Tapping Q & A with Gene Monterastelli - Get the most out of tapping and EFT

Pod #60: EFT for Self Acceptance w/ Steve Wells

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One of the biggest blocks for beginning tappers is using the setup phrase, “Even though…I love and accept myself.” Sometimes we just don't believe it. Sometimes it is painful to think of how we don't love and accept ourselves, and because of this we don't spend time tapping.

In this interview I chat with Steve Wells about the idea of self acceptance. During our conversation I quickly came to realize that Steve and I see acceptance and resistance in the same way. We talk about Steve's own (continuing) journey to self acceptance, how he made significant progress using a simple 30-day process, and how moving towards self acceptance heals many other issues in our lives.

(Full transcript below)

Guest: Steve Wells

Contact: web @ EFTDownunder.com

About Steve: Steve Wells is an international leadership coach and peak performance consultant based in Perth, Western Australia. He helps people to overcome the hidden blocks to achieving their goals and getting what they really want from life.

Steve was one of the first to apply tapping to performance enhancement work with elite athletes and to take tapping to the corporate environment. He regularly teaches and consults worldwide with elite sport and business achievers to improve their performance and enhance the performance of their teams.

Steve is co-creator (with Dr David Lake) of the user-friendly tapping approach Simple Energy Techniques (SET) and the unique advanced Energy-based approach Provocative Energy Techniques (PET). He has helped thousands of people through his worldwide personal development and professional training workshops.

Steve is on the faculty of the Curtin University Centre for Entrepreneurship, where he presents to business owners and senior leaders on peak performance and resilience. He is also on the faculty of the Emotional Intelligence Institute. He is co-author of 4 books, including Enjoy Emotional Freedom.

Steve's programs and presentations are always inspiring, engaging and filled with powerful practical strategies you can use immediately to get better results – with less stress. More information on Steve and his programs can be found at eftdownunder.com and stevewells.com.au.

In this interview Steve talks about a 4 part series on how he moved towards self acceptance. Here are all four parts Self Accptance Series

TRANSCRIPT OF INTERVIEW WITH STEVE

Gene: What’s your definition of self-acceptance and why is it significant in the work you do with your clients?

Steve: It’s a big topic. It’s something which we got lead into through our work with doing EFT. In EFT, everybody says the self-accepting statement but as it turns out, we find out that actually helped a lot of people to tune in to non-self-acceptance. It’s kind of this thing that a lot of people are carrying which is the sense of not being good enough in some way. In fact there’s one negative self-belief I would say that if I’m not good enough, that’s kind of like a universal belief that everybody seems to have on some level – that I would call lack of self-acceptance. That lack of self-acceptance comes out in all kind of ways, not just in terms of what we do to ourselves and in terms of how we treat ourselves but also how we treat other people. The old saying what we don’t like in ourselves we can’t project on to others, what we see in others that we don’t like is the disowned part of ourselves. I think ultimately self-acceptance and accepting all the parts of yourself is necessary before you can accept other people. Ultimately, it’s something that’s necessary before you have any kind of world peace. The peace actually starts within our own hearts. I see that that’s a process of opening ourselves up to loving ourselves so that we can love other people. It’s a necessary step for us to have any kind of inner peace as well as outer peace.

Gene: You defined really clearly there what’s it like to not have self-acceptance, so what’s the opposite of that? What does self-acceptance look like then?

Steve: Well, I can tell you what it feels like.

Gene: That would be great! That’s perfect!

Steve: A lot of people know I had a journey with self-acceptance. In fact it’s an ongoing journey. There are always more bits and pieces to this because we seem to have so much stuff that’s hot-wired into us, from childhood and so on. But when I started with EFT myself, I remembered sitting in my office one day. I was not feeling happy with myself and my life and the way things are going. I was sitting in front of the computer and as I would often do, I was typing out the issues. I was kind of putting them, as you do in EFT, into the set-up statement. In the set-up statement in EFT, you say “even though I have this problem, I deeply and completely accept myself”. I took one look at that statement I thought I do not accept myself at all because of having this problem. In fact the problem that I was having which was I was wasting a lot of time, that I should have been doing profound things in the world, I was just playing internet games. I was playing chess against people in India and places like that, and just getting frustrated with myself for wasting my time doing it. Also, I spent so much time in front of the computer I get a sore neck and a sore back and all kinds of stuff. Anyway, I started working on that issue. I thought the issue is not the issue. The issue is my lack of acceptance of my self. That was the first realization. I thought, okay, I started applying the tapping process to the real problem which was my not accepting myself because of having this problem. I set myself an intention to do a 30-day trial of accepting myself no matter what. Right now, I kind of accept myself because of this problem, in fact at the time I was kind of putting these things. As I did the tapping and as I fought them and as I felt them, I would try to put that response in the computer and I could see that in front of me. The first moment I thought okay, I’m going to accept myself even though I have this problem. The reaction was no, I can not accept myself because I’ve got this problem. This problem makes me a bad person. It makes me wrong in all kinds of ways and so on.

Gene: When you say you created a 30-day intention, did you mean that you were going to tap on it for 30 days?

Steve: I was actually going to work on getting to the state where I could accept myself even though I had that problem, the stuff that we say in EFT which doesn’t happen just because we say it. A lot of people seem to think that there’s some magic in the words. It’s not, I can tell you. We don’t actually use those statements anymore. We found that unless we want people to tune in to that particular issue, we found that the set-up statement tunes them into their non-self-acceptance. We would have people saying “I deeply and completely reject myself” which is more true to them than “I deeply and completely accept myself”.

Gene: I’m seeing the exact same thing for sure.

Steve: Yeah. In fact anyone who believes there’s magic in the words can try doing those opposites, and people actually take them quite quickly. They get shifts on their issues much more quickly in some cases, most cases; especially if you do it with humor.

Gene: How over those 30 days did you specifically tap on this idea of self-acceptance?

Steve: I started with whatever was bugging me or whatever I was doing, and I would tap on “I accept myself even though I’m doing it”, then I would have the negative reaction to that. Then, I would take it further. For example, I’m playing chess on the computer and think “Okay, I accept myself even though I’m playing chess on the computer and I shouldn’t be”. The reaction comes “No, I can’t accept myself for that”. So that then, I’m tapping, “I accept myself even if I never want to accept myself for this”. You can keep taking it further and further. Eventually ultimately it blows out. Every problem I had and every encounter I had I actually tapped with the intention to accept myself even if that happened, even if that was true, even if that continued to be true forever, even if I’m still playing on the computer in 10 years time, I’m going to accept myself even if I never give this up kind of thing. That’s kind of counterintuitive because we have this concept “you’ve got to not accept that, you’ve got to fight that” but what you resist persists. You end up setting up a fight between parts of yourself because there’s part of you that wants that. And so if part of you has to be made wrong to make a part of you right, then you still lose.

Gene: One of the things that I find really useful when we’re starting is to tap on the emotional charge that we have about the issue at hand, whatever that emotion is (frustration, overwhelm). And you’re talking about being able to accept myself in that state and starting there before we go to the issue itself.

Steve: Yeah! Now what we end up doing is basically we do the tapping with whatever people are aware of. We don’t try to change it. We are just putting our attention on it. The funny thing is when you put your attention on it and you’re doing the tapping, it transforms. But if you form the intentions that you have to shift it, now you’re setting up this internal fight. It often ends up being this win-lose kind of thing. I didn’t answer your ultimate question because you asked me what does self-acceptance looks like, and during that time, I got some good understanding and some good shifts and I was feeling a bit better but it wasn’t really a profound shift. Three days later I went into the bedroom a bit early, sometimes I do this, I lie there and I’m just tapping. I’m tapping and I’m tapping on issues. I can’t remember now what exactly the things were but it was again, continuing to think of my 30-day trial. When I came up with the idea I’m going to do this every day and I’m going to focus on accepting myself no matter what, my first reaction was I’ll never do that. I wouldn’t lie, tomorrow I will forget or whatever. Then, I did the tapping on “Even though I’ll forget, I accept myself; and even if I forget, I accept myself; even if I don’t follow through, I’d still accept myself”. Anyway, three days later as I was laying there on the bed doing the tapping and holding the intention to accept myself no matter what, every thought and every feeling that came, I held the intention to accept myself even if I was having this thought or having that feeling. I felt this incredible warmth and this incredible life that flowed through me. I have now seen this with clients and experienced it myself more. This is when we release these blockages, we are opening up for energy, I may call it love – it’s the love of the universe. It’s life energy itself that flows through us that’s been blocked from being able to flow because of this resistance that’s been set up inside us. I think there’s one word for all of our problems, it would be resistance. When you release that resistance, then the energy flows through you.

Gene: What’s really interesting there as you described that, I think back to my own personal journey and my work with my clients. It’s almost as if in some cases the issues that we perceive as being big issues that we need to be taking care of and the issues that are in the front of our mind, in some way are almost serving in a distraction away from looking at that self-acceptance issue, the exact same way that I might use chocolate to distract me from my anger or my loneliness or whatever. By creating this big complicated problem and throwing myself into it, I never have to bump into that really deep resistance of “Oh my gosh, this is who I really am, and I need to accept myself in order to be able to work with that and transform it and be it”.

Steve: Exactly, because what we would see happen if someone did the tapping, and I would get over a phobia or an issue or problem, you kind of have a surge of self-acceptance for a little while. Then a little later, there would be another issue for not to accept themselves over.

Gene: Yeah, but the issues are the symptoms of a deeper problem which is the issue of being able to recognize ourselves for who we are. I can also see as you say that, the sense of the resistance exists because it sees that as functional and it’s trying to protect it. I can see how it would be very difficult and distracting for us to be able to tune in to that because the system so preciously wants to protect that point of view.

Steve: Oh yeah! This is ego or the different theories around it but it’s ultimately as we go through life, we create mini identities. Those identities can get triggered and for a while and rule us during that time. Another way of looking at it: every problem has a trance. You get entranced into a problem. You get triggered to go into the trance of the problem. Willem Lammers in Switzerland would say it’s interjected. It’s kind of a split-off. You actually have to split off part of your energy and he said that’s held in three-dimensional space. I really like his theory. He has an approach called Logosynthesis. He uses words, very powerful words that he discovered that help people bring the energy back that they have invested in these identities. We do the same with tapping. Ultimately when we’re not accepting a part of our self, this is a part of our self that was set up to help us deal with something that was overwhelming such as a trauma or whatever in our lives. It was functional at that time. It might not be functional right here, right now but it has a life-saving purpose. Ultimately, it has to be integrated and accepted within us, then it doesn’t need to be a split off part of ourselves, it could be a part of the whole of us. We can accept all parts of ourselves.

Gene: I can almost see that also being in a case where it might not necessarily be coming from a specific trauma but it could just simply be misinformed because of information that we’ve gathered from our loved ones or from the culture at large, where it’s trying to protect us from a perceived danger that isn’t necessarily a real and actual danger.

Steve: Absolutely! It’s at any point and time in our life when we don’t have awareness. The biggest problem of people is actually narrow-mindedness. It’s that we don’t have a wider view. When we bring the tapping to this, it helps us to see things more clearly. I remember my very first client that I used in tapping with, it was such a profound thing because I saw the problem leave her body. I saw, it’s kind of like this ghost lifted off her. The energy came surging back in. She says “Boy that worked didn’t it?” What happened to that lady, she’d had a trauma because her son was threatening to kill her. He’s been very violent with her. The incident we were working on, he’d cut himself and then he wiped the blade off on her arm and threatened to stab her with his knife. She was shaking like a leaf. What was profound about this experience was that when I saw her a week later, she not only stood up to her son and got him to come to heel, she said to him “Look we’re going to live together; we’ve got to work things out”. She says she became relieved that a certain part of her self comes into play, which was needed. She also apologized to him for the parts that she could see that she had contributed to the problem. I thought what a fantastic, wide perspective she now has where she sees the whole thing – her contribution to the problem and his contribution to the problem. She now wants to resolve it.

Gene: When we get clear of resistance, it does that. It helps us to see things clearer. And the thing I think I found is it also helps us to more easily respond from that sense of inspiration that’s inside of us because we can clearly see who we are and what it is. It’s not like “I have to choose towards inspiration”. It’s a natural choice that I’m sure that as she did that and she recognized her own part of that, it wasn’t like she sat down and said “Hmm, I wonder what my part is” but as that clearing came, it came to an “oh, this is what I own in this and I need to take responsibility for it”.

Steve: Yeah! When we’re in a clearer space and we’re not kind of reactive, we’ve cleared a lot of our reactiveness, then we’re free to manifest whatever parts of ourselves that are needed right here, right now.

Gene: It’s interesting as you talked about that, as you’re explaining, I’m thinking back to something that I already do and I haven’t thought about it in these terms, that when I’m working with clients and we bump into an issue, the first thing I have a client do is I have them thank it for being there because it’s functional. It may not be working properly but it’s certainly motivated by something that’s functional, and it’s this idea of acceptance going “I appreciate the fact that I’m angry right now because it’s trying to keep me safe from attack. It might not be a real attack, but I appreciate the fact that it’s trying and I appreciate the fact that it has my best interest involved, even though I don’t necessarily love the outcome that I’m getting in this moment”.

Steve: Yeah! A lot of people are like “No, we’re supposed to be treating this as the enemy. It has to be the problem.” We’re kind of inclined because as you probably know Dr. Lake and I are using a provocative style for certain times. We’re inclined to go with the energy that’s there which might be a negative energy. But then we exaggerate it and then blow it up and enhance it. People are able to see it. It’s outside of them rather than inside them. It’s kind of you have to exaggerate things so people can see the truth.

Gene: You drag it into the light of day. You turn it into a cartoon and discuss it “Oh, that’s what it is, never mind”. Okay, so let’s say that someone who’s listening right now decides “Okay, I want to do what Steve did. I want to take 30 days and I’m going to move towards self-acceptance”. If I’m going to start something like that, how do I go about it looking at positive things, negative things… how do I use tapping to try something like this on my own?

Steve: First of all, I put that into a four-part series which I wrote back in the old days when we were riding on Gary Craig’s newsletter that he had (his EFT newsletter). It’s still on the site which is now being maintained by Dawson Church but we also have it up on our website www.eftdownunder.com. We’re not meant to be doing a plug but if someone wants to go there they can have that as a starting point and they can follow the process. I have mapped out some specific steps but we’ll also talk about those now. Essentially, you set the intention to do some tapping for 30 days on accepting yourself even though you have whatever problem it is. You’re tapping on the problem but you have to tap with focus not on the problem itself and not trying to fix that problem, you’re actually tapping on “I accept myself even if I have this problem”. That’s the same words in the set-up statement in EFT but when you’re tapping with the intention of “I accept myself” then you’re going to have a reaction to the “I accept myself” part which is either yes or no, then you go with whatever comes. Does that make sense?

Gene: Absolutely! Basically what you’re doing is you’re switching the emphasis of the place that we’re focusing.

Steve: Exactly! The focus is actually on the acceptance, not on the problem itself. When I had that experience myself where I kind of had that rush of energy and love and life and everything through my body, I had this realization, a blinding flash of the bleeding obvious they call it, that I wasn’t the problem. In every problem that I have had in my life up until that point, I had made myself the problem. I blamed myself for having the problem. There was a problem and then there was my reaction to the problem, and part of my reaction to the problem was I shouldn’t have this problem. It’s my fault for having this problem. I’m a bad person for having this problem. Now I started to see the problem was outside of me. It wasn’t me. I had been making the problem me, as if that was part of my identity or something like that. Though my problems were still there but they were all out there, not me. I wasn’t the problem. This is another point that people can do some tapping on. It’s almost inevitable when you have a problem that you’re going to blame yourself for having that problem. You can do some tapping on “It’s my fault for having this problem” then you can add the “I shouldn’t have this problem. I’m to blame for causing this problem, etc”. Then you can do some tapping on “I accept myself even if it’s my fault that I have this problem. I accept myself even if I’m to blame, even if I caused it I’m going to accept myself” and do tapping on that. When you do this tapping, the resistance will come up and it gets tuned in for more tapping.

Gene: We’ve taken the basic set-up phrase and we flipped it around. We’ve looked at “Even though I’ve created this, even though it’s my fault I love and accept myself”, and as we work our way through that, each time we do that, emotional charges are going to come forward around that acceptance space, and we tune in to that and we tap.

Steve: You can also identify where you learned that you’re not acceptable, and where you learned that you’re not good enough, and where you learned that you’re responsible for every problem in the universe and so on. And you can do tapping on those events using the basic tell-a-story process or run-the-movie if you’re more visually minded. Then you go through what happened and doing tapping on not just what happened but also your reactions to what happened and the beliefs that you’ve taken from what happened, and the emotions that you have about what happened. Again, you’re tapping with the focus on accepting yourself even if that happened.

Gene: I found a question that’s very similar to that that’s really helpful that that’s really helpful is what proof do I have that this is actually true?

Steve: Yeah! Like how do I know this, who taught me this, where did I learn this; Gary Craig’s brilliant question, where have I felt this before in my life? These are really good ways of identifying things that you can bring up to do the tapping on. The only real value in a specific event is actually if it tunes you into that effect on your energy.

Gene: Right! We need the emotional charge. We need something that’s there. If it’s just a fact of a story that we’re telling from the past, then it’s no different from reading the newspaper. It’s not helpful at that point.

Steve: This is the one area where we would use the set-up statement because it’s about tuning in the issue of non-self-acceptance.

Gene: So as you look at these senses of these parts where we don’t accept ourselves, we’re struggling to accept ourselves, we’re looking for the proof, is it useful or helpful to tune into the flipside of it? Because typically I found in my own life, it’s not that I completely acceptance myself and I completely don’t accept myself. But there are areas of my life where I can look at professionally and go, “I’m really comfortable inside of my own skin” and yeah, I accept myself here. And in my personal relationships, no, I’m not capable and deserving. Is there any value of tuning into the places where that sense of self-acceptance is positive, is something that’s activated, that’s really being lived out?

Steve: Absolutely! You can always tap on positive or negative. You’re always treating the negative, you’re always treating the resistance, but it doesn’t matter which way you go. One of the ways of getting into tapping on allowing acceptance of your positive side, which is our darkest part if you like, the unwillingness to accept our light and to allow that to flow and be in the world. That’s the challenge for all of us, it’s to get over our resistance to accepting that. One of the things that we like to do is for example is to identify somebody that you admire that has all these wonderful traits that you love and do some tapping on that. You’re starting with “They’re all wonderful, they have these wonderful traits. I wish I was like them” to try on tapping on “Okay, maybe I have a little bit of that but not as much as them”, then tapping on “I have that quality as well”. A lot of people have a lot of resistance to that but if you break it down and work through the steps, it can be a real process of realizing the strengths that you do have and that you can manifest because we have all of this.

Gene: It sounds like when you were talking a little bit about your own journey and the initial commitment to do this for 30 days, you talked about the fact that it’s something that’s still in process. I have a feeling that you’re like me, you’re not done yet. You’re still finding places where these things pop up and there’s still opportunity for us to tap on this.

Steve: Of course! People come and say you must be so centred and this and so whatever because of all the tapping. Yeah, if I look back at my life as it was, I was in a lot of prisons that I didn’t even realize I was in. However, there’s always another level. There’s always more. We’re not fully developed. We haven’t realized ourselves yet.

Gene: With all that being said, with those different approaches, if they’re going to hear one thing about self-acceptance and I was going to give it a go, what’s the one thing that you’d want to pass along to someone as they start this journey and trying to use this as a tool?

Steve: Wow, good question. The advice I would give would be the same as Eckhart Tolle. You begin with your non-acceptance. He’s got a statement in his book Stillness Speaks. This person’s coming to him saying “Oh! I can’t accept this” and he says “Well, start there.” “What, accept that I’m irritated and upset?” “Yes!” Bring acceptance to your non-acceptance. That’s where you start. You start with “I can accept that I don’t accept myself”, “I won’t accept that I don’t accept myself”. Go with that. Add the tapping to that and you’ll go to all kinds of interesting places.

Gene: It’s amazing – the power of honest assessment and recognition of where we are. When we do that, then we can see where the real issues are, then we can see where the healing begins, then we can see where we want to go to because we can see where we are.

Steve: Yup, exactly! When we do the tapping, we’re teaching people to go with whatever comes. Take whatever comes. If you’re working with someone during tapping, you work with what’s there and you follow what comes. When you’re doing it with yourself, you tap on “allow the thoughts and feelings to come” and even though you think this must have nothing to do with it, go with it and see where it goes. It will always go somewhere good.

Gene: Cool! Very good! Steve, thank you very much for your time, I appreciate it.

Steve: Thanks! It’s an absolute pleasure.

Is It A Big Deal?

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I am spending a great deal of time and energy worrying about a number of issues. This is consuming so much of my energy, but most of the issues are really no big deal. How do I deal with the fact I am spending so much on something that isn’t very important?

Recently my sister underwent surgery for a tumor that was between her ribs and her right lung. My sister is only 32, healthy (a yoga instructor), has health insurance, a great medical provider, and a family with the means and flexibility to make sure she has had someone by her side every step of the way. The tumor itself was non-cancerous and she was back at work within 3 weeks of the surgery.

She feels very lucky (we all do). She knows that it could be so much worse.

Four days before the surgery we were chatting on the phone. She was giving me an update on when our parents were flying into town, what was going on at work, and which friends were going to be helping her and in what way.

In the matter of 10 minutes of phone conversation she must have said 15 times, “But you know, it's not really that big of a deal…”

At some point I stopped her and said, “It's OK if you say this is a big deal. You are going to have surgery. They are going to cut you open and pull something out. They are then going to stick a drainage tube to keep the wound healthy and clean. You are going to need people to help you do everything for a number of days and some tasks for a number of weeks. Yes, you have awesome medical care. Yes, this could have been so much worse. Yes, you have amazing friends and family to care for you. BUT this is a big deal. You are allowed to say it is a big deal!”

This led to 20 minutes of conversation, tapping, and tears as she was able to admit all the emotions she was feeling and all the things she was afraid to say out loud because she felt ungrateful. Because my sister felt so lucky she didn't feel like she had permission to complain or even be afraid.

It was an awesome healing moment and I am blessed to have shared that with my sister.

Admitting What Is Really Going On
I struggle with the same thing in my life. I have visited people all over the world who deal with immense struggle and burdens in their daily lives that I could never imagine. I spend more on my mobile phone service in one month than some make in a full year.

I am so blessed!

It is good to see the blessings in our lives, and to appreciate fully, but if we get too wrapped up in our blessings it makes it hard for us to admit the struggles we face. I need to be able to be honest with how I see my struggles and which emotions are swirling around them.

There are two very common outcomes when I start to tap on my problems.

First, when I start to tap on a problem I start to see it in perspective. It seems much smaller because I see it in context. It might feel like a really big deal emotionally, but as I tap on it I see it for what it is. To get to this point I need to be honest about how feel. I can't just dismiss it as “no big deal.” Because part of me thinks (erroneously) that it is a big deal. These emotions that are under the surface are going to eat at me.

Second, what is going on really is a big deal. Because it is a big deal I need to make sure I have myself as clear as possible to make sure I am able to face the “big deal.”

In both cases we can tap when something feels like it is “no big deal” to put ourselves in a place to respond to what is going on. It might look something like this:

Right now I am facing something that is causing me some trouble…But it feels like it should be no big deal…Because I’m telling myself it is no big deal…It feels like I shouldn't be giving it any emotional energy…I feel like it is a waste of time and energy to think about…I feel like expending any emotion on it is pointless…There are others who are dealing with so much more than I am…I shouldn't be complaining about my life…By spending time on this I feel like I am stuck in something pointless…I don't want to get into this because it is no big deal…But because I am spending energy and emotion on this…Part of me must think that it is a big deal…If I take time to tap on it…Then I will uncover the part that feels like this is a big deal…I will connect with the part that is worried…By dealing with the part that is worried…I will make it easier to deal with what I am facing…It might turn out to be something small and quickly evaporate…Or I will discover that it is a bigger deal than I thought…Either way I will gain clarity so I can see what is really going on…And that will allow me to work towards a healthier state.

By tapping in this way, you give yourself the opportunity to move to a place where you don't have to keep saying it is “no big deal,” and to deal with where you are honestly.

The Hardest and Most Radical Tapping You Can Do

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photo by Abby

I was working with a client named “Jane”. Jane really knows Emotional Freedom Techniques(EFT)/tapping.  I said to her, “I have a radical suggestion for you. And you don’t need to do it. But it is a thought. I think you need to surrogately tap for both of them!”

Her response was a loooong pause, followed by, “OK, I’m listening. Why would I do that?”

Let me back up a little. Jane had called me because she was feeling frustrated, hurt, and stabbed in the back. It was a business situation where one person was saying bad things about her and another, who is a friend, wasn’t standing up for her and letting the smack talk spread.

Jane was feeling hurt by the person who was saying bad things about her professionally. She was feeling even more hurt by her “friend” who wasn’t standing up for her or letting her know what was being said about her.

Which led to this interaction:

Me: “I have a radical suggestion for you. And you don’t need to do it. But it is a thought. I think you need to surrogately tap for both of them!”

Jane: (pause) “OK, I’m listening. Why would I do that?”

Me: “Because it is the fastest way for you to be free from the emotions of the situation.”

Now, I want to be very clear, sometimes it DOES NOT make sense to take the fastest path. Sometime it makes much more sense for us to take our time with an issue.

There are times when it is healthier for us to heal slowly. Our systems need time for us to work into the issue. I regularly work with clients for whom it would be much too painful to dive head first into an issue. These clients need to work their way gradually into the deep emotional pain they feel.

One of the beauties of EFT/EvEFT is that it allows us to creep up on an issue.

But there are also times when we just want to be free of something, when we’re ready to go right to the core of an issue. In such cases the fastest path can be best.

I have found that when I’m angry at, frustrated by, or hurt by someone else, the fastest path to being free of my emotions is to tap for them and their issues.

This does a couple of things for me.

First, it helps me to get to the root of my emotions. If I’m trying to tap in health and well being for someone I think does NOT deserve those things, I get fully tuned into the negative feelings I have about them.

The internal dialogue will go something like this:

Me: I wonder what they are struggling with right now

Me: Who cares…I want them to get their finger caught in their zipper

Me: I hope for good things in their day

Me: They can go jump in a lake for all I care

Me: Who is being a burden to them today?

Me: No one, because they are too busy being a burden to me to notice anyone else.

Second, by surrogately tapping for them it gives us a chance to look at things from their point of view. Every action the other person takes serves some functional purpose for them.

I WANT TO BE VERY CLEAR: This isn’t to say that their actions are right!

This isn’t saying it is okay that they take the action towards us!

This is not saying they are permitted to take the same action again to us!

This is not saying that they should not take responsibility for their action!

We all must take full responsibility for our actions, but it might help us to reframe the situation.

My goal in life is simply this: To live the truth I know (which is limited, incomplete, and hopefully expanding each day) in every action and choice I make. In doing this I know things are not always going to turn out the way I want. I hope to respond to all outcomes — the ones I want and the ones I don’t — with a sense of grace and love.

Do I do this all of the time? NO!

Do I do this most of the time? Maybe, maybe not.

But that is what I shoot for. The easiest way for me to do this is to accept all people with love. When I tap surrogately for them, that’s what I am doing.

Again, this is not to condone their actions and/or choices, but it gives me the choice to be free, to stop being an emotional prisoner to their choices.

That is the only control I have, at least until I can reframe the situation to the point of recognizing other options exist.

I am not saying you HAVE TO tap for the people who frustrate, hurt, belittle, and take advantage of you.

Also, I am not saying that you need to stop being mad, frustrated, angry, or hurt.

I know from personal experience, it can be a lot of fun to be angry.

Anger, hurt, and frustration can and do serve a purpose. You can choose to emotionally live wherever you like.

What I am saying is that, based on my own experience, the fastest way to be emotionally clear of negative emotions about someone else is to tap for them.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this! Feel free to comment below or drop me a note.

If you are unfamiliar with surrogate tapping check out:

What more info on surrogate tapping:

Reasons That Stop Us From Trying

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Often we are ourselves the biggest obstacle to our success. We hold beliefs that prevent us from trying, that prevent us from recognizing the opportunities we have to move forward. “Brian” was in a situation where he wanted to move forward with his business. He came up with a number of brilliant ideas to move his business ahead, but when push came to shove he wouldn’t take the steps he needed to take to move forward.

When we successfully identify these beliefs, tapping/Emotional Freedom Techniques(EFT) is a perfect tool for melting these beliefs away, allowing us to easily follow through on our inspiration.

Using a few advanced techniques, we had isolated the source of Brian’s resistance. He was afraid because he had accepted the belief, “I have to be perfect at everything.”

This was a really wonderful piece of information. We could easily understand why this was preventing the forward progress. The belief system looked something like this:

  • I have to be perfect at everything
  • When I am not perfect it feels horrible
    • I am not living up to what I should live up to.
    • Others are going to look down on me.
    • I am going to let myself down.
    • I am going to feel foolish when I fail.
  • Therefore, I am only going to try things I know I am going to be perfect at

This belief system served Brian well. It spared him the misery of feeling foolish by avoiding the conditions that required him to be perfect.

The flaw in the system was the first supposition.

We don't have to be perfect at everything.

There are lots of things that we don’t have to be perfect at. So we tapped:

I don’t have to be perfect at everything…there are lots of things that I need to do just well enough at…I don’t have to tie my shoes perfectly…I don’t need to make a sandwich perfectly…I don’t have to make the bed perfectly…there are lots of things in my life that all I need is to do them well enough…this doesn’t mean that I am going to stop striving…this doesn’t mean that I am going to stop striving for excellence…but I am going to keep everything in perspective…I am going to give myself permission to know that I can do some things well enough without having to do them perfectly.

This round of tapping created a greater sense of peace for Brain, but he could still feel some resistance. For some reason it was still a standard he needed to live up to. So we continued the work by going after the definition of perfect.

It is good that I am trying to be perfect…this is rooted in wanting to do my best…this is rooted in wanting to become my best self…but perfect isn’t about getting everything right…perfect is about doing the best that I can…perfect is about living in this moment…perfect is being able to be thankful for this moment…perfect is being able to recognize that in this moment I get to choose who I am…in this moment I get to learn more about myself in the world…perfect is being easy enough with myself that I can know I am going to get another chance…perfect is striving to be my better self…I am always going to be a work in progress…I am never going to do everything perfectly…but I can live this moment as perfect…by striving to be my best…this moment can be perfect because I can learn from the things I am not doing perfectly

This created more peace and relief for Brian. It also created a belief that he could move forward without having to be perfect. As we were doing the tapping described above, Brian remembered his father’s need for perfection from Brian, even when he was a young child. We then tapped to clean up the emotions in those memories.

Lessons from this session:
1) If you don’t know why the feeling is there, ASK!
Brian had no idea what beliefs were preventing him from moving forward. Once we isolated where the belief was located it was a simple matter of asking. The answer was, this kept Brian safe.

When I tune in to a physical feeling, belief, or emotion, and I don’t know why it is present, I ask three questions:

  • What are you afraid of?
  • What are you trying to protect me from?
  • What information are you trying to convey?

This won’t always give us the information we need, but it will lead us in the right direction.

2) It is there to protect us
I feel like a broken record when I repeat this over and over, but it is a point that can’t be missed. Brian’s failure to move forward protected Brian from the pain of not living up to perfection. Once we understood how Brian was being protected, we were able to transform the false belief into more useful thought patterns.

[Note: Are you looking for tools to help you get out of your own way and achieve what your really want? Check this out]

Stages Of Awareness For The Healing Process (with or without Tapping/EFT)

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In real terms, what does it actually look like when I start making changes in my life with Tapping/EFT?

Tapping/Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) can make changes in our lives in very practical ways. It allows us to change the way we respond to the world around us.

EFT is often most useful for aspects of life where we feel like we have the least amount of control. These could be situations where we feel like we are a victim to circumstance or a victim of other’s choices, or where we feel much too emotional.

Often when we are working on issues like these it takes a little time to see major change because of the amount of work that we need to do. As we do EFT we begin to feel ever more in control of our emotions, and it becomes easier for us to make good choices.
After working with numerous clients, I’ve found we move through 6 basic stages from feeling out of control to easily being in control and making the choices that bring us closer to our better selves.

For example, let’s assume “Anne” is trying to deal with feelings that one of her co-workers has it in for her, undermining every choice she makes.

As Anne does work with EFT on this issue she would move through these six steps.

Stage 1 Of Healing and Transformation: Unaware

In this stage we are completely unaware of the way our thoughts affect our emotions and how our emotions affect our choices. We are simply floating along, reacting to events. We don’t feel like we have much control over what’s happening in our lives.

It might look something like this:

  • At work Anne completes a project.
  • A co-worker comments, “I might have done it this way…”
  • Anne feels like her co-worker is attacking her.
  • She spends the rest of the day in a bad mood.
  • In the future she continues to feel resentful toward the co-worker.

Stage 2 Of Healing and Transformation: Aware Well After the Fact

In the second stage we start to understand cause and effect, but it is well after the fact and it’s only with a great deal of self-analysis. Generally in this stage someone must help us see the cause and effect.

It might look something like this:

  • At work Anne completes a project.
  • A co-worker comments, “I might have done it this way…”
  • Anne feels like her co-worker is attacking her.
  • Anne spends the rest of the day in a bad mood.
  • After work Anne has a drink with a friend and she explains how her co-worker attacked her today.
  • Anne’s friend is able to help her see that maybe her co-worker was only trying to help her out by offering another option, not attacking her.
  • Anne realizes that she did overreact.
  • Once she sees what has happened she gets back to a happier mood.

Stage 3 Of Healing and Transformation: Aware Right After the Fact

In the third stage you see how you are reacting to a situation. You still overreact, but shortly after the fact you understand what has happened.

It might look something like this:

  • At work Anne completes a project.
  • A co-worker comments, “I might have done it this way…”
  • Anne feels like her co-worker is attacking her.
  • After Anne gets mad for a moment she realizes her co-worker was just sharing her own experience. Anne might not agree with it, but she understands the spirit in which it was offered.

Stage 4 Of Healing and Transformation: Aware as the emotion is arising

In the fourth stage it feels like the world is starting to slow down a little. We recognize what’s happening as the emotion arises. It is as if we are becoming a third party observer of our own experience. As it happens we will think, “This is what just happened, this is how I have interpreted it, and I am now reacting like this.” We may be quick enough to stop the emotional reaction.

It might look something like this:

  • At work Anne completes a project.
  • A co-worker comments, “I might have done it this way…”
  • Anne feels like her co-worker is attacking her very briefly, but she realizes almost instantly that she’s about to overreact. She hears her co-worker clearly.

Stage 5 Of Healing and Transformation: Aware of the thought which leads to the emotion.

In the fifth stage it feels like the world has slowed down even more. In this stage we recognize the thought before the emotion. Once we recognize the thought, we can see how the thought is flawed. Recognizing that the thought is flawed, we are able to stop the unwanted emotion before it has the chance to arise.

It might look something like this:

  • At work Anne completes a project.
  • A co-worker comments, “I might have done it this way…”
  • Anne realizes three weeks ago if her co-worker had said this she would have felt like she was under attack.

Stage 6 Of Healing and Transformation: No thought

Once you get to stage six, once again you don’t notice anything happening, just as you didn’t notice in stage one. But stage six is very different because the thought and emotional response occurring in stage one simply don’t occur. In stage one you don’t notice anything because you are unaware. In stage six you notice nothing because there is nothing to notice. You no longer feel like you are being attacked in any way, therefore there is nothing to react to.

It might look something like this:

  • At work Anne completes a project.
  • A co-worker comments, “I would have done it like this…”
  • She thinks about their feedback.
  • She might use it. She might not.
  • Anne thanks him for his feedback and moves on with her day.

THE MATRIX
I think a great illustration of this is in the movie The Matrix. For those who didn’t see the movie here is a quick recap of the critical points:

Neo, the main character played by Keanu Reeves, is minding his own business living on the fringe, a very brilliant computer hacker. Through a series of events he is introduced to the idea that the world he perceives is not a real physical world. Instead what he is experiencing is a very realistic-feeling virtual reality experience. It’s nothing more than a giant computer program that is giving him information. He is not simply watching a movie in his mind, but is actively interacting with the program. The program responds to his thought as actions.

Others who understand they are living in a virtual world persuade Neo to help bring down the system. As Neo learns more and more about the virtual reality system his mind is caught in he also learns that he can control more than just his actions, he can also control other elements of the system as well because it’s nothing more than information.

The most famous scene from the movie comes after Neo begins to assert control over elements in the system. One of three bad guys who had been sent to stop Neo fires a handgun at him. With his newly-gained control of the system Neo is able to slow the world enough to dodge the bullets.

At the beginning of the movie Neo is completely unaware of what is going on. Once he chooses to see that there is more at play than he had previously thought and that he might be able have some control, the world changed. At first he understands very little; he’s more overwhelmed than before because he has little control. Because he is unable to process all he’s been taught about the system, he feels like he has less control over his life than he had without this extra knowledge.

But as time passes he gains more knowledge and experience. He starts to understand how the world works and the things he can control. He sees more clearly what is illusion and what is real. As he does this he is able to see the world around him slowing down.

The scene where Neo is dodging bullets is the first time in the movie where he demonstrates a great level of control. This is very similar to stage 4 describe above. He sees the trouble coming but is able to slow it down enough that he’s not hit. In stage 4 we see the emotions arising from the thought, but since we are aware, we stop it from affecting us.

To extend this analogy even more:

  • Stage 1
    • Analogy: We are shot but don’t realize it. We let the wound fester, making us miserable.
    • Real World: We feel we have no control over the world and no control over how we feel. Things happen and we suffer.
  • Stage 2
    • Analogy: The bullet hits us, but we don’t realize it right away. It is only after we realize we have been hit that we seek medical attention.
    • Real World: Something happens, making us feel like we are a victim of circumstances. We just suffer emotionally until we understand what has happened. At this point we stop suffering.
  • Stage 3
    • Analogy: We are hit, but realize it right away. We seek immediate attention.
    • Real World: We react over-emotionally to something, but right away we realize why we are overreacting and are able to find our way back to peace.
  • Stage 4 (As stated above)
    • Analogy: We see the bullet coming and get out of the way.
    • Real World: As something is happening around us our emotions start to rise, but we recognize this right away and are able to deal with it quickly.
  • Stage 5
    • Analogy: We recognize the gunman but get out before a shot can be fired.
    • Real World: We see what’s happening and recognize how it might normally get an emotional charge out of us, but we remain in a state of peace.
  • Stage 6
    • Analogy: The gunman never shows up.
    • Real World: Situations that would have brought emotional charges in the past no longer mean anything to us, so we don’t even notice the situations occurring.

Depending on the severity of the issue, we are going to move through these 6 stages at different rates. In some cases we’ll pass from stage one to stage six in just one round of tapping. In others, where issues have built up over years, like self-esteem issues, it will usually take much more time to move through these six stages.

The primary reason it’s important to understand these stages is that this helps us to understand how we are healing. A number of my clients have been frustrated that after doing so much work, they still haven’t gotten better. They feel they haven’t gotten any better because they still have the same emotional responses. What they don’t always realize is that they now recognize why they are overreacting, and they regain emotional stability much faster. Understanding these stages of healing enables us to see that we are healing.

What is interesting about these stages is we can pass through them at different rates for different issues and different parts of our lives. We can be moving from stage to stage in one part of our life (how we interpret what others say as judgment on us) while in another part of our life we are stuck in stage one, completely unaware of what is going on (why being around people in bad moods rubs off on us and brings us down).

Remember, the healing process is just that, a process. Some issues are going to take more time to heal than others. When we understand the process of this healing, we will identify this healing as it is happening, which will encourage us to continue working towards our goal.