Emotional Freedom Techniques, or EFT (sometimes known as Tapping), is a universal healing tool that can provide impressive results for physical, emotional, and performance issues. EFT operates on the premise that no matter what part of your life needs improvement, there are unresolved emotional issues in the way. Even for physical issues, chronic pain, or diagnosed conditions, it is common knowledge that any kind of emotional stress can impede the natural healing potential of the human body.
In many cases, EFT can be applied directly to physical symptoms for relief without exploring any emotional contributors. However, for the most powerful, longest lasting results with EFT, we do expect to identify and target related emotional issues.
EFT combines the physical benefits of acupuncture with the cognitive benefits of conventional therapy for a much faster, more complete treatment of emotional issues, and the physical and performance issues that often result.
While related to acupuncture, EFT does not use needles. Instead, we use a simple two pronged process wherein we (1) mentally "tune in" to specific issues while (2) stimulating certain meridian points on the body by tapping on them with our fingertips. Properly done, EFT appears to balance disturbances in the meridian system and thus often reduces the conventional therapy procedures from months or years down to minutes or hours. The basic Tapping process is easy to learn, can be done anywhere, and can be used to provide impressive do-it-yourself results. Professionals can obtain further training and apply EFT to their clients at an even higher level. See the Professional Training in Gold Standard EFT website.
In regard to research, EFT's foundation comes from a common sense blend of Acupuncture and Mind-Body Medicine, both of which have decades of scientific studies supporting them. Further, many peer reviewed EFT Tapping studies have been completed and you can find an updated list on the ACEP's Energy Psychology Research web page. You may also wish to read this excellent article summarizing the research on EFT and similar methods written by David Feinstein, PhD.
To us, however, the real proof of EFT's power is not to be found in the laboratory. Rather, the true evidence lies in how well it works in practice. Obviously, the more skillful you become at EFT the better will be your results and the more thorough will be your understanding.
The EFT basics can be learned by anyone just by studying the online tutorial on The Gold Standard for EFT website. While there are many variations available around the world, we as the founders stick to our version, Gold Standard EFT. We suggest that people start with the original and then consider variations from there, but we find that the Gold Standard approach is consistently the most effective.
Getting Started
The tapping points of the EFT Basic Recipe are as follows. The tapping process includes a Setup Statement and some other language that helps the client focus on the problem while re-aligning the energy system. The Gold Standard for EFT tutorial has complete instruction and demo videos on the EFT Basic Recipe page.
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Image courtesy of The Gold Standard for EFT Basic Recipe tutorial
KC: The Karate Chop point (abbreviated KC) is located at the center of the fleshy part of the outside of your hand.
KC: The Karate Chop point (abbreviated KC) is located at the center of the fleshy part of the outside of your hand (either hand) between the top of the wrist and the base of the baby finger or....stated differently....the part of your hand you would use to deliver a karate chop.
TOH: On the top of the head. If you were to draw a line from one ear, over the head, to the other ear, and another line from your nose to the back of your neck, the TOH point is where those two lines would intersect.
EB: At the beginning of the eyebrow, just above and to one side of the nose. This point is abbreviated EB for beginning of the EyeBrow.
SE: On the bone bordering the outside corner of the eye. This point is abbreviated SE for Side of the Eye.
UE: On the bone under an eye about 1 inch below your pupil. This point is abbreviated UE for Under the Eye.
UN: On the small area between the bottom of your nose and the top of your upper lip. This point is abbreviated UN for Under the Nose.
Ch: Midway between the point of your chin and the bottom of your lower lip. Even though it is not directly on the point of the chin, we call it the chin point because it is descriptive enough for people to understand easily. This point is abbreviated Ch for Chin.
CB: The junction where the sternum (breastbone), collarbone and the first rib meet. To locate it, first place your forefinger on the U-shaped notch at the top of the breastbone (about where a man would knot his tie). From the bottom of the U, move your forefinger down toward the navel 1 inch and then go to the left (or right) 1 inch. This point is abbreviated CB for CollarBone even though it is not on the collarbone (or clavicle) per se. It is at the beginning of the collarbone and we call it the collarbone point because that is a lot easier to say than "the junction where the sternum (breastbone), collarbone and the first rib meet."
UA: On the side of the body, at a point even with the nipple (for men) or in the middle of the bra strap (for women). It is about 4 inches below the armpit. This point is abbreviated UA for Under the Arm.
The EFT Basic Recipe is only a small part of professional skills In EFT. For the rest of the instruction, please refer to the tutorial on the The Gold Standard for EFT website.
