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

Not Sure How To Be Specific – AKA I Don’t know what to say (part 6)

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I know EFT is most effective when I am really specific about what I am tapping on, but I am really having a problem with that because there are so many emotions at once I don’t know where to start. One thought leads to the next that leads to the next. What do I do when I don’t know what to focus on because there is so much going on at once?

Almost every resource on Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT), including mine, will tell you that the fastest way to have success with EFT is to be as specific as possible. But there are times when this is really hard to do. Unfortunately, when we don’t know where to start we are much less likely to do any EFT at all.

Having a whole constellation of emotions all at once is much more common than you would think. It most often happens with my clients when we are starting a session. At the beginning of a session, after the small talk, I generally ask the client, “What would you like to spend our time on today?”

My client will then share what their hope is for the session. Sometimes they will have a whole list of issues. These issues can be related to each other, or they might be just a whole group of issues that have come up since we last talked. Often after talking about what they would like to work on they will be very emotional (because of all the emotion they stirred up as they described their issues) or they will say something like, “…and I have no idea where to begin.”

In these cases I would lead them in a tapping session much like this:

“I would like you to start tapping and close your eyes…take a deep breath…I would like you to tune into all the emotions and issues you just brought up…not in any specific way…but just in a general way…tune into the total constellation of emotions…don’t try in any way to see any specific part…just tune into them all together…you might notice them somewhere in your body…or outside your body…just listen to my words…right now I have lots of emotions all at once…I am not sure where to start with all these emotions…but that’s okay…we have lots of time to deal with them in the order they need to be dealt with…I am thankful for all these emotions…every one of these emotions represents a part of my that is trying to protect me…or a lesson my body wants me to learn…I am thankful that my body is willing to do this for me…to take care of me by having me feel these emotions…but right now what I really want to do is learn these lessons…and let these emotions pass…I thank my body for its healing ability…and the fact that I can let these go right now…right now I see light and energy and healing pouring into this constellation of emotions…there is some other place these emotions are needed in the universe…they are no longer needed here…so any of these emotions that need to go somewhere else can do that now…any of the emotions that want to stick around are now changed into something else that is helpful to me…just feel the constellation of emotion melting away…one more deep breath…and open your eyes. [How to use these tapping phrases]

After we do this, I check in with my client to see what has come to mind and where we need to head next. Typically this has calmed my client down a great deal, enough that they can see much more clearly what they need to be tapping on next.

This might be compared to cleaning a house that hasn’t been lived in for a long time. When you first walk in it’s completely overwhelming because trash and dirt are everywhere. The first step is to get some big plastic bags and just walk through the house grabbing all the big things that are obviously trash. After you do this you can see more clearly what the next step is.

You don’t need to be working with a practitioner to do something like this. The next time you’re struggling to know where to begin your tapping, take a few moments to just tap on the group of emotions. After you do this you will have a little more focus knowing which issues to tune in to first.

The Power of Color

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There are a number of healing traditions that use color as part of the healing process. Is it possible to use these techniques or color in general in combination with EFT?

[This article is by Catherine Poole.  Catherine is a medical intuitive who has spent decades studying and teaching color theory. In this article she explores what each color represents when it comes to healing.  At the end of this article there is a short audio which shows you how to combine color with EFT. Catherine is available for private reading (which can be done in phone sessions) and can be contacted at http://CatherinePoole.com/.
Teleclass with Catherine Poole: Color, Disease and EFT]

Your body knows what colors you need to improve and balance your emotional state. Color is not simply a pleasurable aesthetic experience. Color is energy and our bodies are energy. Color does not solely exist in order to make our world look pretty. Color vibrates, is energy, and it gives us energy and can help with our moods. Color influences each of us physically as well as psychologically and emotionally. Color is associated with specific qualities and certain colors can be used to promote certain abilities.

Every color projects a mood because each color effects certain emotions and certain centers of energy in your body, and also influence certain organs and functions. I taught color theory and human response to color for many years and was a professor at the University of Notre Dame from 1991-2001. I now use my research and knowledge to help clients, doctors and their patients understand color, energy, health and attitude. As a medical intuitive, my work is similar to how a criminal profiler works with police, I help clients understand WHAT their body is communicating and how to listen, understand and heal. Color is a vital factor in the healing process. Color can provide you with energy, healing opportunities and insight into your life.

Red symbolizes raw human emotions therefore sex, drugs and rock & roll! It is unpredictable, intense and can be associated with fear and control. It stimulates the release of adrenaline into the blood stream. Red is associated with all body parts involving solids. Bones, muscles, teeth, and organs dealing with solid waste (large intestine and colon) are all associated with base or red energy.

  • Provides strength, stamina, energy and can indicate one to “stop” and make a choice.
  • Loosens muscles, relieves joint pain
  • Aids in reconditioning paralyzed muscles, great for physical therapy.
  • Helps with circulation
  • Beneficial to people that chill or catch colds easily

Orange influences areas of your body dealing with fluid/water such as kidneys, lymphatic system, blood, even menstrual flow and reproductive areas. Orange also represents emotions and creativity, promotes a happy outlook, so it helps with issues of sadness.

Bring on the orange when:

  • you need to speed things up
  • you need to initiate interest in what is going on around you
  • you need to stop taking yourself too seriously
  • you are afraid to enjoy yourself (sexually)
  • you can't let go of your past (“what if’s” or “if I had only’s”)*

Yellow represents your sense of self. Yellow influences areas of your body that burn energy, such as stomach, pancreas, small intestine and any organs which deal with metabolizing food. Yellow promotes healthy self-image, and supports ego. Yellow stimulates thinking and supports the quest for knowledge.

Bring on the yellow when:

  • there's confusion or indecision
  • there is a tendency to SAD in dull weather
  • dieting
  • there is nervous exhaustion, “burn out” panic attacks‚ – boost a weak, confused immune system

Many associate the color pink or red with love. However, it is actually green which emanates love. Green represents teaching and relationships. Green assists us in relating to our environment, our relationships with ourselves or others, and with our spiritual source. Green influences areas of your body dealing with air, control and nurturing such as lungs, heart and breasts. I do not encourage wearing a lot of green when healing from cancer, blue is more beneficial, although green holds the self-esteem qualities of yellow and the healing qualities of blue, green can promote growth, so use it in balance, but not extensively.

Bring on the green when:

  • you're feeling restricted
  • you need change but fear the unknown
  • there is a need for new ideas
  • you would like to break habits or patterns
  • you need balance

The throat center is your center of communication. Truth, loyalty, honesty are all represented by the color blue. Blue influences areas of your body that address communication, such as the throat, ears and even hands. Blue is calming and healing. I often recommend those healing from breast cancer wear blue bras, but also wear a blue stone or necklace which helps enhance the healing process.

Bring on the blue when:

  • Blue is the OPTIMUM healing color! When healing, wear blue, envision blue.
  • You want to calm agitated, excitable, or chaotic states
  • You want to communicate clearly
  • You are looking for peace, detachment, solitude and rest

Violet is the color of intuition and integration of ideas. It is associated with eyes and your sinuses. It combines the healing, calming qualities of blue and the energy of red, therefore it helps in balancing your life.

Bring on the violet when:

  • You want to speed up natural healing of the body
  • You want to calm hyperactivity or energize lethargy or depression
  • You want to remove obstacles from your life
  • You want to stimulate your imagination in positive ways

Indigo holds more healing qualities of blue, whereas violet has a tendency toward red.

Bring on the indigo when:

  • A need to focus on personal issues, beliefs and ideas
  • A need to cool and quiet normal mental processes
  • A need to relieve physical, mental and emotional pain
  • A need for temporary relief of everyday
  • A need for space and solitude

White is all colors and when added to create pastels, white brings a sense of calming. The addition of white promotes a “higher” quality of the color from which it originates. Pink, for example is nurturing and spiritual because it takes the passion and energy of red and calms it down to the nurturing qualities of pink.

Black is what I refer to as a magnifier. Those trying to intimidate by wearing all black are really communicating they need direction! Black magnifies any adjacent color Black absorbs color and is easily influenced. If you need benefits of a color but do not want to be decked out in red or yellow, wear black and accent with the color you feel you need. Let black do the work for you and take the color healing and color energy to the place on your body that needs it most! This can be done with jewelry, a scarf, a belt or a shirt or sweater.

Accenting with a color can bring in a mood or certain direction into your life. If you are depressed, buy an orange mouse pad or placemats. Drink from a green coffee mug if you do not like who you are at the moment! (“I love me” is a great corresponding affirmation with green.) You can change the entire energy of a room by painting a corresponding stripe on the wall or changing the throw rugs or accent pillows. It does not have to be a complete renovation. But again ask yourself what you need to bring into your life and work with the corresponding color. What was going on in your life when you decided to paint your bedroom?, bought a new shirts? or introduced a new color in your life? You can better understand what is happening and what energy you need by comparing color to what is occurring in their life. Chances are you need the energy of that color to help you heal and move forward.

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Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)

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[Note: Since posting this in 2008 I have written a guide for parents. You can find it here: EFT for ASD]

Anyone who has the opportunity to get to know a family with a child who has been diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) knows how baffling and mysterious ASD can be.

One of my regular clients has a son, “Nathan”, who was diagnosed with ASD. About two years ago I approached Nathan’s father, “Jason”, and share with him that EFT can be very effective for clearing up substance sensitivities. In a number of cases symptoms of children with ASD have radically improved when substance sensitivities had been cleared up.

[“Defeat Autism Now! (DAN)” (a collection of medical doctors, research scientists, and parents) is leading the charge in showing how substance sensitivities can be related to the symptoms of ASD. Their protocol is very thorough, dealing with but not limited to allergies, diet, digestive enzymes, vitamins and minerals, and the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. These areas are taken one at a time. Each child responds differently to each step, but it gives parents and doctors a methodical approach to deal with symptoms.]
With some skepticism Jason agreed to try surrogate tapping for Nathan’s sensitivities. Using surrogate muscle testing I created a protocol of substances to tap for and time frames to tap for each substance (e.g., times a day and number of days). To help reduce Jason’s skepticism I told him, “Even if nothing comes of the tapping, you will be thinking loving thoughts about your son a few times a day.”

Just as a coincidence the day Jason started tapping for Nathan, Nathan was taken to a language lab and tested out having the verbal skills of a 20 month old. He was six at the time. Two weeks later, when the language lab started for the school year, Nathan was asked to leave because his verbal skills tested equal to those of a 5 1/2 year old.

Seemingly overnight Nathan started speaking in complete sentence and using three syllable words. The only change in those two weeks was the surrogate tapping of the parents.

Within three months Nathan’s general practitioner had taken him off all of his behavior medications. Jason reported the GP saying, “I have no idea what you’re doing, but don’t stop.”

Over the last few years Nathan’s parents have been slowly working through the DAN protocol. As part of the process a number of months ago Nathan was tested for and diagnosed with “leaky gut,” a very common condition for children with ASD. In very simple terms, leaky gut involves microscopic holes in the lining of the GI tract. Particles of food slip through these holes, moving directly into the blood stream without being properly processed.

Because of some other medical treatments Nathan was going through, they were not going to start the leaky gut treatment for three months after the diagnosis. I asked Jason if he was willing to do another surrogate tapping experiment. Having seen the obvious successes from clearing up the substance sensitivities, he was excited to try.

I drew Jason a very crude drawing of what the cells in the lining of the GI tract look like and what happens when leaky gut occurs. Each night for a few minutes Jason would tune into Nathan and see the cells moving back together, closing the holes, while tapping.

Three months later when it was time to start the leaky gut treatment Nathan was retested for a base line. In the three months that Jason had been tapping Nathan’s leaky gut had improved dramatically. The doctors were quite surprised.

We are now looking at each of the steps of the DAN protocol to find ways that each of those steps can be surrogately tapped for.

Getting Started

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I know EFT works because it has worked for me before. For some reason I just can’t get myself to sit down and do the tapping I want and need to do. What is my problem, and is there anything I can do about it?


photo by Jon Marshall

I’ve lived this reality myself. I know how powerful Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) is. But there are times that I just can’t do the work I know I need to do. [As a side note, sometimes I then get frustrated with myself for not doing the work I need to do, which makes me feel worse. That is a story for another time.]y for another time.]

Avoidance of tapping is a very common problem. There are a number of very good reasons for this type of resistance.

First, change can be scary. Change implies something different. Different is unknown. Unknown can bring problems we doubt we can handle. Sure there might be problems right now, but we know how to manage these problems. It may not be perfect, but we have tools to deal with it. Even though it feels good to leave these problems behind, it’s hard to move to a place where there might be new problems we can’t manage.

Second, the current situation with its associated emotional baggage is serving us. Every piece (e.g., a fear that protects us from danger or a limiting belief that keeps us from stepping out only to fail). On some level we know this baggage is serving us.

Intellectually we can understand that these are not good reasons to resist doing the EFT work we need to do, but that does not stop there power from preventing us from sitting down to do EFT. For this reason, I love starting an EFT session by tapping away any resistance to change that exists.

It takes only a few minutes. Once I have done this I am ready to go after my issues.

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Getting What We Want (Part 4 of 4) – Taking Inspired Action

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I know that I can use EFT to help me get what I want in my life, but I don’t know how. Do you have any suggestions?

So far we have named what we didn't want, named what we do what, and started to get clear of the emotional blocks that are preventing us from moving forward. There is one final step. We need to take action.

Often when the idea of getting what we want is presented it is oversimplified.

“Just think about what you want and you will get it. It's really that simple.”

But without action nothing happens. I can spend hours thinking and dreaming about the most beautiful amazing sandwich ever made, but if I don’t open my eyes and take some action I will just sit quietly in my living room slowly starving.

It is certainly possible for a great sandwich to arrive with little effort in a way I never dreamed, taste like nothing I have ever had before, and cost me nothing, but usually I need to do something first.

I need to act. This might seem to be the most obvious step, but somehow we often miss this step (or as we talked about in the last step, there are compelling reasons for us not to take this step).

I know how hard it is to take action to get what we want. As we talked about in step three, there can be many penalties for taking action. We could fail, be unsatisfied, or make the situation worse.

These possibilities often make action steps daunting. In step three we named many underlying unspoken fears. If we take the time to apply Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) to these worries, taking action will be much easier because fears have subsided and resistance has melted away.

Now it’s time to consider what type of action you want to take. Not all actions will effectively lead you toward your goal.

We’ve been using the example of job satisfaction in this series of articles. Does this mean that since you’ve cleared your emotional blocks that it’s time to walk into your boss’s office and quit today? Maybe. Maybe not.

There are a number of ways that you can make changes to improve your job situation. Maybe because you have a better sense of what you need from your job and feel more confident to speak up for yourself you can negotiate a change at your current job. You also might be in a situation where you are supporting a family and it would be impractical to quit your job without having a new source for a paycheck.

So how do we know which is the right action to take? To be honest there is no way to “know” with 100% certainty which is the right action to take (at least I haven’t found it so), but there are times where I have felt inspired to take a certain action. This inspiration is not so much about believing the action will lead me to a definite, expected outcome. It’s more a case of feeling it is the right action to make now because it matches my new vision minus the limitations, or blocks, that once existed.

Let me explain.

I believe deep at my core is a still small voice of inspiration. This voice is never quiet. It is constantly speaking the truth of who I am. It sees past all of my worries, fears, and doubts. All of the emotional blocks we cleaned up in step three have no effect on this small voice. As it speaks the truth, it constantly encourages me to move closer and closer to who I am truly meant to be.

When we have all the “noise” of the emotional blocks running through our heads (for example, ”You can’t do that.” “What is your family going to think?” “You are going to fail again.” “You don’t deserve better.”), it’s very difficult to hear the still small voice of inspiration.

Once all the noise is quieted, we are more able to hear this still small voice. Then ideas, thoughts, and inspirations start floating to the forefront of our minds. We begin to see opportunities we didn’t see before, and progress comes easier to us.

I truly believe all of these opportunities and inspiration have always been there, but now we are able to see them.

For many of us it’s difficult to trust the inspiration that bubbles up inside. You might be asking yourself, “How can I tell the difference between some hair-brained scheme that gets me in trouble and true inspiration?”

For me, discerning between the two has been a learned skill. The more I trust my intuition, the more things works out easily, and the more I trust my intuition.

I have also added a tapping routine to being open to true inspiration in my life. It goes something like this:

I know a part of me is guiding me to my higher self…a part of me is only speaking the truth about who I am at my core…who I am in my very nature…I am very happy I have this still small voice guiding me…but there are times it is very hard for me to hear this voice…or to trust this is the part that is leading me forward…any block I have to hearing or trusting this voice…I now name it…thank it for trying to protect me…and let it go…I give myself permission to trust the wisdom that is inside me…as I move through my day I give this still small voice permission to speak up and guide…I know I am in full control and can make any choice I want…I am just looking for guidance…bring the guidance to me in unusual and unexpected ways…because if this happens I will be more likely to recognize where the inspiration is coming from…this will make me more willing to trust this inspiration in the future…I give myself permission to make the hard choices…in big and small ways…to make changes to my life today [How to use these tapping phrases]

When I start my day like this I am more likely to be open to the still small voice guiding me to better things.

Conclusion
It is possible for us to radically change our lives for the better. EFT can be a great tool in achieving these changes. Before we can make changes to our life we need to know how we want to change our lives. Often it is easier to name what we don’t want in our lives than what we do want. Once we have named how we would like to change our lives, it is important to clear out the emotional blocks that are preventing us from making these changes. Even when we have a very clear picture of how we would like our lives to change and have very compelling reasons to make these changes, it can be very hard to make these changes because of these emotional blocks. Finally, as the emotional blocks melt away, it becomes possible for us to take direct action, not just mind action. Because we have cleared out the noise that comes along with emotional blocks, we are able to hear the still voice of inspiration leading us to live as we truly are.