huge, like there's no way you will be able to get it all finished, and it's easy to become disillusioned. But just chipping away, 1/2 an hour at a time, sees the job done much quicker than you realise.

* You often get to a stage where the vines grab you and get caught in your clothes one too many times, and you get fed up and just don't want to do any more. You pack it in for the day, and start again feeling much fresher and ready to deal with it the next day. And you know that if you don't, there will just be more to clear when you do finally get back to the job.

* At times it seems impossible to see how to cut the vine out at the bottom, it's such a tangle you can only work on the edge, snipping way what you can. But then all of a sudden, after snipping enough away, the bottom comes into view, and it's easy to reach through and snip it, and pull out a huge mass all caught up in it.

Fortunately there is one difference between the two jobs though - I can't see that it could be at all possible to pull all the roots of the blackberries out and stop them regrowing, but with the fantastic tools that we have for our healing, like EFT & Focusing, we really can get our issues out by the roots, with persistence!

So if anyone out there is feeling like your issues are just too big and you'll never be able to clear them, draw on the motivation and support of a group or a friend, or just someone who can listen, and think blackberries!!! It didn't take that long until we couldsee the whole wall, and it looks fantastic!! And because were were working at the core of our issues, we are both starting to really see that self acceptance is becoming a real goal, rather than a hazy concept that we can intellectually buy into but can't really see ourselves achieving.

In this world where the intellect is prized, and the right side of the brain seems to be crowded out by logic, we are lucky to have the tools that we do, such as EFT, TAT, Reiki, Meditation & Focusing, to swing things a little more in favour of the right side of the brain. When I recently saw the 18 minute video (available to view here) of Jill Bolte Taylor, a brain scientist who spoke about the experience of watching the affects of a stroke on her, it really got me thinking how it is that these tools are so useful.

Jill spoke about how when the left side of her brain shut down in the minutes and hours following the stroke, the feeling of separation and logic so familiar to that side of the brain receded, and allowed the expansive feeling of belonging and being connected to all, that the right side of the brain knows, to come to a fore. She concluded her passionate presentation with an urge for all of us to make the choice to live more from the right side of the brain.

Reflecting on her presentation later that day, I realised how powerful a metaphor Jill had shared with those of us walking the path of self healing. We live in a world dominated by the left brain, and yet the left brain is simply not equipped to heal most of our physical and emotional issues, if any. If we could heal based on logic and reasoning alone, none of the fabulous tools available for self healing today would ever have emerged. Their strength, both individually and collectively, lies in their ability to help us to tap into the right side of the brain, where I believe all true healing occurs.

And yet it’s still so tempting for a lot of us to analyse and try to reason our way out of our issues! We think if we can only figure it out, we’ll be free from the emotional highs and lows we are experiencing, and live happier lives. I feel that the key to our healing lies in the times that we make the choice that Jill was talking about – making the choice to maximise the times where we are living out of the right side of our brain, and allow that part of our brain to resolve our issues based on it’s own wisdom.

I’ve had a couple of wonderful experiences of this recently in my own healing journey. Travelling through my home country of New Zealand over the last couple of months, I’ve noticed a couple of issues creep in. Trying to “figure them out” netted no change at all, so I sat down to do some EFT to see if I could get to the bottom of what was going on. As I went through the EFT, I became aware of a part of me that I had previously been completely oblivious to, a part that was trying to protect me, based on assumptions left over from an experience so long ago, that I thought was no longer affecting me. I was incredulous to hear that part’s message, to realise that a part of me was still frozen in time, and to experience the integration that followed theEFT session. I would never have figured it out logically, it would simply never have occurred to the left side of my brain that the issue I had was in any way connected to something that I thought I had resolved long ago. I gave thanks for the power ofEFT to help me to get out of my own road, and allow my right brain to go to work.

A month later, during a Focusing session with my new Focusing Partner, I saw this in action again. I was feeling overwhelmed about my inability to shift a long term pattern, one that the logical side of my brain has been ready to trade in for some time, but seems to lack the ability to figure out how! As I Focused, and went into the felt sense that developed in my stomach, I asked the felt sense what it needed. All of a sudden I saw an image of a little plant in a pot, badly wilted with the flower drooping right over. I just knew that the plant represented a part of me that I hadn’t given any energy to for a long time, if ever, and I felt such sadness. My left brain immediately kicked in and demanded to know how the little plant could possibly be saved. I took a breath, put my hand back on the felt sense, and just allowed whatever needed to form the space to do so. The little plant revealed that all it needed was a little water to keep it going, that no great measures or heroic efforts were required, simply a little water, and the energy that went with delivering it. Logically the issue was still as big and impossible to resolve as before, but I had had that shift that all Focusers come to know, that shift that suddenly meant I was no longer in the place of disempowerment that I was, and had instead felt an undeniable forward movement. I smiled and gave thanks for the power of Focusing to help me to get out of my own road, and allow my right brain to go to work.

It is my belief that Reiki, EFT, & Focusing, and many other methods of the same genre, all assist us to get out of our own way, to move aside the logical left brain, to allow a window into the creative and wise right brain. However none of these methods are any use to us, without what Jill Bolte Taylor spoke so eloquently about – we need to make the choice to live more out of the right side of the brain. So if you are tempted to spend more time trying to figure it all out, remember that involving both sides of the brain will actually enable you to do that far more effectively. All the tools mentioned on this Self Healing Portalcan help you do this, once you’ve made the all important decision to honour the right side of your brain.

When I was new to EFT, I spent a lot of time studying how to deal with psychological reversal, and I felt it held the key to healing complex cases. I regularly used language like ‘self-sabotage’ and ‘resistance’ in my healing vocabulary. As a new practitioner I found myself feeling like I was ‘doing battle with PR’ a lot of the time. With what I’ve learnt over the last few months, I now realise that using all of these terms can be counterproductive, and there’s a much more supportive way to look at this important aspect of healing.

Learning Focusing has completely changed the way I approach my own healing, and the way I work with others. It has helped me to realise that there is no definitive “I” who is feeling something, but rather “I” am a collection of feelings, thoughts and beliefs, some of which are completely inconsistent with each other. I have come to realise that it isn't helpful to see myself as being reversed on healing an issue, or as if a part of me is sabotaging myself, and that instead, it is far more supportive if whenever I feel stuck in any healing that I’m doing, I acknowledge that it's probably simply a result of there being a belief, emotion, or thought inside of me that needs to be heard.

After working with the ideas in Ann’s writing about using Focusing with action blocks, I realised that what she was talking about extends far beyond dealing with action blocks themselves. Ann writes that any time there is something that you want to do in your life that you don’t, you need to be aware that there is also a part of you that doesn’t want to do the action. I have found that this also applies to things that you want to do that you actually do. Here’s an example that may help explain this:

I have made the decision to move back to New Zealand, and to build an eco-home and create a large permaculture garden with my partner. I’m really excited about the upcoming move and the whole project, even though I know it’s going to be a huge amount of work. I’m also aware of some thoughts that in the past I would have pushed out of my awareness, because they would have seemed too difficult to deal with. These thoughts are along the line of the fact that I love living by myself, I love having all the time I do to do the healing and learning that I’m doing, and I’m not going to have the luxury of all that time once building our own home. By sitting with these thoughts, I am able to acknowledge them as real. With what I’ve learnt with Focusing over the last few months, I know that it’s not a matter of having to convince that part of me that it is wrong and that it needs to change it’s mind, but rather all I need to do is simply hear it’s concerns. I’ve experienced the forward movement that comes with this so many times, I know it’s a safe thing to do, and that I’m not going to end up feeling like I have to negotiate with someone holding me hostage, which is how I would have felt in the past if I had seen this as resistance or self-sabotage or psychological reversal.

If you are feeling stuck in some area of your life, or things just aren’t flowing in the direction you want to go in some aspect, consider looking at the language you are using, when you talk about the problem, or simply when you are ‘talking’ to yourself with your thinking. You may find that there are aspects of yourself that you are denying the right to be heard, who are, for good reasons, pulling in a different direction to where you want to go. If you are using EFT, consider tapping for these thoughts in a way that you acknowledge that this part of you has a right to feel the way it is, and try finding ways to listen to it, rather than simply tapping to ‘remove the resistance’. You may find that your relationship with yourself changes radically, and moves you towards true self-acceptance.

I now realise that my initial instinct that dealing with what is termed psychological reversal is indeed very important. However I have found that my approach to it has completely changed. Where in the past I thought I need to tap to ‘remove’ the PR, I now realise it’s far more a case of needing to take the time to truly listen to feelings, beliefs and thoughts inside me. Focusing has really helped me to do this, because through it, I have experienced time and time again that I do not need to exile the part of me that is pulling in a different direction to where I want to go, and I don’t have to negotiate with it either, or try to change its mind. All I need to do is simply listen. What a relief!

The internet is such a rich source of free information and inspiration to help us with our healing, but there is so much out there sometimes it can take some time to tap into useful resources. This article provides links to and information about a couple of sites on the internet that have some really useful resources.

This blog, created by the makers of the new DVD on EFT called “Try it on Everything” has lots of free audios available to listen to online, or download. Each audio is an interview with an EFT expert, giving ideas of how to approach a certain issue with EFT. I find them to be a rich source of both inspiration and information – I download a few onto my MP3 player, and listen to them sometimes while walking with the dogs. Each one is about 30 minutes long, and contains ideas on how to approach the issue, as well as some example tapping. Initially I stuck with listening to the ones with topics that seemed relevant to what I was working on, but I later discovered that listening to the topics that didn’t seem relevant was often just as useful, because it gave me ideas of different approaches, which can be used no matter what the issue you are working on is.

EFT is such a wonderfully simple method, and yet it has such scope for creativity in its use that different people can use the same basic method in quite different ways. The interviews on the EFT Revealed blog give many ideas on how to approach an issue, because they are with such a wide variety of very experienced EFT practitioners. If you are stuck on working with an issue on your own, or just looking to learn new ways of applying EFT, I highly recommend these audios. If I’m working on something and no matter what I tap on, I just don’t seem to be able to clear the issue, I sometimes download and listen to one of the EFT Revealed audios, and more often than not, I have an idea of a different way I could approach it which helps me to clear the issue.

One interview that I listened to recently which contained a particularly useful idea was Maggie Adkins Talking to Your Body. Maggie presents a very simple but powerful method for getting answers from your body about an issue, that could be used any time you are working on something physical and looking for a new lead to tap on.

I have recently discovered that EFT Practitioner Brad Yates has two free demo e-tapping files available on his web page. This tapping is a brilliant way to start your tapping on a resistant issue that you have been trouble shifting. I find that if I do the tapping with a particular issue in mind, before starting other work with that issue, something seems to open up inside me and give me more access to shift the issue. You can either play the two audio files online and tap along, or download them in MP3 format onto your computer.

Ann Weiser Cornell’s Focusing website is really rich with sources of free information and inspiration for anyone using Focusing as a tool in their self healing. There are three main areas of free information on this site:

The library contains lots of articles that give insight into Focusing. Ann generously shares her huge experience with Focusing through these articles, and reading a selection of them is a great way to see how powerful the Focusing process can be, and how you can approach the stories waiting inside you to be told.

The FAQ page not only contains answers to frequently asked questions, but also an index to the weekly Focusing tips that Ann sends out in her newsletter. These tips are a brilliant source of information – if you have been doing some Focusing and seem to have hit a brick wall and just can’t go any further with an issue, scan your eye down the list of topics and you may well find something jumps out at you. I’ve used this quite successfully – picking a topic that seems to be drawing my attention, and through reading the tip learning a new approach to listening to the story inside of me.

The multimedia download page gives links to download sample chapters from Ann’s books, and recordings of phone seminars that Ann has done. The phone seminars are a great way to get a feel for how you can use Focusing.

One area I’ve really benefited from with Ann’s resources is Focusing on Action Blocks. If there is something in your life that you want to be doing, that you just don’t seem to be able to do, using Focusing can be really powerful. If you prefer to read about this, you can read a chapter from Ann’s book “Radical Acceptance”, or if you would prefer to listen, you can listen to the phone seminar Ann did on Focusing and Action Blocks.

If you are looking for a simple method to help you to deal with ongoing anxiety, a method called "Simple Energy Techniques, which is a simplified version of EFT might be of use to you. Dr David Lake and Steve Wells are well known EFT practitioners and trainers from

Australia

,who have come up with this technique by observing what happens when you miss certain parts of the EFT process out. They have agreed with Gary Craig that it will be known as SET, as it is in many ways different to EFT, although it is derived from use of EFT.

For anyone dealing with ongoing anxiety, there is an EFT Revealed interview with Steve Wells available for free download which is very interesting, and talks about how to use the SET method. You can download the audio free of charge from http://eft-revealed.com/blog/category/anxiety/ Alternatively, you can download Steve and David's free report about SET here.

One thing I like to say is that I got a lot of help from that site you told me about - that anxiety tape and their concept of continuous tapping. I tap on my fingers quite a lot now at random times and I am much calmer. In fact weirdly more so than I have been from a year of more of practising meditation and breathing exercises.

So if you are looking for a simple way to deal with ongoing anxiety check out the information on SET, a very simple self help method that can work very rapidly and very effectively for some people.

I have been experimenting with some ideas that EFT expert Silvia Hartmann wrote about in a recent EFT Newsletter, and have found this to be very effective. Silvia talks about the idea of proxy tapping for our past selves, and healing across the different time periods of our early life. You can read the Silvia’s article on the emofree site.

A really powerful use for this that I have discovered is working with really key writing on our walls (key messages we took on board that dictate how we behave now). I recently had something happen that caused me to worry intensely about something, and when I felt the worry as tightness in my chest I realised that I really needed to sit down and do something about it. I’ve been trying to break my worry pattern for years and while it has improved a lot, the tightness was letting me know I had some way to go!

I started by pulling out a copy of Silvia’s article, and thinking about events that could have resulted in writing on my walls to do with worry in the different time periods she suggests (pre-birth, birth, first 6 months, 6 months to 2 years, 2 to 6 years), and came up with the following list (note that the items on the list are of course based on my own perception as I grew up, and may bear little resemblance to reality in some cases. When we are working with healing, it’s our perceptions that matter, not what was in actual fact the case):

I also made a list of conclusions I had drawn about worry as a result of my upbringing and came up with:

I then used another method I sometimes use to flush out additional writing on the walls – thinking about how a person without your writing on the walls handles a similar situation. This led to me thinking about how my partner was handling the same situation, and flushed out the writing on the walls that:

I decided to combine the sort of tapping and phrases that Silvia suggested in her article, with doing the 9 gamut process very slowly for each trauma, something else I have been experimenting with and finding very powerful. Sometimes I type up the starting statements that I am going to tap on, in order to allow myself to just “follow along”instead of having to think up the words as I’m tapping. This is the process I mapped out:

1. Start by tapping on the top of the head and talking to the baby and young child inside of me to let them know what I would be doing, and thanking the parts of me who have been keeping me worrying to ensure that I’m a responsible person. (To start with acceptance and make sure all parts of me realised this was a team thing, rather than something I was trying to “get rid of.”)

2. Even though this baby was bathed in worry while in the womb, from when her Mum was worried about the affect on her of the medication she was taking for a short time,from all the things her Mum worried about while pregnant with her, I now deeply and profoundly love and accept and heal this baby. (Setup on karate point then rambling through the points with the various parts.)

4. Tapping through all points with the phrase “I now deeply and completely HEAL this baby of all effects of worry sustained while in the womb”

5. Even though this baby was affected by all her Mum’s worries leading up to, during and after the birth, and was so worried about being born that she was two weeks late, I now deeply and profoundly love and accept and heal this baby. (+ Rambling through the points including statements like “born into worry and stress”)

6. 9 Gamut process for worry about being born and associating life with worry because I was born into worry and stress

7. Tapping through all the points with the phrase “I now deeply and completely HEAL this baby of all the effects of worry sustained leading up to, during and after her birth.”

8. Even though this child was taught to worry and not to trust, I now deeply and profoundly love and encourage this child to trust(+ rambling through points)

10. Tapping through all the points with “I now deeply and completely HEAL this baby of all effects of being taught to worry as the first response to anything upsetting and let her know that it’s safe to trust.”

11. Even though this child was taught that it is responsible to worry, I now deeply and profoundly love and encourage this child to know that trusting in the responsible choice. (+ Rambling through points)

12. Tapping through all the points with “I now deeply and completely HEAL this baby and this little girl of all the effects of being taught to worry as the first response to anything upsetting and let her know that the responsible choice is to trust.”

13. Even though as a baby and a child I was taught that responsible people worry, I now choose to know that the responsible choice is to trust. (Tapped this with three rounds: 1 - Taught that responsible people worry, 2 - The responsible choice is to trust, 3 - Alternating the two

As I tapped the following additional things came to mind which I addressed as they came up:

By the time I had finished half of this tapping I had burped and yawned so much,and accessed so many previously unknown feelings that I had to stop for the day. By this time I had completely stopped worrying about the previously “major” situation, and had realised that my partner’s approach was the responsible one.The following day I finished off the tapping to be sure.

While I won’t know whether or not this has really made a dent in my lifelong tendency to worry for a while, I know that I cleared a heck of a lot of writing from my walls that I didn’t even know I had and I have had an number of occasions since where I would normally have worried, which haven’t resulted in any worrying at all. I was also totally at peace with the situation that had caused so much worry that my chest had been tight, and surprise, surprise – it resolved itself the following day and it turned out my partner’s approach was the only sensible option! I have also had a marked absence of the voice in my head who is usually giving a running commentary on things to worry about which has taken me rather by surprise!

I seriously encourage anyone who is dealing with core writing on the walls to consider using the tapping in this way that Silvia suggests, and incorporating a slow and mindful version of the 9 gamut process each step of the way if it feels supportive to you. This sort of tapping on early messages is so incredibly powerful, it’s really getting to the root of so many of our current issues. If you would like to try this, here is a summary of how you could approach it:

2. Brainstorm events that could have resulted in the writing on your walls for each of the age groups: (pre-birth, birth, first 6 months, 6 months to 2 years, 2 to 6 years)

3. Write down a list of conclusions that you may have formed about the topic you are working on as a result of your upbringing. If you would like to, also consider the view point of someone who doesn’t share the writing on your walls to see if you can find more writing on your walls to list down.

a. Set an intention while tapping on the top of your head. Let the baby and young you know what you are doing. Tap to thank the part of you that drives the behaviour for doing what it has been to help you and invite it to work with you.

b. For each setup statement also create the words to ramble through with, note that you will do the 9 gamut process and use Silvia’s statement “I now deeply and completely HEAL this baby/young child of all effects of ….”

c. Finish with a Choices Statement that reflects where you would like to be now with the issue.

5. Incorporate new items that come to mind into the tapping as you tap through the script. If more specific thoughts come to mind, modify the script to also incorporate them.

6. If there is any blame or resentment for you with those who contributed to the writing on the walls, tap to clear these as well as this can reveal other issues standing between you and peace.

I recently had the privilege of witnessing the most beautiful healing in the son of a friend who came to see me. There were a lot of learnings for him so he generously suggested that I write up his case to share in case some of the learnings help others.

Lucas is in his mid twenties and is a healthy and fit young man. The reason he came to see me was that he had a huge longing for an intimate relationship and it was dominating his feelings. He stressed that he came from an excellent family and had a great childhood and felt that he didn’t really have any issues, yet he couldn’t understand why he hadn’t had any success in finding a relationship.

The first session we did didn’t really reveal any new information and Lucas was a little frustrated that he wasn’t able to access his feelings. So at the start of the second session I asked Lucas whether he knew anything about his birth (I was working on the basis that the first intimate relationship we have is with our mother and was curious to know whether there were any challenges for him right from the start.)He said that he was born a month early and spent several weeks in an incubator. He knew that his mother was upset at not being able to spend as much time with him as she wanted to, or hold and feed him when she wanted to. I introduced Silvia Hartmann’s idea of proxy tapping for past selves to Lucas and asked him if he would like to try some and he thought it sounded worth trying.

While tapping for the little newborn baby he was, alone in the incubator, Lucas started to get in touch with a little sadness for the little boy. We did some tapping on the sadness and some on how he didn’t have the intimacy he wanted with his mother right from the start and how that may still be affecting him now, and Lucas suddenly realised that a part of him was really afraid of intimacy. We continued working on this theme, while also tapping for the little baby he was, and this issue was collapsed and Lucas felt really differently.His longing for a relationship and his fear of being hurt and vulnerable seemed to have simply vanished.

At the start of our third session together Lucas was feeling a little raw and was very surprised to have realised since the last session that in actual fact he wasn’t very in touch with his feelings at all. He had come to realise that he is a very intellectual person and constantly analysed what he thought about a situation, but was rarely in touch with how he actually felt. When we started tapping on sadness for the little boy who had been so isolated, Lucas said he felt it wasn’t worth going there and really minimised the sadness. We both felt like there was a brick wall in between Lucas and his feelings as the session progressed, and that we weren’t getting to the real issues, instead it felt like we were just circling round and round symptoms of the problem.

At this point we decided to try some Focusing, which Lucas had read a little about but not yet tried. I invited him to go inside and see if he could get in touch with the part of him who was sad. He said he felt as if he had been hit in the stomach and that he could feel the sadness there, then almost immediately Lucas said that he thought this was silly and not worth going there. I suggested he see if he could get in touch with the part of him who thought it was silly.As Lucas sat and listened to this part of him, it became evident that the part was trying to protect him from feeling, something it had done all his life, since the intense feelings of being all alone in the incubator had been too much for Lucas to deal with. Once he had truly listened to this part, Lucas was then able to get in touch with the intense sadness and aloneness of the little baby in the incubator, and for the first time in many years, he found himself able to cry. As we tapped and Focused the image of the baby in the incubator went from one of intense loneliness and vulnerability, to one of being protected and safe, and Lucas felt like a huge mountain of emotion he didn’t even know was there had been shifted.

When Lucas suggested that I might like to write up his case, he told me some of the things he had learnt from the EFT and Focusing sessions that were really important to him. They included:

Lucas feels like so much in his life has changed as a result of this and he left the fourth session determined to maintain his newly established dialogue with the fearful voice in his head.

If you have been working with EFT or another method of healing for a while and are finding that there seems to be a brick wall standing in your way, consider taking some time to go quietly inside like Lucas did, and see if you can hear the voice in your head that is urging you not to go near how you are feeling. Simply listening to that voice, without reasoning with it or trying to change its mind, may enable you to discover why that part of you is afraid of you getting in touch with how you are feeling about the issue. If you find it difficult to do this sort of exploration alone, consider having a session with a Focusing coach to help you to get in touch with this aspect of you.

The Dangers of Positive Thinking (Making friends with “negativity”)

If ever there could be an unpopular title in the self help world, this might just be at the top of the list! I know, I can hear the uproar now, but I believe that this is a really important topic to address. Fortunately with an awareness of the downside of too much positive thinking, and tools like EFT and Focusing, this needn’t be a problem for any of us.

Many people think it’s not possible to have “too much” positive thinking, but I believe that positive thinking used unwisely, when it essentially just smears a very thin coat of paint over a wall covered in unhealthy beliefs and points of view and unresolved emotions, can literally kill us.Research is now showing that there is a common profile amongst people who have cancer, and included in this profile are being nice and positive and rarely expressing negative emotions or thoughts.

Negative thoughts and feelings have had a bad rap over the last couple of decades, but it is my belief that these thoughts and feelings are in actual fact our friends. I see regular “negative” thoughts and feelings as being similar to a warning light on a dashboard – if they keep showing up they are alerting us to some underlying issue that needs to be resolved. We can try to stop the light coming on with a lot of positive thinking, or we can clear the underlying energy blockages that are resulting in the light coming on. If we clear the underlying blockages, we will find ourselves naturally thinking positively because the cause of the “negative” thoughts will be gone. This has the added benefit of freeing up all the energy we were using to consciously create positive thinking, which becomes available for healing and enjoying life.

It can be difficult to see so called “negative” thoughts and feelings as our friends, so here are a couple of examples to illustrate this idea in action:

Food sensitivities

For many years I had reactions to a lot of different foods. I thought that it was the inevitable end result of damage to my digestive and immune systems due to the long term illness I had, and the medication the doctors prescribed. I was determined to be positive about it, and my message was that it didn’t matter that I couldn’t eat a lot of regular foods,I was lucky just to be well, and when I didn’t eat the foods I was reacting to,I wasn’t ill. Eventually, thanks to EFT,I was able to discover that there was a little voice inside me that was trying to protect me from the foods that it considered to be dangerous for me. When I was able to stop covering over the voice with positive thinking, and instead listen to its message, I was able to heal the beliefs that were causing that part of me to react to common foods. I haven’t had a single reaction to a food or chemical in the 18 months since, all because I stopped ignoring the “negative”thought, and instead befriended it and took the time to listen to it.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

A common pattern with folks with CFS is to push ourselves very hard. This often includes lots of positive thinking to convince ourselves that we can seethe positive in any situation and carry on and get things done. CFS is a devastating illness, and the need to be positive is very real. However it’s another good example of where being positive to the exclusion of listening to the “negative” messages of our body and mind is not conducive to healing.

There is always a reason why we have the symptoms that we do and in a lot of cases no amount of positive thinking is going to make them go away.With CFS a far more helpful approach is to make friends with our body,and really spend the time hearing its message, hearing all those so called“negative” thoughts, beliefs and feelings, which are truly our friends as they hold the keys to us discovering why we are ill and how we can heal. For those of us who put a lot of pressure on ourselves sometimes the only way our body has of drawing our attention to points of view and feelings that we have that need resolving is to shut down our ability to really function in the world.While we can just put a brave face on and accept our limiting functioning, we can often move to far greater healing by befriending our body and our “negative” thoughts and in doing so discover the key to our healing.

If you would like to explore this idea further, check out Appendix J in the free book “You CAN Heal with EFT” and do some tapping for the part of you that wants to just think positively and the part of you that is producing the “negative” thoughts. This process by EFT Master Jaqui Crooks can be a great way to start a tapping session and maximise your chances of making friends with that part of you that is being “negative”. When we do this, more often than not we discover that the part has positive intentions and if we can hear it out, we can start working with that part of ourselves instead of just painting over it with positive thoughts.

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A Healing Journey by Rebecca Baldwin

Rebecca has battled for many years with depression and major challenges with her weight and binge eating. She has searched for answers in many directions and for a long time feared that nothing would really shift things enough to be able to lead the joyful life she so desperately wanted but had trouble envisaging due to her challenges. In this article Rebecca shares with the Self Healing Portal readers a method that she has discovered that has helped her move towards peace and truly learning how to love herself. Many thanks to Rebecca for sharing this inspiring article.

Dear Friends,

As I begin to write this letter to you, I am surprised that though I’ve been thinking about writing this for more than a month, I still do not know where to begin. I normally try to tell my story chronologically and in context, but I feel now I want to start simply by trying to describe today.

Today is sunny, warm, and early autumn in my neck of the woods. Today is deep breaths and expansiveness in my chest. Today is joy and confidence and simple ok-ness that I haven’t always known. And really, today is not so very different from a lot of days I’ve been living recently.

I have not always described today this way. I have not always felt the electricity that flows through all of life or marvelled at what my body can do. I have not always differentiated between my mind, my body, and “me” – that is, the “I” that in English claims possession of that mind and body. I have not always known my own power. I have not always felt frequent bursts of uncontrollable gratitude. And I have not always been free to take good care of myself. But today, I am.

My journey to today has felt long at times, though today, it looks so short. My journey to today has been full of tears and pain and fun and games and fear and gnashing of teeth. My journey to today has encompassed more self-help stress and boom-bust (hope-depression) cycles than I care to remember. My journey to today has been ugly and beautiful and strange, and I am crazy grateful it has brought me to today.

I don’t quite know if it would be responsible of me to encourage you all to run right out and start learning Focusing tomorrow on the promise of wild freedom, though I think that’s a pretty accurate description of my Focusing Partnership experience. I want to acknowledge the power Focusing has given me to consciously create the life I want. I also want to acknowledge that my Focusing does not stand in isolation; I cannot separate it from all my life experiences or from the myriad other healing tools I’ve utilized (and dabbled in) along my way to today.

While I can’t know to what degree my today has been created by Focusing as opposed to any other means of bringing about the good, I do know I have watched myself change exponentially since beginning Focusing Partnership. It is exciting to see such positive growth build on itself so rapidly after years of feeling the steps were slow and hard-won.

I also know how I feel when I Focus. Suzanne Noel (Focusing Teacher) likened Focusing to a dream in which one can move around while awake. This is the best description I’ve heard of my experience of Focusing. In short, Focusing is fun. Like a dream, it opens up images and sensations I’ve never allowed myself in my “real world” life. And like a dream, it’s temporary; even stressful nightmares fade in the light of day. Similarly, the most painful, tear-stained of Focusing sessions ends (intentionally) with a softening or lightening of some kind and an awareness that the experience was distinct from (even if related to) the external reality of my day-to-day life. It is wonderfully freeing to find this kind of distinction. It allows each reality (internal/Focusing and external/regular life) a safe space in which to fulfill its function without getting mired up in the “stuff” of the other world. This quality has made Focusing the safest emotional tool I’ve ever used.

Focusing seems to provide me access – a window – to the often confused and juxtaposed multi-emotional busy-ness that overwhelmed me so often in my past. I essentially had 31 years of disowned, ignored, subconscious, or unacknowledged emotional-spiritual messages whirling around inside me with no outlet. No wonder I was overwhelmed, and no wonder I didn’t exactly want to ever deal with all those emotional messengers!

Interestingly, I learned I don’t have to “deal” with them.

Amazingly, Focusing allows me to properly hear the messages as what they are – messages, not “me.”

Happily, as I no longer spend my energy trying to avoid the messages, I now have energy to create myself anew.

And that brings me to today. I am someone new today. I am a dancer (though I never have been before). I am a joyous, positive person (and no number of bouts with depression in my past can confuse me about that). I am someone who loves and marvels and feels gratitude toward her body (huge for me! I wish you could know just how unbelievable that is for me to feel). I am someone who finally can agree with the compliments given to her (I always said thank you, but now, I actually can nod my head in simple, comfortable, non-arrogant agreement when someone tells me I am a ray of light).

And I am changing the world – my world – your world – today because I am changing.

Rebecca Baldwin

USA

If anyone would like to get in touch with Rebecca, send an email to selfheal4me@gmail.com and your email will be passed on to her.

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Clearing Emotions to Expose the Point of View

Animals have been teachers for me for as long as I can remember, and I recently learnt a powerful lesson from a wonderful cat who I shared a home with for two years. As a result of our move to New Zealand, my partner and I drove the cat we had previously given a home to up to his new home in the north of France. The initial 15 minutes of the trip were really difficult for me. Monty had previously been a wild cat and had never been confined before. He has a strong constitution and the sedative only took the edge off for him, so he was meowing a lot and sounded so plaintive it felt like it was cutting right through my heart. I started tapping for Monty as we drove away from the house, and continued tapping but it didn’t seem to be having any effect, I was in tears and both Monty and I were getting more and more upset. My partner suggested I switch to tapping for myself as he could see that I was getting more upset and knew that we had a 10 hour drive ahead of us.

As I started tapping on how awful it was to hear him cry and feel his pain, we noticed that Monty immediately calmed down. I continued tapping and as I did I realised that the main issue was that Monty’s meow represented pain and suffering for me, and that was why I was so upset. I talked to my partner in an attempt to find a way to reframe how I was relating to Monty’s meow, and as a result tapped on “Even though Monty’s meow represents pain and suffering to me, I now choose to see that his meow actually represents strength and fortitude.” Tapping on this statement led to the realisation that as a highly sensitive person I hadn’t realised that my suffering with someone who is upset is often simply adding more suffering to the mix. All of a sudden I realised that I had the choice, I could choose to be upset or I could choose to trust that Monty is a strong cat (evidenced by his response to a strong sedative!), and trust that he could handle the move just fine.

This is such a great example of how tapping on an emotion with EFT can help us to clear the excess emotion and reveal the point of view that is actually generating the emotion. As I tapped on the feeling that his suffering was cutting through my heart I was able to see with clarity that it was my interpretation of the sound of Monty’s meow that was actually causing the suffering, and that in choosing that interpretation I was adding more to Monty’s upset. Monty settled right down and slept most of the trip, only making small complaints about being in the cage each time we stopped, and adjusted incredibly well to his new home.

As I continued to tap and process the learnings from this experience as we continued on our journey, I realised that I have for a long time unknowingly worn suffering as a badge of being a highly sensitive person. It became so clear to me that I would be able to help far more in situations where someone is upset if I was able to maintain clarity and see the strength in the other person/animal rather than focusing on my own interpretations that have been coming from my points of view rather than any factual basis.

This was a huge learning experience for me, and I know there are a lot of other folk who read the Self Healing Portal newsletter who are highly sensitive, so I thought I’d write this experience up in case it can help anyone else out there who suffers terribly in the face of others’ upset. It is a powerful example of how emotions are generated from a point of view, and how we can use EFT to clear the emotions and then reframe the point of view.

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A Shift in Perspective

One of the blocks that many of us encounter along the path of our healing journey, whether we are consciously aware of it or not, is a part or parts of us not wanting to be made wrong. When working to heal any long term pattern it is inevitable that we will encounter points of view that are supporting the pattern that are not in our best interests. This can result in a part of us feeling like it will have to be made wrong in order for us to heal, and so it stubbornly digs it’s heels in and refuses to co-operate, feeling that we will get in trouble if we are proven to be wrong and so it is not in our best interests.

Most of us go through life taking on points of view as a result of the experiences we’ve had, then collecting evidence over the years that support our points of view. Healing requires us to allow the points of view to change as we clear the emotional trauma associated with the experiences that result in us taking on the beliefs and perspectives that we did. With the assistance of wonderful tools like EFT and Focusing we are able to let go of the comfort of “being right” and instead experience the joy that comes from having the freedom to see things in a new way.

Years ago someone shared a great analogy with me to help me with this. Imagine that there are two men standing on opposite ends of a football field, talking to each other on cellphones. Jim and Bob don’t know where each other are, and Jim says to Bob, “Have you seen the new hot air balloon in town?” Bob replies, “Yeah it’s pretty cool. I’ve never see a black hot air balloon before.” Jim says, “Surely there can’t be two hot air balloons in town, but the one I’m looking at is white.” “Where are you?” asks Bob. “Down at the football field.” replies Jim. Bob shakes his head and says “That’s where I am, and the balloon is definitely black.” Both men shake their heads as they wonder if their friend is losing it, Jim can clearly see that the hot air balloon is white and Bob can clearly see that it is black. Eventually Bob realises that if Jim is at the football field too, if he goes for a wander he and Jim could talk in person and resolve the mystery. As he walks around the hot air balloon and looks up, he can see that in actual fact the hot air balloon is white on one side and black on the other…

When something traumatic happens to us, it’s easy to take on a point of view as if the event was solely how we experienced it and that there is no other way to see it. Like with the hot air balloon, if we are able to shift our perspective a little, we will be able to see more of the situation and see if from other angles. We weren’t wrong in how we saw it, we simply had a limited perspective and couldn’t see the whole picture.

One area where remembering this can be very useful is if we are struggling to forgive someone for something that they did that caused us to be hurt. If we can use EFT or Focusing or another method that works well for us to raise our perspective and see it from another angle, we may find it easier to forgive the person for their involvement, without having to make ourselves wrong. Life really isn’t black and white, just like the hot air balloon, even though it can feel that way when we are convinced there is no way we can forgive someone.

Another area I find this helps is when I’m stuck in some strong emotions that just aren’t shifting when I’m tapping with EFT. A good example of this is an experience I had where my partner and I were taking our cat on a long trip to his new home. I was very upset by Monty’s meows and it wasn’t until I asked my partner how he saw it that I was able to see that I was stuck in my own perspective of Monty’s suffering, which was quite different to my partners’. You can read about this at . Asking someone else how they view a situation can be a wonderful way to help us to reframe our point of view and find the emotional relief that comes from doing so.

There is no doubt that it can be uncomfortable coming face to face with points of view that we have taken on that are no longer supporting us. I experienced this in a graphic way when I realised while doing some EFT that I had taken on the belief that the world is an unsafe place and that I was vulnerable due to birth trauma. When I realised that a part of me was causing me to react to foods that aren’t in fact harmful because its perspective was that the foods were dangerous, I went through an uncomfortable few moments realising that my years of illness were rested on a point of view I took on that was not actually true. Initially it felt like my whole illness would be invalidated if I was to heal as a result of discovering this, there was real resistance to accepting that in actual fact, my beliefs were wrong! Fortunately EFT got me past that resistance and my years and years of seriously poor health are now becoming distant memories.

So if you are stuck in an illness or a pattern that you are having real trouble shifting, consider looking at your point of view and having a chat with any parts of you that may be feeling threatened by the idea of your points of view changing. Remember the hot air balloon and see if you can rise above your old story and take on a new one, and enjoy the freedom that comes from doing so.

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Tips for Using the Movie Technique

The Movie Technique in EFT is an incredibly powerful one but at first glance some people seem to be put off it, either thinking that it’s too simple to work or too complicated to use! This tool is too good not to be in every DIY EFT’ers toolkit, so this article examines some of the common misunderstandings with the Movie Technique and gives some suggestions for dealing with it when it’s not working the way it should.

The instructions for this technique are deceptively simple:

1. Create a short movie of the event, run it through in your mind and give it a title and assess the intensity on the SUDs scale.

2. Tap on the Karate Point with “Even though I have this movie I deeply and completely love and accept myself.” (x3) then tap through all the points with “this movie.”

3. Re-run the movie in your mind without tapping and see if anything has changed and re-assess the intensity on the SUDs scale.

4. If the intensity is anything above zero, repeat steps 2 – 4 until the intensity is down to a zero.

In practice however people often have questions each step of the way.

It’s too simple to work

Some people feel that to simply pick one tiny part of their problems and tap on that is to exclude so much that it can’t possibly be useful. Whenever we use a new technique it can be helpful to have a bit of an understanding of how it works, so we can entertain the idea that as simple as it is it could be very useful in helping us to heal.

When we experience something traumatic our brain locks in all the details of what happened. Our brain already knows what needs to be healed in order to release the trauma of the event. When we create a movie and give it a title we are essentially running through the event and then say to the brain “Ok, when I say I’m referring to everything that we just watched.” Then when we tap simply with the title of the movie the brain clears all the details that were included in the movie. This is why this technique has helped so many people to clear so much trauma so quickly – the brain has all the details and in far finer detail than we can verbalise. Instead of simply tapping on the aspects that we consciously remember, when we use the Movie Technique we are clearing all the aspects, whether we know about them or not. I believe that this is what makes this technique so powerful.

Step One – Creating the Movie

When we create the movie it is very important to keep it short (at the very most it should take no more than 2 minutes to run and usually it can simply be a few seconds). This ensures that we are being very specific, which is how EFT works best. In most cases there are only one or two or maybe three real spikes in intensity in an event, so if we keep the movie to one spike of intensity (which is why we keep it short) we are sure that we are being specific. Some people get caught up in trying to get an accurate title for the movie – it’s important to remember that you aren’t going for an Emmy award, the title is simply a short phrase that you are giving to your brain that represents the visual movie you just ran.

When assessing the intensity of the movie, it helps to really tune in to what you feel in your body as you run the movie, as this helps you to monitor the changes in intensity after tapping through each round. If you can, getting a rating on the 0 – 10 scale is very helpful but if you find that it is easier to simply go on gut feeling and the feelings in your body as to when you are done, that works too.

It is very important to note that if viewing the movie in your mind is likely to be traumatic for you, it is better to start with using The Tearless Trauma Technique to bring down the intensity of the movie before viewing it. It is not only unnecessary to go through the trauma in a way that is upsetting for you, but is also counterproductive as it further traumatises you. Using the Tearless Trauma Technique is far more supportive in these circumstances.

Step Two – Tapping

With this step you simply follow the instructions to the letter. Some people feel that they have to be creative and narrate the movie as they tap or find explanations for how they felt etc. This is not only unnecessary but can also detract from the power of the technique – the technique works so well because it takes advantage of the fact that the brain has stored all the details and knows what to work on. When you tap simply with the movie title you are sending a powerful message to your brain that you want to clear all trauma associated with that event. If we talk our way through the movie as we are tapping it can be effective, but it’s not using the Movie Technique! If you want to tap into the power of this technique, simply tap through each point with “this movie”. The only time you need to use specific details is if you keep re-running the movie and finding you get stuck on one point. See discussion further on in this article if this is happening for you.

Step Three - Re-assess intensity

For this step you DO NOT tap, and instead simply close your eyes and view the movie again. Note if there have been any changes at all, and if any particular details are more or less prominent. Re-assess on the SUDs scale and note any changes in the feelings in your body as you view the movie.

Step Four - Repeat until intensity is at a zero

For this step you simply keep tapping in the same way, however you use the words “this remaining movie”. If you are finding that the intensity level isn’t dropping or is only coming down in very small increments it could be an indication that there is a part of you that is reluctant to let the trauma of the event go because it perceives letting it go to be dangerous for you. This can happen because a part of us stays frozen at the time of the event and so has a limited perspective on what is beneficial for you and what isn’t. If the intensity just isn’t coming down, try doing a couple of rounds through using the following phrases as a guideline (if more suitable phrases come to mind for you, or more specific phrases, use them instead):

Karate Point:

Even though a part of me is afraid to let the trauma of go, I deeply and completely love and accept myself.
Even though a part of me feels it won’t be safe for me to let the trauma of go, I …
Even though a part of me isn’t ready to let go for whatever reason, I ….

Through the points:

Part of me is afraid to let go
Perhaps it feels it isn’t safe for me to let it go
Part of me isn’t ready to let go
It doesn’t feel safe to let all of this go
I thank this part for protecting me
And doing all it can to keep me safe
I honour this part for all it’s doing
To ensure that I’m OK
And I ask this part to consider
Working with me to find a way
To let go
Because holding onto it is causing me pressure
And I’ll be safe and protected once this trauma is cleared
Thank you for working with me
To help me let this go
I’m ready to let this go

If this tapping doesn’t result in the intensity coming down, you may also want to explore the following themes:

Even though a part of me feels I don’t deserve to let this trauma go, I…
Even though a part of me doesn’t believe it’s possible to let this trauma go, I …
Even though I will feel guilty if I let this trauma go, I ….
Even though I won’t be able to blame this trauma when things aren’t going well in my life if I let this go, I …
Even though I’m just not ready to let this go yet, I …
Even if I never let this go, I …

If as you re-run the movie you keep finding yourself locked onto one specific detail, it can be supportive to do a few rounds with the Basic EFT Recipe to clear that particular aspect and any associated emotions, then go back to working with the movie. If you are stuck on one point of the movie it will be an indication that this aspect requires further exploration.

Some of the ways people find the movie changing as the intensity comes down are:

The details that were sharp and clear become more vague or fuzzy
The worst part of the movie no longer seems to even feature in the movie
They find that they go from being in the movie to watching it as if it was happening to someone else
It simply becomes one of many memories that don’t have an emotional charge
It goes from colour to black and white, or from having a loud sound track to none at all

When working with a major trauma it is also common for people to first only be able to view the very start of the movie, then each time they check back in to it they move a little further through the event, and they keep doing this until they have cleared the entire event.

As with all of EFT it is very important to test the event you are working on well when you believe that you are at a zero intensity. Run the movie in as vivid detail as possible and really try to get the intensity up to be sure that you are clear of it before concluding that you are finished with tapping on this particular event.

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Many people have turned major trauma around using this technique and many of them were initially very sceptical, thinking it wasn’t possible to clear such major trauma so quickly and relatively easily. Some people are afraid that they have so many traumatic memories that they will have to spend the rest of their lives tapping to clear them. It’s important here to understand what is known with EFT as “The Generalisation Effect.” If you aren’t aware of this important concept with EFT, download a free copy of the book You CAN Heal with EFT and read the section entitled “The Generalisation Effect and the Table Top”.

EFT practitioners regularly witness the amazement of someone they have introduced this technique to suddenly finding that something that has been so traumatic for them for so long no longer seems to be hooking their energy. Fortunately this powerful technique doesn’t require a practitioner to assist you unless you really want to work with someone, as your brain takes care of the details for you with the movie and you don’t even need to think of what to say. If you haven’t given it a go yet, I seriously recommend trying it. This technique has proven to be very powerful time and time again.

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I'mSO excited about the new me I'm experiencing by Arum

This article in our series of articles by people who have found something that really helps them on their healing journey is by a woman who has shown enormous persistence with her healing. Arum has reached out to the EFT Forums for help, and has had major benefit from doing so. Many thanks to Arum for taking the time to share her healing journey with the Self Healing Portal readers.

The main challenge I faced in using EFT was just believing it would work, and continuing to tap while I was in such a depressed state. I was so depressed I felt like the grim reaper had me in his embrace, hovering over my head, with his arms around me. The first thing I felt in the morning when I woke up was a terrible feeling of dread, and the thought, “Oh God, not another day, and how will I ever live through it?” It even scares me now to remember what it was like, in fact tears are coming to my eyes.

The fear I experienced at that time was so consuming, I would be lying on the couch, and my eyes would momentarily close, and I would open them with a start feeling deep intense fear. It was an AWFUL fear. At night I would wake up and feel this fear, and stay awake for hours terrified, and wonder how it would all end. While sitting in my spare room I would cry and cry while tapping, hoping that when I stopped there would be some kind of change in my mood.

One day I went to the park near my house with that awful depression and stood there and tapped and tapped. There was a slight shift in my mood, and it gave me hope. After that I tapped like crazy, looked up all kinds of videos and watched them on the web, mostly Robert Smith who used the shortened form of EFT. I tapped and tapped, and started to notice a change.

Again I say the biggest challenge I had was just to be patient, and believe, and try to have the energy to tap while I was feeling all that fear and depression. I was at the end of my rope, I had almost decided I was going to end it all. To do this I was going to go to a tall building, drink some very strong alcohol, and jump off. As I'm a very religious person this just created more guilt, fear and depression. You can't imagine how different I feel about this now.

There have been a couple of things that have helped me to get past blocks to healing with EFT. One reason I was able to go on was the fear that if I didn't, I would revert back to the way I was before. That was frightening. Also the better I felt the more it gave me confidence that I could feel better still. Also, watching all the videos on You Tube and reading testimonials about people who were "cured" by EFT really gave me hope. The videos by Robert Smith I have to admit were very inspiring.

There was a lot of pain and burning in my right leg, because I fell down some steps in 1983 with my baby in my arms, and in order to keep her from getting hurt I instinctively turned to the left. As the pain started to subside gradually, (it was tough finding the "core" issue), I realized the power of EFT, and prayed it might help my depression. As I thought about this miracle, and it really was a miracle, I was so grateful to my God for making it available. The fact that I wouldn't have to take pills, it was free, and I wouldn't even need to leave the house! Now that's a perfect solution. After being depressed for my entire life, and wasting so much time, I was determined to keep at it until I felt somewhat normal, able to enjoy getting up in the morning.

My husband has been so very supportive of me. It was difficult for the rest of the family to understand, they acted like I was a witch doctor, and I don't blame them. It's still almost unbelievable. In my excitement there were people I tried to help, but most thought I was nuts. What they didn't realize is that I was REALLY nuts before I found EFT.

The EFT Forums have been really helpful to me. There are many kind people on the forums who have commented on my issues, and have given me many helpful pointers. Mostly they have cheered me on, and I think that was the most helpful. While researching EFT so much, I was learning to actually heal myself, but the encouragement was everything to me. People who don't even know me, showing so much confidence that I would get better, that was wonderful. After all, when someone pats you on the back and says, "You are doing well", that's like a shot in the arm. Yes, the EFT forumwas a life saver. :)

I’ve seen so many changes since doing EFT regularly. I have stopped biting my nails. Instead of tapping on biting my nails, I tapped on not putting my fingers in my mouth. Now, if my hands go near my face, my mind clicks in, (Don't put your fingers in your mouth, - “eeeeewwwww!!!!!"). Also, I used to berate myself constantly in my mind, but I don't do that as much now. The constant negative thoughts were buzzing around in my mind like a giant beehive, it caused terrible anxiety. Now my mind is quiet, and relaxed. The mornings don't start out with, "Oh my God another day", but I always tap if I feel any negative feeling, and usually watch one of Robert Smiths Videos. Mornings aretimes for taking a walk and doing EFT to totally relax.

I had lost interest in everything, even the religious volunteer work I do. Even though I was an obsessive gardener for most of my life, I lost complete interest in it. My interest in life is gradually coming back. Like Gary Craig says, some of these things are subtle, and they are only noticed after a period of time has passed. Once again I'm starting to take an interest in how I look. Before it was a chore to take a shower, go shopping or anything. Those feelings are starting to change.

Life is more positive, it's easier to smile, I had to remind myself before. Thinking about the future before was terrifying, now I'm able to enjoy the present, and let God take care of the future. The feelings before were so scary, a feeling of unreality, like I wasn't really a part of anything. Some of these feelings are difficult to explain, but I feel alive now, instead of feeling like I was walking around dead. My attitude about life in general has changed, I can reason on things better. A day never goes by without tapping. When I ask my husband if I’ve changed, he smiles and says “Yes, you are the way you should be now.”

When using EFT for self healing, the most important thing to remember is persistence, that’s the main thing. Tap every day, and either tap on a memory using the Personal Peace Procedure, or do general tapping to keep your mind at peace. If someone or something upsets you, get by yourself and tap. Also, educate yourself concerning EFT. Ask questions, watch as many videos as you can on You Tube, send for Gary's videos, if at all possible. Practice using different EFT techniques, such as the 9 gamut, the long method, the short method, different meridians. Learn how to mental tap, great for being in public.

It is important to use a practitioner if you can. This hasn't been possible for me, and it has turned out well regardless. I did have some help from a very kind practitioner from the EFT Forums who contacted me a couple of times and that was very helpful. I don't think that some practitioners are really aware of what a financial difficulty it would be for some people to get help with their tapping. With things so tight, people are having trouble just making ends meet. It's wonderful that we have these tools that we can use to do this healing on our own if necessary. I'm proof. Things continue to get better and I have hopes this will be a pattern. Don't let financial challenges stop you from healing!

Consistency is important. If you can, set aside a time during the day where you can be in a relaxing environment to tap. Use the EFT forum as you go, asking questions, and using the different pointers the practitioners offer. Tap when you get up in the morning, and after praying at night tap again. :) Never stop tapping, you will see changes.

Arum

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