Homework for Functional Yoga Therapy
EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) / Tapping

EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques) or Tapping is a fast and gentle way of discharging emotional distress, traumatic memories and negative thoughts.

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EFT stimulates specific acupressure points by tapping on them with fingertips while focusing on a negative emotion or issue you'd like to change.  This calms the nervous system and discharges whatever happens to be stuck - feelings, beliefs, behaviors and even physical symptoms, often, when nothing else has helped.

Most everyone has experienced a time when they've met someone that just rubs them the wrong way even though this person has been perfectly lovely.  We've all had times when we've overreacted to a certain situation for no apparent reason.  Both of these are examples of the nervous system being triggered, often at the subconscious level, by something in the environment that brings up the feelings of a previous, unpleasant experience.  This person or setting has caused the nervous system to hijack your brain and put it into a defensive mode, activating the fight/flight response or, sometimes, even the freeze response.

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The Limbic Brain (the mammalian brain) which is part of the Amygdala is the part that decides when to go into the Fight/Flight/Freeze response.  This part of the brain developed millions of years before speech so talking, alone, is not an effective way of moving the nervous system into a calmer state.  The take-away is that you cannot talk your way out of trauma.  Tapping brings in the physical/somatic aspect that has a direct and immediate effect of down regulating the Amygdala's reaction to real or imagined threat.

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A good example is of a dog growling at a friend approaching the house and you try to explain (talk) that this is a good person.  Most likely this approach will be ineffective.  If, however, you pat (or tap) the top of the dog's head while explaining, chances are the dog will calm down.  Tapping tells the 'dog brain' that the threat is over.

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In Tapping we use language to trigger the upset (activate an emotional charge) and tapping to down regulate the nervous system.  There are still benefits of tapping without the speaking part but when language is incorporated with tapping more of the brain lights up making the tapping  more powerful.  Research shows that one hour of tapping can change the expression of 72 genes and reduce cortisol (a stress hormone) by 24% (some studies show this to be even higher).  When the nervous system is in a calm, rest, digest state the body is able to do maintenance, repair and heal to bring about an overall healthier person.

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One of the best things about EFT is that it's easy to learn and can be used anytime the need arises.  Try It On Everything", a phrase used often by EFT founder, Gary Craig. Give EFT a try even if you think the problem is impossible. This is because EFT appears to produce benefits for just about everything thrown at it. ​

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