May/June 2009 Alternative Health
EFT Tapping: Try It on Everything

by Jill Mangino

Can you tap your way to healing?

In the DVD Try It on Everything: The Revolution Starts Within, 10 participants join Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) practitioners for a retreat that changes their lives forever. From healing grief, chronic back pain, insomnia, addictions and phobias, these profound personal transformations offer evidence of EFT's effectiveness as a revolutionary healing modality.

EFT or tapping is rapidly gaining worldwide recognition as a healing tool that offers tangible results. The healing concepts that it's based upon have been in practice in Eastern medicine for over 5,000 years. Like acupuncture and acupressure, EFT uses ancient Chinese meridian points to relieve emotional distress and physiological pain. It's a powerful, self-administered technique where you stimulate meridian points by tapping on them with your fingertips - literally tapping into your body's own energy and healing power - combined with verbal statements that acknowledge and address the issue.

Here's how a basic EFT sequence works.

Step 1. Identify the problem you want to focus on. It can be general anxiety, or it can be a specific situation or issue that causes you to feel anxious.

Step 2. Consider the problem or situation. How do you feel about it right now? Rate the intensity level of your anxiety, with zero being the lowest level of anxiety and 10 being the highest.

Step 3. Compose your set up statement. Your set up statement should acknowledge the problem you want to deal with, then follow it with an unconditional affirmation of yourself as a person: "Even though I'm anxious about ______, I deeply and completely accept myself."

Step 4. Perform the set up.

With four fingers on one hand, tap the karate chop point on your other hand. The karate chop point is on the outer edge of the hand, on the opposite side from the thumb. Repeat out loud the set up statement three times, while simultaneously tapping the karate chop point. Now take a deep breath.

Get ready to begin tapping all nine energy points. Here are some tips to help you achieve the right technique.

  • You should use a firm but gentle pressure, as if you were drumming on the side of your desk or testing a melon for ripeness.
  • You can use all four fingers, or just the first two (the index and middle fingers). Four fingers are generally used on wider areas, such as on the top of the head, the collarbone and under the arm. On sensitive areas, such as around the eyes, you can use just two fingers.
  • Tap with your fingertips, not your fingernails. The sound will be round and mellow.
  • The tapping order begins at the top and works down. You can end by returning to the top of the head, to complete the loop.

Step 5. Now continue the set up by tapping five to seven times each on the remaining points in the following sequence, starting with the eyebrow. As you tap on each point, repeat a simple reminder phrase, such as "my anxiety." After you complete tapping all nine points, take another deep breath.

  1. Karate chop: The outer edge of the hand, on the opposite side from the thumb.
  2. Eyebrow: The inner edges of the eyebrows, closest to the bridge of the nose. Use two fingers.
  3. Side of eye: The hard area between the eye and the temple. Use two fingers.
  4. Under eye: The hard area under the eye, that merges with the cheekbone. Use two fingers, in line beneath the pupil.
  5. Under nose: The point centered between the bottom of the nose and the upper lip. Use two fingers.
  6. Chin: This point centered between the bottom of the lower lip and the chin.
  7. Collar bone: Tap just below the hard ridge of your collarbone with four fingers.
  8. Under arm: On your side, about four inches beneath the armpit. Use four fingers.
  9. Top of head: The crown, center and top of the head. Tap with all four fingers on both hands.

Step 6. Now that you've completed the sequence, focus on your problem again. How intense is the anxiety now, in comparison to a few minutes ago? Give it a rating on the same number scale.

Step 7. If your anxiety is still higher than a two, you can do another round of tapping. Keep tapping until the anxiety is gone. You can change your set up statement to take into account your efforts to fix the problem, and your desire for continued progress: "Even though I have some remaining anxiety, I deeply and completely accept myself."

Step 8. Now that you've focused on dispelling your immediate anxiety, you can work on installing some positive feelings instead. Use these positive phrases with the same EFT tapping points and sequences described above: "I have faith in my ability to change." "I am joyful about these positive changes." "I am becoming a more relaxed and joyful person."

For more details on tapping, visit www.tryitoneverything.com.