Stop smoking with EFT

Using EFT for addictions

What drives an addiction? Why do so many who give up alcohol, without addressing the underlying causes, develop addictions to other substances such as food, cigarettes or coffee? Gary Craig, founder of EFT says the driver for addictions is anxiety. Anxiety in this context encompasses fears, angers, guilt and shame. When these anxious feelings come up in our awareness, they are too painful to feel and we will do almost anything to quell and soothe them so we don't have to feel them.

Dr Joe Dispenza has very interesting ideas on addiction. Watch the following clip from What The Bleep Do We Know

In his book Healing the Shame that Binds You, John Bradshaw quotes Pia Mellody defining addiction as “any process used to avoid or take away intolerable reality”. He also goes on to say:

"Because it takes away intolerable pain, it becomes our highest priority. It does so much for us that it takes time and energy from the other aspects of our lives. To be shame-based is to be in intolerable pain. You need relief from this intolerable pain. You need something outside of you to take away your terrible feelings about yourself. You need something or someone to take away your inhuman loneliness. You need a mood-altering experience. There are myriad ways to mood-alter. Any way of mood-altering pain is potentially addictive. If it takes away your gnawing discomfort, it will be your highest priority and your most important relationship. Addictions can take many different forms; ingestive, eating, feelings/emotions, thoughts, compulsions and activities".

We can use EFT to dissolve the underlying causes and anxiety that drive our addictions.

Water and mind - How Consciousness effects Water

The movie technique - a tool for being specific with EFT

By Gary Craig, founder of EFT.

In an earlier Tutorial I emphasized the importance of addressing specific events rather than global issues. This can often spell the difference between apparent failure and dramatic success. Even though the concept is easy to understand, some newcomers have difficulty putting it into practice.

Fortunately, there is a tool that greatly simplifies this important task. I call it the "Movie Technique" and it is demonstrated many times in the EFT – Beyond the Basics DVD set (previously called Steps Toward becoming the Ultimate Therapist).

Simply stated, if the client can make a mental movie of the event then it is automatically a specific event. A movie has a specific beginning and a specific end in time. It has a specific plot and specific characters. It has specific words & specific actions and generates specific feelings. In fact, if the client can't make a specific movie of their problem then the problem is too globally stated.

Here's an example. Suppose the client states their problem as,"My father always abused me." This is too global, of course, because that abuse is likely comprised of numerous specific instances (events) of abuse. If you ask the client to make a specific movie of this abuse, YOU FORCE THEM IN THE DIRECTION OF A SPECIFIC EVENT. Once in awhile the client will make a vague generalization of the issue instead of a specific movie. In such cases, you will need to guide them in the proper direction.

To give you some guidelines for stepping through this Movie Technique, I submit the following procedures that I have refined over time.....

• First, ask the client, "If it was a movie, how long would it last?" Typically, they give me an answer that can be measured in minutes. This reflects, of course, a specific event. If they say, "several hours" or"several days," then you can usually assume they are still being too global.
• Next, ask the client, "What would the title be?" This also tends to force specificity. In most cases, they will give you a specific title such as, "Fight in the Kitchen" or "My accident in Mom's car." If they give you a more general title, be sure to check out how specific they are being.
• Next, ask them to run the movie in their mind and evaluate the intensity they are having NOW (as they imagine it) on a scale of 0-10. Alternatively, you can ask them to GUESS what their intensity would be IF they vividly imagined it. I usually find their guesses to be reasonably accurate AND guessing tends to save the clients some emotional pain.
• Next, do several rounds of EFT on "this ____________ movie." At the end of each round check out the 0-10 intensity. Typically, it will come down to low numbers or to zero. You may be done with this specific movie at this stage but continue with the procedures below to thoroughly test the completeness of your work.
• Next, ask them to go through the movie in their mind, starting with a low-intensity segment, BUT STOP WHENEVER THEY FEEL ANY INTENSITY. You will usually need to emphasize the importance of stopping because most clients are conditioned to believe that, in order to be rid of their problem, they must be brave and feel the pain while going through it. This is now ancient thinking. With EFT, these stopping points provide opportunities for tapping.
• Next, use EFT on each stopping point until there is no more intensity on that segment (aspect) of the movie.
• Have them run through the movie in their mind again, beginning to end, tapping on intense aspects as they come up, until the movie no longer has a charge on it.
• Finally, when the intensity seems to be resolved, ask the client to go through the movie one last time, but exaggerate the sights, sounds, colors, etc and really TRY to get upset about it. If they find some more intensity, then keep repeating the steps above until it is gone. When they can no longer get upset, your work is done.

Properly done, this procedure should neatly remove a negative tree from the client's emotional forest. Then you can remove another tree...and then another...and then another...until 5 or 10 of them have been thoroughly uprooted. Since most of these trees have some commonality among them, there is usually a "generalization effect" that spreads throughout the whole forest, thereby toppling the rest of the trees. Thus, the client's problem of "My father always abused me," even though it may have several hundred specific events (trees) contributing to it, is often handled after 5 or 10 specific events have been neutralized.

The importance of being specific when applying EFT

Article by EFT Founder, Gary Craig
This tutorial should be read several times. It is that important.
Why? Because it addresses one of the most common errors made by newcomers to EFT. Once this is corrected, your results will have much greater consistency and many of your "difficult cases" will melt away quite easily. The problem is that most clients tend to see their issues through "global glasses." That is, they describe their issues using broad labels which, to them, seem very specific. Examples might be...

"I just don't feel very good about myself."
"My father always abused me."
"My mother never gave me the love I should have had."
"I don't do very well with relationships."
"I'm easily rejected." 

Each of these...and countless more like them ... are like emotional forests made up of specific trees (negative events) which contribute to the overall problem. Using EFT on the globally stated problem is like trying to chop down an entire forest with one swing of the axe. If you address the global problem in this way, you will probably make some progress each time you swing. However, compared to the enormity of the forest, the progress is not likely to be noticed and thus the client will probably claim "no result"... or ... you might erroneously consider them hopelessly Psychologically Reversed ... or ... you might erroneously conclude that they are beset with energy toxins ... or ... you might give up and think EFT "doesn't work" or ... or ... or.
Instead of using EFT on an issue like, "Even though I'm easily rejected....." it is best to break down the globally stated problem into specific events such as....

"Even though my 3rd grade teacher embarrassed me in front of the class....."
"Even though I felt so left out when my father didn't attend my high school graduation...."
"Even though my high school sweetheart said, 'I've grown tired of you'...."
"Even though I was sent to my room for the whole day on Thanksgiving at age 8...."
"Even though Mom told me 'you'll never get married unless you are thin like your sister'...." 

These are the TRUE CONTRIBUTORS to the "I'm easily rejected" issue. They represent the FOUNDATION of the problem. The feeling of rejection is but the symptom of these underlying specific causes. Stated differently, if we didn't have these specific causes, how could we possibly feel rejection? The answer is 'we couldn't' because there would be no prior experience by which to measure a current "rejection."
So....we need to neutralize these causes by using EFT on individual trees. When we do, several benefits occur....

1. The client can easily recognize whenever EFT has eliminated a negative tree from their forest. They may start with an intensity of 7-10 for a given event and end with an intensity of 0. This is clearly noticeable and thus substantially improves the client's (and your) confidence in the method.
2. Each tree that is removed thins out the forest. This allows the client to walk through the forest with more ease instead of consistently bumping into yet another "rejection tree." The sting of rejection becomes less and less.
3. An important GENERALIZATION EFFECT occurs. The various"rejection trees" tend to have some common themes among them so that removing one tree has an effect on the remaining ones. Often, we can remove 5 or10 trees and then watch the whole forest fall.

I cannot overemphasize the importance of being specific. It often spells the different between dramatic success and apparent failure.

You are powerful

Excerpt from Until Today by Iyanla Vanzant:

"I am willing to acknowledge … I am powerful! I am brilliant! I am the lover of my life! Of course you have power! It is an internal force contained within and moving throughout your entire being. You may not be able to see it, but it is there. Just like the toaster and the television, the only thing you need is to get plugged into your Source. There is a light within you that the world is waiting to see. This light, your light, shines so brightly that it has probably blinded you! Your vision has probably been blurred because of your own disbelief that someone like you could give so much to so many by simply being turned on about who you are and what you do. The light within you, which is powered by an invisible Source, will guide, protect and supply you with everything you need, at all times, under all circumstances.

One of the most self-loving things you can do is to let your power be seen. If you are not sure of what to do and how to do it, love the process of learning how to love and accept yourself more fully, more completely. Love the process of living. Love the ups and downs, the ins and outs. No one is expecting you to get it right the first time around, but if you set the intention to love yourself while you are learning to love, the Source of the light of love within you will give you all the power you need to keep trying until you master the art of loving.

The shift that you must make in order to use your power, to see your light and to secure the key that will open all the doors of life is to move your attention from the outside world to the inside of you. Know how to plug into your power. Learn what it is, how to keep it flowing and, most important, how to use it. Accept and acknowledge your own brilliance. Stop waiting for others to tell you how great you are! Believe it for yourself and about yourself.

Until today, you may have been experiencing darkness caused by a power outage. Just for today, turn on the light of your inner power of love!

Today I am devoted to allowing the power of love that I am to shine brilliantly"

How to listen to your body

How to tap into your intuition